Bye bye Bali! After Friday's aquadream snorkelling adventure, I took a shuttle bus to Sanur so I could be close to the airport for my 6:20 AM departure to Singapore. Stayed at Bintang Bungalows - at $20, it was the cheapest place I could find with a swimming pool although it didn't have hot water. Sat on the beach in the afternoon under the shade of some trees and put my headphones on so I could "politely" ignore the beach vendors without having to engage in co...

A loooooong, winding, 3 hour taxi ride north of Ubud is the relatively small and peaceful town of Lovina. I ended up staying at a small, run-down beach hotel called Bali Grand Sunset Beach Hotel. Don't know about grand, but it was certainly a great spot to swim in the clear sea and watch the sunset into the mercurial water. The sound of the waves lapping on the Bali-coffee-coloured-lava sand was marred only by the persistent beach vendors interrupting the peace ...

Was supposed to go on an Eco-cycling trip in the countryside but ended up staying in town on my final day in Ubud. Glad I took the day off to relax and talk and just sit still for a little while. Met up with Julia and Ben and walked around the magical Monkey Forest where hundreds of wild monkeys hang out and terrorise the tourist who are foolish enough to bring bananas into the forest. Watching the monkeys squabbling and playing was like observing a microcosm of...

My first full day in Ubud and I'd arranged to do a Balinese cooking course at Paon Bali Cooking Class (recipe for fusion Gado Gado salad below). The day started quite early with an 8:30AM visit to the Central Market in Ubud. We were shown the different local fruit and vegetables - many of which were already familiar from the various market visits I have been on in the previous cooking classes in Cambodia and Vietnam. I tried mangosteens for the first time - dee...

Even before the plane took off, I knew I'd made the right decision to come to Bali! I was standing in the queue for the Air Asia flight and overheard an American woman mention that 1 million people passed through the Suria shopping centre at KLCC on the weekend - she added, "That's more than the population of Hawaii!". So, I was curious and asked her whether she lives in Hawaii (which she does) and whether she knows a friend of mine, Maria, who also lives there a...