The Johnsons' Journal

Its been two years now since we left our jobs in California, got married and moved to Australia.  To celebrate (well mainly our 2^nd wedding anniversary), we headed of to the island of Bali in Indonesia for a small holiday break.

We arrived in Bali on the evening of Scott’s birthday, October 8^th, and while we were both exhausted from the long flight and 1 hour and 20 minute drive on the busy streets of Bali to the small town of Ubud, we were welcomed to our first hotel with a cake and birthday song for Scott.  And he was very surprised!

Our first day in Ubud, we woke to the sounds of the jungle from our balcony.  We spent most of the day enjoying the Balinese gardens, ponds, and lounging around the pool at the hotel.  We also enjoying the complementary afternoon tea (something that I grew to look forward to each day).

The following day we were feeling recovered and decided to hire a driver to show us some of the local sights.  Our driver, Jiwa took us to two temples, Tirta Empul, the sacred water temple and Pura Gunung Kawi, one of the most important temples in Bali.

We were also able the visit a local coffee plantation where they produce Bali coffee and Luwak coffee, which is said to be the most expensive coffee in the world.  This is due to the small productions and since it has to be eaten and digested by an animal called a Luwak, which is a cat like animal, before roasting.

We enjoyed many cups of Bali coffee.  But were not adventurous enough to try to Luwak coffee.  (I’ve always been told that cats are one of the most dirty animals and even though these animals are not cats, the comparison has put me off the coffee for good.)

The last stop was the Monkey Forest in Ubud, famous for the resident monkeys that you can feed with bananas.