On the way to Munduk Waterfall, once you’ve passed the village entrance gate, on the left side of the road, stop by for a breathtaking view of two lakes sisters who are peacefully located side by side (where else you can see two lakes at the same time right in front of you – please tell me if you found one somewhere in the world!). The stop over point is located across a coffee shop serving original Bali coffee planted in the area!

It’s an outdoor sitting are with wooden benches and parasol to be used during the day, but when I got there with Bart, it was (not surprisingly) raining with often fog blanketing the lakes view, the benches were all wet, it was a bit disappointing, but not so long, before a van full of Indian tourists came invading the place, the sunshine decided to warm up this beautiful place again at Munduk Village with a beautiful bird eye view overlooking green tropical rain forest and…The Sister Lakes : Danau Tamblingan and Danau Buyan. ‘Danau’ in indonesian means Lake. And I can see clearly this beauty of Singaraja Regency from the hill land.

WHAT TO DO :
Just sit down, enjoy the spectacular view, take a snap shots with your loved one(s), sip a hot Bali Coffee or tea, enjoy the banana frites covered with honey drops..

HOW TO GET TO THIS STOP POINT :
From Bedugul main road, heading towards Singaraja, turn sharp left to Munduk Village direction, follow the mountain roads, you will reach at this wooden deck with chairs and umbrella on the side road. No entrance fee nor obligation to order any drinks, but across this place, is a restaurant where you could just order your food and drinks. Try the Bali Coffee!

Note : Munduk Village is located on a hill land and has mountain weather, most chances are : Rain. Bring your rain coat or umbrella…ella…e.e..!

It’s been a TOO hot sunny day in the south of Bali lately,38-39 C, who can survive the day! That makes me want to go to north of Bali again, as the weather is much cooler here. Love the mountain roads, love the serenity staring down at these two magnificent lakes..It’s another privilege moment for me living in Bali..

An ideal and strongly suggest itinerary for a day trip to Bedugul & Singaraja area would be :
- Bedugul (Visit Ulun Danu Temple, Botanical Garden)
- Munduk Waterfall
- Munduk Village, to stop by an open air sitting area overlooking 2 magnificent lakes of Tamblingan and Buyan, next to each other, side by side
- On the way back to Bedugul, a MUST visit to : Bedugul Market and watch an array of ‘warung’/stall displaying fresh colorful fruits and vegetable, harvested from Bedugul land (will share this on my bi-lingual culinary blog www.wisatakulinerbali.com soon!)

Related post :
- A day trip to North of Bali (Part 1) – MUNDUK WATERFALL
- A day trip to North of Bali (Part 2) – BEDUGUL

]]> http://www.beeamazing.com/a-day-trip-to-north-of-bali-lake-tamblingan-lake-buyan-the-sister-lakes/feed/ 2 http://www.beeamazing.com/a-day-trip-to-north-of-bali-part-2-bedugul/ http://www.beeamazing.com/a-day-trip-to-north-of-bali-part-2-bedugul/#comments Tue, 17 Aug 2010 12:11:23 +0000 Bee http://www.beeamazing.com/?p=995 - There are still many places in Bali I have not yet discovered and explored despite the fact that I’ve been living here for about 9,5 years.This is a serial of 3 blog posts of A Day trip to North of Bali (trilogy!). Written NOT in an order of where to visit first, although for your easy guide, I will give an itinerary that most people usually does. Enjoy! -

Three places to visit when you go to Bedugul : Ulun Danu Temple on Lake Beratan – Bedugul Botanical Garden - Bedugul Fruit & Vegetable Market. The last one will be featured on my Bali culinary blog soon! Stay tune! Most people will visit Bedugul first before they explore other area on the north of Bali. But as I pointed out on my previous blog post of Munduk Waterfall, be free on deciding your itinerary. I visited Munduk Village on one rainy day without going to Bedugul first.

ULUN DANU TEMPLE – BEDUGUL
Bedugul is a mountain lake resort area in Bali, located in the centre-north region of the island near Lake Bratan on the road between Singaraja and Denpasar. Bedugul is located at 48 kilometres north of the city of Denpasar, about 2,5 hours driving from Ngurah Rai International Airport (I could make it faster with Bart as the speedy gonzales driver:p). Other nearby lakes are Lake Buyan, and Lake Tamblingan. Bedugul enjoys a mild mountain weather due to its location at an altitude of about 1,500 metres (4,900 ft) above the sea level.

Major sites in Bedugul are the Pura Ulun Danu water temple and the Bedugul Botanical Gardens. (source : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bedugul). Ulun Danu Temple is a Balinese Hindu Temple set in the lakeside of Beratan and as an icon of the tourist destination in Bali. But for me it is like a floating temple on a lake – Beratan Lake! There is this constant fog layering the atmosphere when you enter the lake area..so mysterious. To get to the temple you really have to watch for the park announcement updating the situation in allowing you to go ahead crossing the lake or not.

I found this cool wooden deck and just had to stop for a quick pose before continuing exploring the temple and the lake area then move to Botanical Garden which is located only 10 minutes from Bedugul mountain lake resort.

EKA KARYA BALI BOTANIC GARDEN - BEDUGUL
The Botanical Garden, opened in 1959 under the name Eka Karya. With a total area of 157.5 Ha and is the largest in Indonesia. Some of the specialist collections include: orchids, ceremonial plants, medicinal plants, cactus, ferns, aquatic plants and trees. It is a place for recreation as well as for scientific, cultural and technical activities purposes. You will be amazed with  the tropical rainforest plants and birdlife here and more than 2000 species of plants preserved at Bali Botanic Garden, represent plants from the eastern  part of Indonesia: Bali, Nusa Tenggara, Sulawesi, Maluku and Papua.

The Garden opened for whole year seven days a week, except on Nyepi Day Most of area will open from 08.00 AM – 06.00 PM, however some glasshouses such as orchids, cactus and Begonia may be closed earlier at 04.00 PM  (source : http://kebunrayabali.com ).

Park Admission
Individual :IDR 7,000
Motorbike parking : IDR 3,000
Car parking : IDR 6,000
Bus parking : IDR 12,000
Car is allowed to drive around the garden with additional fee : IDR 12,000

Other fun activity for children & adults :
- Get your picnic gears and food! The Lake side is the most favorite spot.
- Bali Tree Top Adventure – 5 Adventure Circuits from one tree to another with height range between 2-20 meters.65 challenges for all level and ages : Suspended bridges, Spider Nets, Tarzan Jumps, Flying-Fox, Flying Swings, and many more  fun challenges. Visit : http://balitreetop.com
- Visit Orchid & Cactus houses

This place is also used for Group retreat activity and even fashion photo shoots! I remember back in the days of my office job working for Bali’s finest event company, Balistarz who also doing a photo production service, we organised a photoshoot with Western model from Singapore and Italian photographer , shooting a new collection of Bali based brilliant dream dresses fashion brand : Dinda Rella. Bedugul is stunning!

An ideal and strongly suggest itinerary for a day trip to Bedugul & Singaraja area would be :
- Bedugul (Visit Ulun Danu Temple, Botanical Garden)
- Munduk Waterfall
- Munduk Village, to stop by an open air sitting area overlooking 2 magnificent lakes of Tamblingan and Buyan, next to each other, side by side.
- On the way back to Bedugul, a MUST visit to : Bedugul Market and watch an array of ‘warung’/stall displaying fresh colorful fruits and vegetable, harvested from Bedugul land.

Related post :
- A day trip to North of Bali – MUNDUK WATERFALL
- NYEPI DAY – Like & Dislike

If you are going up to North of Bali, to the highland village of Bedugul, that is famous with its Botanical Parc (Kebun Raya Bedugul) and Ulun Danu Temple on Beratan Lake, your journey can continue up to Buleleng, to the splash spot of the area : Munduk Waterfall. This is not only a visit to a beautiful waterfall place in Bali, but also a short hiking deep into the rain tropical forest of Munduk Village. Very recommended for Bali visitors after 4 or 5 days with skin tanning beach days and Seminyak night life, you should definitely schedule a day trip to Singaraja area.

Munduk is a quite village much different from  the south of Bali area situated at 1,500 meters above sea level, at the Northen part of Bali, Buleleng. That’s 2 hours drive from Denpasar. After passing Ulun Danu Temple in Bedugul, turn left at Wanagiri Village, Munduk is about 5 km downhill from here. A special small parking lot next to a small ‘warung’ is available right on the steep hill road of Munduk village. Be careful when you cross the road as cars and motorbike are speeding up as they enter to an extreme up hill and down hill road at the same time, from 2 ways. Waiting for you crossing the road (slowwwly…) is almost impossible at that speed level.

The path way as you enter Munduk rain forest is a mix between natural trail road and paved way. You will have occasionally to share the small path with the villagers on motorbike..Interesting hiking type!

You will be captured by the beauty of green lush tropical forest across the hill, with coffee and clove plantation around you. Stop by for a photographic moment! I was really in the middle of a pretty forest jewels having seen these giant bamboo trees, tropical colorful flowers and plants.

To get to the waterfall is actually easy, as they made the sign boards clearly enough to follow. But! at one intersection Bart and I got lost into another part of the forest area where it led us to a village  with no tourists/visitors but us..and the sound of  the pigs grunt! We actually missed one (OBVIOUS!) sign! haha..So I think I should just post some pics here just to give you a guidance, in case you giggle too much with your friends (like I did) you didn’t notice the sign boards to the waterfall.

To the right..to the right…

Just right after you did a wooden board surfing to cross the wet watery soil, there will be a local people sitting on a plastic chair taking Rp 5,000 (50 cents) of entrance fee to the waterfall. The ticket guy was away when we got there, so the waterfall visit was free of charge

I noticed this is one of favorite destination for french and taiwanese tourists, with a big difference of attitude. The french tourists only took a picture of the waterfall, enjoy the splash, then leave. The taiwanesses took half an hour to change 20 (almost the same) poses of 2 victory fingers under the waterfall, one by one, and there were 4 of them…and that’s the only reason why Bart and I had to spend more time just to wait for them to finish their victory and ‘vogue’ pose so we could take ours…*sigh*..

You will be as happy as I was when the rainbow struck across the water right under the waterfall, leaving a shinning reflection on the river beneath it. Who wouldn’t be jaw dropped when you see this beauty of nature moment..

*An ideal and strongly suggest itinerary for a day trip to Bedugul & Buleleng area would be :
- Bedugul  : Visit Ulun Danu Temple, then Botanical Garden.
- Munduk Waterfall.
- Stop at the highest point at Wanagiri Village, Sukasada sub-district, Buleleng,  at this open air sitting area overlooking 2 magnificent twin lakes of Tamblingan and Buyan.
- On the way back to Bedugul, a MUST visit to : Bedugul Market where ‘warung’/stalls displaying an array of fresh colorful fruits and vegetable, harvested from Bedugul land itself. Why I put Bedugul Market at the end, because shopping should be on your last itinerary after other nature spot destinations -  that’s if you don’t want to loose to much time between bargaining and spending your money

I had a pleasure moment when last year my culinary blog www.wisatakulinerbali.com on which I’m blogging about Bali culinary delights (not only about real and traditional Balinese food, but more on my recommendation of yummy,healthy, affordable, “Warung” style eateries in Bali) received an “Internet Sehat” Award from Indonesia ICT (Information & Communication Technology) Watch for Travel & Culinary Blog category, how nice!! And things like that always encouraged & motivated me to keep writing & blogging!

Through Twitter I could meet the right people on the right niche of the Travel Community,i e. Writer, Blogger, Journalist,etc. And there are a lot of Travel Community websites now that allow you to share your travel stories, photos, sagas, write a guest post. And when I met @travelpod on Twitter, I found the link to www.travelblogsites.com (Travel Blog Sites is powered by Travel Pod – the web’s original travel blog) and wanted immediately to get listed on their comprehensive directory of independent travel blogs on the web (who wouldn’t want!). They aim to rank the travel blog sites all weekly and profile the best ones on a daily basis! Travel Blog Sites lists and ranks the Web’s best travel blog sites.

The Travel Blog Ranking score is updated weekly, and it’s the average of the Alexa.com and Compete.com rankings for each travel blog (yum!I want!). So you know how excited I was when I finally saw my blog was featured! and one day soon hopefully I’ll see my name on the Top 100 TravelBlogSites. Just noticed my lovely fellow blogger Keith ‘Velvetescape Jenkins stunning travel blog was ranked on this a while ago, I’m so proud of what he’s doing! Congrats! He’s been living an amazing Travel Blogger life, I guess (Keith, if you read this, I want that “I’m AWESOME TOP 100 Travelblogsites” Banner on my blog too!!!Awww!!)

If you’d like to be featured on Travel Blog Sites, let them know on Twitter. Thank you Travel Blog Sites!!

Hostelling means staying in value-for-money accommodation where you can interact and have fun with other travellers in a convivial atmosphere. Why spending hundreds dollar in a fancy room when you’ll going to be there only for sleeping in the night? And I’m going to stay just for 3 days. I better save the money for sightseeing (and shopping too!). I’m welcoming any great places to see, to taste recommendation. A tout à l’heure !

But I never bother to check the next door beach of Dreamland, called Balangan, and I don’t know why! ..and I kept saying this to Bart once we got to this tranquil beach : how on Bali earth we never got to this beach that’s located only 10 min from my house in Jimbaran!

Balangan Beach, is a surfing beach, located up in the Bukit Peninsula, Uluwatu. Go straight head up the hill, pass GWK (Garuda Wisnu Kencana), on a small intersection (where to the left you will go towards Bali Cliff ) take the right small road next to NIRMALA Supermarket (you will notice ‘To Balangan’ sign), just follow the road of ‘Cotton trees’, and there is a small metal fence to the beach parking lot.

The still natural & untouched parking lot (please..please no paving stone), love it!

The mix of white and black sand on some spot of the beach, the funny green and dark brown musty stone texture on the shore, and those hollow spaces with clear water to wash my hands after playing with sands, with still very few people/tourists *phew* on the beach, THAT’S!! what I love about Balangan.

This is exactly the place for you to get away from your hectic routine life, the ME TIME spot, perfect hidden place, a very peaceful beach to read your book with zero interruption.

]]> http://www.beeamazing.com/balangan-beach-the-hand-basin-beach/feed/ 4 http://www.beeamazing.com/what-these-2-texas-guys-doing-in-bali-helpless-in-kuta/ http://www.beeamazing.com/what-these-2-texas-guys-doing-in-bali-helpless-in-kuta/#comments Thu, 16 Jul 2009 05:34:24 +0000 Bee http://www.beeamazing.com/?p=481 ” Gaby,
I found your blog on through Google and have enjoyed reading it very much so far.  I wonder if it will be possible to get some advice from you about my stay in Bali: where to go, what to see and eat, etc……Kuta makes me sick with all the tourists everywhere.  I came to Indonesia to experience the culture, the food, the beauty, and the people.But here in Kuta, with all the development and crowding, I am getting none of that, and starting to go crazy because of it…. Please let me know soon if you are able to help us!  We appreciate so much already what you have written on the internet that we will have no hard feelings if you cannot help us……I have only 7-8 more days to discover the amazing beauty of this place, not the ugly tourist centers that we are currently in.
Looking forward to hearing from you,
Brian “

So last month I received this email from one of my blog reader, and quite surprising as he pointed out that finding my blog through Google has given him some good tips about what to do in Bali to help him escaping from his ‘helpless’ situation in the Bloody Kuta (later he told me how he ended up in Poppies Lane, on his first visit to Bali!staying in a dirty cheap hotel,and surrounded with some tourists that showed a disrespectful act to locals, and it made him and his friend were very sick of it).

Believe it or not, to have that kind of response from what I wrote on my blog, besides receiving lots of comments on every blog posts, and more and more of followers on Twitter that brings pretty big traffic to my blog (Thanks to USA now!), is a rewarding moment for me as a full time blogger, as well as for Bart who has consistently inspired me and supported me technically.

So here we were : Bart & me, on a ‘Mission‘ to save Brian & Francisco-2 nice guys from Austin,Texas-  we picked them up at Kuta,  ‘rescued’ them from the crazyness of this busiest touristy spot ever in Bali (and people just never stop abundantly attack and invade Kuta Beach & its famous spots!), took them to my favorite places and introduced them to the ‘real’ Bali as it should be enjoyed. And here’s their “VelvetEscape” (borrowing from my fellow blogger, Keith from www.velvetescape.com) in Bali :

1. LAKE VIEW, Kintamani – the scrumptious lunch overlooking Mount Batur & its crater lake

2. IBU RAI, Ubud – what’s better than cold beer & wooden fire pizza?

An angel pouring cold beer & freezed Cisco's face…

IBU RAI Restaurant sparkling in the night

3. RAFTING with SOBEK, Ubud – paddling the spectacular Ayung River

FORWARD!!!..See..how hard I'm paddling while the 2 guys just enjoying the 'going with the flow'..*sigh*..

SOBEK – The Adventure Specialist www.balisobek.com

4. WARUNG WARDANI,Dps and SPICY GRILLED FISH,Jimbaran – the hot & spicy culinary tour

Balinese chicken spicy rice WARDANI (they put lots of ice cubes in Cisco's beer glass…WOTT?!?)

Hands are much better utensils than fork & knife to deal with these crazy fish bones!

5. BALI ARTS FESTIVAL, Denpasar – an annual big cultural show not to be missed!

Mask Dance Drama

6. BALI TRIATHLON, Jimbaran Bay – get up and RUN, Cisco!!!

People get ready to SWIM – BIKE – RUN !!

People get ready to watch people Swim-Bike-Run..zzz…

This Bali experience seemed like has given them some deep thoughts about several things in life and Bali in a very particular finding. One experience lead to another. Cisco decided to quit smoking! Brian agreed human hands are the best utensils to enjoy the spicy sauce grilled fish. Despite of the overly charged airport taxi, they knew there is still probably a disguised angel named Made Jaga who voluntarily walked with them to the beach, drove them to Ubud, found them a place to stay there, and refused to get paid for the service, for helping a lost tourist is a ‘good karma’ for him..

I hope this BeeAmazing experience made Brian & Francisco 1st visit to Bali memorable and never a dull moment passed on this fun trip! Thank you to Benny ‘Bart’ Risanto who patiently drove us to Kintamani & Ubud <3 !

Hotels Brian & Cisco loved :
- HARRIS TUBAN, next door to airport, worth for every rupiah spent, clean, modern (just don’t go to the cafe accross
the hotel,please!!)
- SARI SEGARA RESORT, Jimbaran, their 4th floor room gave a nice ocean view with fishermen boats on the background, cozy balcony to hang out with friends!

Hotels Brian & Cisco wish never to go back there again :
- ‘MH’ Hotel in Poppies Lane 2
- ‘PG’ Cottage in Jl.Hanoman, Ubud
they are both just dirty & noisy, with ‘ thin made in straw wall’ (WHATT??really?) rooms

For a great selection of places to stay with discount prices visit Bali Hotels for more information

Related posts :

- BALI ARTS FESTIVAL 13 June-11 July 2009
- A Night at Bloody Kuta
- THANK YOU, INDONESIA!
- Mangrove Photoshoot

Follow Brian on Twitter
Follow Fransisco on Twitter

All photos on this blog post are courtesy of www.risanto.com

On my last visit to my parent’s house in Bandung,West Java in December 2008 I promised my self I should go back visiting this city, where I was born and grew up, every 3 or 4 months (my wish!), as I always miss my niece & nephew soon after I landed in Bali and so exactly on My dad’s birthday, 2nd of June’09 a ‘direct flight’ of Merpati Airlines Denpasar – Bandung flew me away from the sea,sun,surf island to the flower city or people in the past called it: Parijs van Java.

I called it a ‘direct flight’ even though there was one transit in Surabaya just for 30 minutes, because I usually took a flight of Denpasar – Jakarta as it is much cheaper then continue the trip to Bandung by land with a travel van for another 2,5 hours. But this time I got a great deal from Merpati Airlines I grabbed it right away after I spotted a promo air fare for Jun’09 only on their website.

You might wonder where that Parijs van Java name came from for Bandung. Well, Indonesia was colonized by Dutch for 3,5 ages (woww that long??!), and with the fact that Bandung has a beautiful landscape for plantation and known as the most prosperous plantation area of the province was one of the reason why dutch men and dutch ladies liked to hang out in this cool breeze of Bandung air. And flowers were blooming as if you were in Versailles Palace of Paris. And this is why people back then called my hometown : a Parijs van Java, Paris from Java…Check out more about the history of Bandung here and log on to www.visitbandung.net if you’re planning to see what Bandung has to offer soon during this Summer time!

But nowadays, all you can see mostly are factory outlets (GOOD quality of cloth at very affordable prices! Bring MONEY when you go to Bandung!), tons of restaurants and other eating places. YUP! Bandung is the city of shop and eat till you drop and full :p And that’s litteraly my main agenda whilst in this city : good sleep, good eat, and good shopping! I’m not thinking about jobs, or anything else beside totally relax and enjoying being with family. Sometimes I wish I could live in a same city again with them, but hey, we all have our choice of life and respective direction of where we want to go in or life…

My little niece, Dede, was one of the main thing that makes my Bandung visit happy. She lovvves hanging out with me because sitting on my lap, touching my laptop keyboard and get to choose any card she likes on this Dress up and Dance card online game like on www.loveandberry.com is her fun activity with me beside, off course getting photographed again and again, over and over again. She just never stop posing, wishing she’ll becoming a supermodel one day. So all my camera shots were just about her and her hundreds ‘belle’ poses and her brother, Ecal. That’s all!! And I never get bored taking her pics neither!

A good friend of mine, Gita, with her magical photoshop hands made this cute collage on Dede’s pic, how cute is that!! I’ll make sure I’ll give this pic to Dede,Thanks Gita!

Oh one more thing, Arma, yes, Arma is my BEST friend ever since we were in a kindergarden. She has three little kids that sometimes drove me mad with their ‘over-excitement’ in the malls..arggghhh…And what both of us lovvve to do beside shopping is : EAT!!MAKAN!! So in the middle of a windy day,feeling week from 2 days of diarrhea, a bit fever, here we were at RASA Bakery, an old restaurant in Jalan Tamblong, Arma took a picture of me sipping hot tea, my comfort drink ever…

Bee, Arma & The Three Musketeers

Now, at last..in Bali again…one week visit to Bandung was just never enough…But for now, here comes Bali sunshine that I desperately needed after 21-22 degree celcius too cold for my ‘surfer girl’ temperature…WELCOME BACK TO BALI,BEE!!

Related post: Bandung and Jakarta so far

But last night Bart and I had really fun with our sightseeing in this area, our main intention was just doing an ice cold
beer Rendez-vous by the beach, but we stumbled upon this new food court with various food stall to offer where ALL the waitress will shout the menu at you at the same time, we felt like the place is on fire and everybody screaming : Run..! Run..! Run..!! Gee…I’ll never come back to this place, I couldn’t even have a chance to choose which food stall I’ll like if they’re like a lunatic screaming at me like that.

Escaping from that suffocating place, we then decided Pizza,Fresh Green Salad, Coca Cola Zero and Sparkling Strawberry Tea will be the best dinner choice, after all,it’s dinner time! And it’s none other than Pizza Hut, local franchise brand that has variety of topping and flavour, not a classic wood fire one, but enough to make my #TravelTuesday entertaining. And there goes away my bad mood…Thanks,Bart!