After the reports of Filo and Cracker about the Pacung Indah we thought that it would be a great place to stay as a base to drive from. Pacung Indah is on the main road from Denpasar to Singaraja. It is just south of Bedugal or as it is known more as Candikuning. Now both of these guys mentioned the markets there but I just didn't quite picture it as they said it. I suppose I didn't realise the fact that it was on the most main road in Bali, made it a little different than the quiet little village I was thinking.
With talking to Lanny, especially after the bombing, she said that not many people tend to go there as it is full of Muslims. The place did seem different, but that it one thing that I noticed about Bali is that it is so different everywhere. Places have their own uniqueness to them. You might not have realised as yet but I am not a Kuta girl, I don't stay there but will go in to visit/shop or just eat. I'm an explorer I suppose, I like to see something different.
So we left Ubud and headed Norwest as we wove our way to Pacung. It was actually easier than I had envisaged and not very far at all. 3pm we sat down for lunch and at 5pm we were booking into the Pacung Indah. The place advertises that it has 'a view to dine for' and it is absolutely correct. After the Sunset Hill villas, this was back down to more of a basic kind of accommodation. The place was fine and we had a lovely little sitting room with that great view. Sorry to say that the infamous toilet with a view now just looks at a grey wall, but I can understand why because people sitting on that side half wall of the restaurant would have been able to see in!
We decided to take a drive up the hill to Candikuning as we knew that there were night markets. What a great drive that 7kms of windy, ascending road. We like to talk a lot to the locals and try to pick up as many words as we can. I always carry two main things with me, my diary, with the list of places to go/things to do and a pocket Indo/English dictionary and try out and learn new words with anyone that is interested. Well we saw a stall on a cross road and decided to stop. Mmmm local food, we eat fairly carefully but I can normally tell if it's o.k. or not and I was hanging out for this ever since going to the Seminyak night markets. So we stopped and asked for Dua Ote Ote (2 fried vegetable fritters) and Emphat pisang goreng (4 pieces of banana fritters). Yummmm. The only problem is I know that they tend to charge the tourist more and we hoped that asking in Indonesian that they might not charge as much. They were delicious and we payed 3,000rps. So if anyone can tell me that 50c was too much then I thought that they were worth it, but I would be interested to know. We sat up in our hot sitting room with the lovely big window open but there were no flyscreens and bugs and mozzies were coming in for a feed. We were in bed really early as: 1. there wasn't too much to do and 2. for some strange reason we had been waking up really early. Sleep was hard to come by, it was still rather warm and the cooling system, a floor oscillating fan, was a rather noisy.
We had breakfast Aussie style with perfect poached eggs then off to the markets. Half way up the road to Candikuning we stopped at Bartutiti to the markets there. I like really local markets, mostly vegetables, I don't think that I have seen so many cabbages in one place. We videoed around, feeling too touristy but I really wanted to film it. The rices in big baskets, all sorts of colours, red, black, creamy white, brown and really white. The Red rice was about 4,000rps/kilo, well that was touristy price, but very good. I looked up and saw Jen standing behind a lady and tapping her head, Jen's that is not the lady's, I had already noticed and tried not to make it obvious that I was filming her. She had a cabbage leaf on her head as a hat! Now I love to get photo's that have a feeling for the place, especially people when they don't know it. It just captures something of the place.
Well we moved on to the Candikuning markets. This was good but loads of foreigners bus into the place and the people there are tourist-wise. One seller was getting really rude to me when I was talking with someone about glasses. I was in my car and had already said that I didn't want any, but he came along and had to but in, when I started mentioning prices, when he had asked me what I had already paid, he started to call me a liar. Now there is one thing I hate and that is to be called a liar, especially when I don't. I told him that I knew that he wasn't from there and not to give the poor honest sellers a bad name to tourists. We saw some lovely plants in a nursery there. Such lovely orchids. The funny thing was that they kept asking us to buy things. It was a shame that we couldn't.
We continued on to the Handara Kosaido Country Club. The Japanese golf course there that charges about US$100 for a round of golf. We continued around the rim of an extinct volcano crater with beautiful views of lakes Buyan and Tamblingan. It had such a lovely country road feel about it. It was just so beautiful. Something funny happened as we were going up to the drive around the crater top, we continued on the road to Singaraja as we weren't sure where we wanted to go. It's that nose thing again. Well on the side of the road, we saw quite a large group of monkeys. As we turned around to venture down the cater top road, we stopped on the side of the road with camera's in hand. Now I have heard quite a few stories about these monkeys and how they can be quite vicious, but to see these adorable creatures on the side of the road, we just had to stop. I didn't hop out of the car but I started to put my window, quite cautiously down to see one that was sitting on top of the railing on the side of the road. As it was going down, this thing just started to hiss at me. I wanted to take a photo but not through the dirty glass. As it hissed, that window went up so quick, Jenny just laughed, all right for her, she was sitting on the other side of the car with it still running and able at any time to flatten her foot on the accelerator. I tried again, and again it hissed. 'O.k! Fine! I'll take your photo through the dirty window!' And off we went. So much for the 'cute' monkey!
As we continued, we thought that we would go and take a look at Munduk falls. Another steep windy decline from the crater and saw the sign for the falls. We went to park on the side of the road where a little car park was made, there was noway known that you could park anywhere else. Of course, there was a woman there with a little stall selling drinks and things. She asked for 2,000 rps to park and asked if we wanted to buy a drink. We had our own water bottles, but Jenny said maybe when we get back. Now those of you who know Balinese, you know that you never say that. I just looked at her with that 'you shouldn't have said that, you'll be sorry', kind of look. So off the track we went. Now we like to say g'day to all and sundry and we saw a group of people coming up so I said 'hi' and 'how far is it' and 'is it worth it'. Well I got nothing. Then as they walked by, there were talking amongst themselves. What language, who knows but it wasn't English. And here I thought that they were English speaking! You just can't pick them sometimes. Of course, half way there, there was a little booth that you had to pay 3,000rp ea. Of course we didn't know that, I said to Jen, 'how smart is that. It's not as though you would turn around and go back. I suppose, I am used to our national parks in the South West of Western Australia. You don't have to pay to walk off the side of a road to see a waterfall. We got there and we were right, it was a waterfall! Quite high and thundering down, not exactly Niagara Falls. But still pretty. I wouldn't travel especially to see it, but since we were in the neighbourhood....
Back to Bedugal and to Lake Bratan. Again they want you to pay to park and pay for entrance. We saw some more non English speaking aussies and joined the group. I actually only wanted to take a quick squiz as I found my way to the toilets. The gardens were amazingly kept. There was a temple there and inside, instead of being all paved like normal, this was all manicured lawns. Hmmm. A lovely place for a picnic. There was a kiddies playground and you could hire boats to go on the lake.
Next stop was the botanical gardens. We had taken a quick look the night before. It cost either 6,000rps per car or 3,500rps each I had read reports that it wasn't well maintained. We actually found it well manicured. You definitely need a car to see it all. We had mentioned to someone about going there and the girl responded that that is where you go with your boyfriend on Sunday. I was actually quite taken back, as I always am by their honesty, but I didn't really think of a Balinese girl saying something like that, but I suppose courting is courting the world over.
We went back to the Pacung Indah and got ready for tea. The one downfall about this place is you either eat there or across the road to the other hotel. I suppose I get spoilt in Bali by the choice of venue, so I don't really like it if I can't choose. There was one fellow working there that tended to make me a little uncomfortable, he always seemed to be there and he would just stand over our shoulders but not say anything. It was a little hard to have one of those relaxed conversations with him. I hate to say it but dinner was very disappointing, not what I was expecting at all, when I questioned what was on my plate, he just told me what they were out of. It would have been nice to have been told that when I ordered, then I would have chosen something else. I mentioned it to our hoverer but didn't get any satisfaction so we got up to leave as politely as we could ASAP. I probably should have refused to pay for it, but I hate doing that, and if the place was full, I would have done, but there was only three other people there and I know that those working there still needed to get paid.
Up for breakfast, continental, and they forgot our cereal. Now I know it might sound petty, but when you are the only ones there and your having continental breakfast, how do you forget the cereal? The response wasn't a very happy one, in fact the woman was quite rude and asked Jen straight up when we were leaving, then annoyed when I asked about my cereal. They were all in casual clothes for some reason and that same guy was there again. Does he ever not work? Again he would just stand and stare at us. It was really unnerving. He looked very pleased to tell me that he would give me 20% discount for the dinner that I didn't eat. Things like that just put a bit of a dampener on a place for me especially when you go to walk back to your room and the rubbish is being collected an taken up the same pathway and just spilling everywhere, and stink? I haven't smelt anything so bad. As we carried out luggage (as I didn't want to wheel it through the muck) back to our car, we had to again walk through it. I nearly threw up. The guy carrying it had it dripping all over him. I thought, thank God your not my husband, I get cranky at him when he comes into my house with work boots on. I know that looking at individual things they probably weren't such big issues but they were just adding on. Maybe not sleeping to well, the hanging on annoyance of all that had happened previously, I don't know, but sad to say, we were looking forward to our next stop.