We only had a short visit to Bali, so our only real options were to stay on the ship, spend the day at a beach resort, or take yet another guided tour. We opted for a tour, which, to be fair, was probably more enjoyable than the other two we took on this voyage.
The Queen Elizabeth was unable to dock in Bali. We aren’t sure whether that was because she’s too long, or because there was another cruise ship in port that day that had booked the only dockside slot. (Cruise ships generally book port berths two to three years in advance.) In any event, we were taken to and from the ship by tender (smaller boats) which gave us a rare opportunity to take a photo of the ship at anchor in the open water.
Driving around the island it was clear that Bali has developed rapidly and without much in the way of centralized controls — as evidenced by the mess of wires on these poles, which was fairly typical.
The first stop on our tour was the Pura Luhur Uluwatu or Uluwatu Temple, considered one of the six most important Hindu temples on the Island. While Indonesia as a whole is 87% Muslim, the Island of Bali is about 87% Hindu.
The Temple is located on a cliff, towards the extreme south of the Island.
We were told multiple times that the Temple is overrun by Macaque monkeys, who are notorious for stealing visitor’s belongings. Despite the warnings to stay clear of the monkeys, put non-essentials like earrings away, and keep your hands on anything that could be stolen, one of the women on our tour had her prescription sunglasses snatched. We had a “monkey wrangler” with us, who was able to barter the return of the glasses for some fruit, but they were badly damaged. Of course, the barter system only encourages the monkeys to steal more – knowledge they are apparently happy to pass on to their offspring and newcomers to the area.
Most of the Temple was open to visitors, but the inner temple, behind us in this photograph, was restricted to prayer only.
The monkeys were everywhere in the complex.
This statue provides a partial explanation for why the monkeys are tolerated in the Temple. It depicts a monkey army, led by Hanuman the monkey god, fighting to reclaim Lord Rama’s wife Sita.
It was a warm day, and some of us were happier to be tramping up hills than others!
From Uluwatu we drove north to the Garuda Wisnu Kencana Cultural Park, which is a privately-owned tourist destination completed in 2018. The park is dedicated to the god Wisnu (Vishnu) and his flying bird mount, Garuda, and is filled with statues of Vishnu and related gods.
Development of the park was controversial for many reasons and it has a bit of a twisted history. This statue of Vishnu was originally intended to be part of the main monument, but was ultimately replaced by a larger one which you’ll see a few photos down.
Similarly, this statue of Garuda was also intended to be part of the main monument. The blue dot at the bottom left is Greg, for scale.
This is the final Garuda Wisnu Kencana statue, and unfortunately this is as close to it as we got. The statue itself is 76 metres tall, and with its pedestal the total height is 122 metres. It depicts Vishnu riding Garuda in search of the Amrita, or elixir of life. You might notice that Garuda’s wings seem a bit stubby. They were originally wider, but were cut down due to concerns about wind effects on the structure.
Here’s a smaller statue depicting the same thing (with nicer wings), near the park entrance.
During the tour, our guide told us that there are estimated to be over 14,000 Hindu temples on Bali, not including the private temples you’ll find in almost any Hindu home. This was one of the many roadside temples we passed on our drive from Garuda Wisnu Kencana Cultural Park to our final stop of the day, the Jaansan Beachhouse Restaurant.
The restaurant is right on the water, just south of Bali’s main airport. These are fishing boats; a lovely view for our lunch.
And such a lunch it was. Karen is a big seafood fan and was very happy with the selection: fish, prawns, crab, lobster, some token vegetables, and (hiding under the palm leaf cone), sticky rice. The shellfish was perhaps a bit overcooked, but delicious nonetheless.
From lunch it was back on the bus to the dock. We were a bit late arriving, as were many of the tour buses, so we ended up having to queue quite a while for our tender. But eventually we were taken back to the ship, which then departed for three days at sea en route to Fremantle, Australia.
