Finding Ubud again

It's been four years since we’ve been in Bali. With all the challenges we’ve had making travel plans in Australia over those years: fires, border closures, floods, Covid outbreaks etc, it was quite stressful preparing for this our first OS adventure in quite a long time.

We flew out of Melbourne on Monday night and arrived in Denpasar, bang on time at 10.00pm Bali time with no hold ups, no baggage lost and a super efficient reception at Ngurah Rai Airport. We were out of the airport in 30 minutes after touchdown and in Ubud less than an hour later. We thought our whole Qantas flight experience was excellent (unlike most other peoples’ reviews of its performance over the past year and a half), a wonderful start to a holiday we’ve been looking forward to (but oddly stressed about it some ways too).

This was the view from the balcony of our room 303 at the Cendana Resort (and Spa) on the first morning we were in Ubud.

We had a big warm, genuine welcome from the staff at breakfast. They remembered us from previous visits and seemed so happy we’d returned. They remembered J & J and the girls too. No wonder this place keeps calling us back!

This is breakfast with the best view ever! …...

….. including the morning offering ceremony to bring a peaceful, mindful blessing to the start of a beautiful day in Ubud.

We spent most of the morning walking the busy nearby streets of Ubud trying to get our bearings in amongst all the changes that have happened over the past four challenging years in Bali. We were thankful to find some things the same: Café Wayan, Cinta Grill, Ibu Rai, Casa Luna, the Laughing Buddha, Tutmak, the Pondok Library, but Sri Bungalows has new owners and a new name. So many of the little shops and cafes have disappeared and new ones built in their place – and usually more glitzy and “contemporary” than the older versions. There's even a fancy new Starbucks on Monkey Forest Road now! But Cafe Wayan and Cinta Grill are old faves that are still here and still going strong .....

 

The traffic is as wild as ever and horror upon horrors the central football field is now a dusty carpark!! This really upset me as that football field had a real sense of community, being the only open green space in town and a visual reminder that locals (especially the young locals) were an important part of Ubud life. Big community events (ie Independence Day celebrations etc were staged on the field too…. Now it's just a dustbowl full of cars and scooters!!!

Jalan Raya Ubud was more crowded than I’ve ever seen and I was a bit shocked to see the open air community centre is now closed off to the public and the beautiful adjacent Water Palace (Pura Taman Kemuda Saraswati) at the back of the iconic Lotus Café (still there) now charges an entry fee!!

The central Ubud Art Market is unrecognizable now in its freshly minted (newly built) condition – all white tiles and neat rows of little shops but I have heard that what's on offer hasn’t changed much at all from the old days.

Ubud is fighting the good fight however and trying to keep the old ways around hiring drivers. It might be swimming against a very strong tide I am afraid - but hopefully it will work.

Monkey Forest Road up near the Art Market end.....

And across the road from the primary school at school pick up time .....

Me walking along Jalan Dewi Sitra (and noting the closure of the beautiful Locavore Restaurant and other changes - sigh!) ......

Everywhere there were crowds of tourists and so much to buy buy buy – it's like everyone in Ubud is in a frenzy to make up for lost time. We were so relieved to stop for a sanity break at our all time fave 3 Monkeys Café – still as refined and aesthetically beautiful as it ever was. We thought our amazing drinks and fresh Vietnamese spring rolls lunchtime snack were very restorative.

Our hotel is very much unchanged: same beautiful setting and perfect location in central Ubud, carefully tended gardens, same wonderful caring friendly staff, same outdated rooms and furniture but now with much better WiFi, very good quality bedding and tea making in every room now!

The entrance to Cendana has unfortunately been really compromised by the demise of the glamorous Lamak Restaurant. The architecture and gardens opening up to this laneway really provided a lovely entry way to the hotel. Lamak has just been abandoned and four years in the tropics, open to the elements, does a lot of damage. There's now an ugly big metal fence, all askew, to hide the mess that is the old Lamak. The new entry to Cendana takes a bit of getting used to - sigh!

The hotel's smaller pool is being renovated, ready for the Christmas holiday period.

The view from the back of our unit to the empty block next door.......this land used to be kept cleared and there'd often be cows and ducks etc roaming here...

But there's no denying the fact the hotel is still a lovely little old style Bali haven in the centre of this busy town......

And Cafe Wayan was as lovely as ever for our dinner stop last night: Massaman curry for Rob, Nasi Campur for me (of course).

The answer is no

Despite the best efforts and modest request for change by Australia's Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples, the majority of Australia's non-Indigenous population voted NO in the Voice Referendum yesterday.

Rob and I were very engaged with the Voice campaign so both of us are feeling sad today about the outcome and also very concerned about how our Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander brothers and sisters are feeling about this rejection of their modest request. 

Our only comfort is that Canberra voted overwhelmingly YES - the only jurisdiction in Australia that did..... and I would predict that our local Ainslie booth would have voted YES in even greater numbers. We feel lucky to live in such a kind, positive, outward looking and well-educated community, unlike many other parts of Australia.

Other than this sadness and our worries about this week's events in the Middle East we've had a good week with some quality time with Abi. We spent last Sunday morning out at Redlands with her. We are both in awe at the way she handles Ringo, the 16.2 gelding, full of hard excitable muscle and a low tolerance for the tie up space and tack up time! But Abi doesn't take any shit from Ringo - ever!

Once he's saddled up and in the arena Ringo is more amenable. I know I'm biased, but Abi and Ringo definitely look the most stylish and well-coordinated pairing in the arena!

Abi's former pony Harry is currently without a rider so Abi has taken on the extra duty of keeping him exercised on her regular visits to Redland. She gave us a demonstration of her lunging skills last Sunday. It's very technical and she is seriously good at it (of course!).

As an added bonus we had a few hours after school with Abi during the week - afternoon tea at a cafe and time for a good uninterrupted chat - just priceless.

we've had two more restaurant outings over the past week or so too - more birthday festival celebrations!! and I am still having fun on the sewing machine.... still on my campaign to have a more sustainable wardrobe.

Birthday Festival

My birthday is always around a long weekend holiday - lucky me! This year we decided to celebrate in style with a Coogee stay in the company of the young ones ........ how good is that?

Ella came up with Rob and me on Friday, in time for lunch at our fave Coogee Bay Hotel before the rest of the family joined us late in the day.

 

We had some time on the beach after lunch ..........

....... and time for a browse in the surf shops lining Coogee Bay Road.

This year my birthday coincided with a Super Moon. I got this shot on Friday evening through our dirty sash windows facing Carrington Road and was lucky enough to get a moon reflection as well as the real one rising in the eastern sky.

Saturday night we all made our way into the Rocks, very excited about the prospect of dinner at Sake, the contemporary Japanese restaurant on Argyle Street. We all love Japanese food!

None of us follow League or AFL so it was a bit of a shock for us to find we'd picked double Grand Final weekend in Sydney for my birthday celebration. So it was hard to find a venue/space at the Rocks to enjoy a quiet, classy drink together before dinner in amongst the cheers and shouts of the AFL followers enjoying the game. 

in the end we were thrilled to find the tiny, but quiet, rooftop bar at the old heritage Australian Hotel on Cumberland Street to get our celebration started!! 

I don't think we stopped laughing the whole time we were together this night (except for when we were eating (and drinking))!! 

I think Abi took the prize for enjoying the food the most at the sublime Sake - but it was a close race!!

What a wonderful night of refined, layered flavours and quality, fresh seafood - enjoyed with my very favourite people!

Yesterday was clear, sunny, very hot and very crowded here in Coogee. We estimated there might have been around 10,000 people on the beach .... but we managed to find a postage size area to park ourselves for a few hours while the girls and Joshy enjoyed the surf.

Somehow Joshy managed to get us the very best table at the Coogee Bay Hotel Marra Restaurant for lunch - while the rest of Sydney was roaring and swigging on in the beer garden getting primed in readiness for the NRL Grand Final later in the afternoon.

Young Ollie joined us for a late lunch too, having made the rail trip up from Wollongong for the occasion. He was immediately at home with the family vibe, but introducing a few new lines of conversation and laughter with his stories of Uni life (including a stark shortage of red meat of the steak variety).

The best dessert on a 34oC day at Coogee Beach (even worth the queue) ..........

Then a nice time of the day at the rock pool at the base of Coogee's Northern Headland - Giles Bath.

We had a slap-up breakfast together this morning at the Crowne Plaza Hotel before the young ones set out back for Canberra after our three days of fun.

Rob and I are here for a few more days, but it seems so much quieter and so much more ordinary without the company of the young ones ....... but we are focussing on how lucky we are to have had such a wonderful time together this birthday weekend, with so much laughter and wonderful memories to hold dear!