Our current hotel, theSunari Villas & Spa Resort, is located directly on the Bali Sea along the road from Bueleng to Seririt. Our room is about 70 meters from the beach. Unfortunately, this is not really suitable for swimming, because there are only boats at anchor or on the dark sand. But we have a fantastically beautiful pool area.
Snorkeling on the coasts of Bali
After a proper breakfast, we used the morning to snorkel in an offshore reef. A local took us out to sea in about 15 minutes with his boat, a dugout canoe. Below the water surface we discovered a very beautiful reef landscape. Around us swam countless fish in all sizes and colors. We saw blue-striped surgeonfish, halterfish, butterflyfish and parrotfish, among others. To attract even more fish, we fed them small pieces of bread. Brave fish even got the food directly from our hand. In such moments, I am always annoyed that I don't have an underwater housing for my camera.
Bali – Pura Meduwe Karang
In the afternoon we drove to the Pura Meduwe Karang Hindu temple in Kubutambahan, 30 minutes away. At the entrance there are 34 stone figures, which represent various motifs, from the god to the pig.
Here we had to learn again "painfully" how the Balinese have learned to rob the tourists. First we had to rent a sarong – a kind of skirt – only to donate our actual change afterwards. The sarong certainly has a religious background (temples can only be entered with covered knees), but when we see locals in the temple walking around with shorts, we don't see how to pay for it.
Then an art guide told us historical things about the temple all the time – without us asking him. At the end came the well-known "lyre" like "I have to buy food" or "have 20 children at home" etc. Something like that always ruins the experience of "temple visiting" for us. And as if it wasn't enough, when we were about to leave, there was also a woman in the car door. We should now also pay parking fees.... Of course, these are not large amounts of money at stake here, but I think that if we played along and paid everything, then there would soon be people on every corner wanting to collect money. Sometimes we also had the feeling that the rip-off artists do not work under state supervision or license.
- overall rating
