1. Surfing
Not gonna lie...I was a bit nervous about surfing since I heard it was so hard. But...we all killed it! Got up on my first try and we had SO much fun! Pretty sure it'll be harder in the freezing rough water in SF, but I'm willing to try :)
2. Hiking a Freaking Volcano at Sunrise
Yeah...awesome! We got up at 1:30am to head to the volcano...that part sucked, but the rest was amazing. So we all got mini flashlights and hiked 2 hrs in the dark to the top of the volcano. We got there just in time to see the sunrise - it was beautiful! The one thing we were all surprised about was how freaking cold it was at the top...we totally froze.
Also, one of the reasons they do sunrise hikes is because people would never actually go to the top if they realized how steep it was. It was pretty intense! This is us trying not to die on the way down - it was all volcanic sand and was quite loose...
After the hike, we stopped at a beautiful hot springs hotel and hung out in the pool. It was a pretty amazing day :)
3. Bike tour of Ubud & Rice Fields
We took a day bike tour of Ubud, which was amazing! We stopped at an amazing viewpoint then went to a coffee making area that does Luwak coffee,
which I call shit coffee since it requires a "Catfox animal" to eat the coffee beans and shit them out. Yeah, and it's the world's most expensive coffee. I'm not a big fan of black coffee, but I will say that it was the best black coffee I've ever had. I love shit coffee!Next up was biking in the countryside to see local homes or compounds as they call them. It was really cool to see - life is so different on the compound! Outside of the entrance is a cock - or a fighting rooster that the husband spends hours massaging every day... Cock fighting is huge in Indonesia. There are multiple families living there, they all share a kitchen and never leave their family compound. They also have compound cows and pigs, which are prized possessions in the back.
Then it was off to the rice fields to see how they process rice. We got to see the end of the harvest, which was really cool. On the way to lunch, we stopped at a massive banyan tree, which Tiff and I attempted to climb :)
On the way to lunch, we had 2 options: 1) bike uphill for 45 minutes to lunch or 2) get a ride to lunch. I thought it was a great opportunity for a workout since I hadn't been able to work out in India for a few months. Uhhh...yeah, almost died. The guide said it "wasn't a bad ride", which is total bullshit. It was hard - not a good first workout!
4. Cooking Class
We learned some mad skills for cooking Indonesian food and I have to say - it was the best Indonesian food we had in Bali! And I didn't even blow anything up!
5. Dolphin Watching
Another early morning - we got on the boat at 6am to go watch the dolphins. It was pretty amazing to see so many dolphins out there and the scenery wasn't too bad :)
6. Monkey Forest
Yup, the name describes it. It's a huge forest with thousands of monkeys just roaming the area freely. And they're quite smart and aggressive - one chased Traci to get her water bottle and was jumping all over her! Overall - a little freaky, but pretty awesome.
