BALI: 4 DAYS IN UBUD
EXPLORATION, REST + RECENTERING
Okay people, bring on the Eat Pray Love jabs. I’ve heard ‘em all already. I’m skipping ahead a bit here, foregoing Paris and Singapore for now. After 24 action packed hours in Singapore, I flew to Bali. At the time of travel, entry COVID tests were still required, but are no longer necessary. To get into Bali you do need a Visa, which you get on arrival, appropriately called “Visa on Arrival.” Bali’s updated tourism site, Welcome Back to Bali, is relatively helpful and provides up-to-date information on entry requirements.
Upon landing in Denpasar, I had reserved a driver for transfer to Ubud through my hotel. I wasn’t totally prepared for traffic in Bali. The 24 kilometer ride can take up to two hours, and it was close to that before I arrived to Komaneka at Bisma in Ubud. Arriving to Komaneka was where I got my first taste of the grace of Balinese hospitality. The staff is so calm, so welcoming and pleasant to be around. The Balinese also have an incredible knack for remembering your name after meeting you once and if on the off chance they forget, you can remind them and they will never have to ask again.
KOMANEKA AT BISMA
Komaneka at Bisma came at the recommendation of my friend and former colleague who honeymooned here. I lusted after its instagram account for a bit before booking the one-bedroom pool villa. For those that don’t know, Ubud is located in central Bali amidst the dense jungles and rivers, and most importantly, it's the spiritual center of Bali. Spiritual healing and mindfulness is what I felt was most essential to my trip when planning it, coming out of my completely consuming and overwhelming job. In retrospect, I probably would have done Ubud second and given myself a few days to relax on the beach, settle into solo travel, and mentally prepare my expectations for the spiritual part of my journey. Live and learn, right?
DAY ONE
Komaneka’s pool villas are beautiful, despite a bit of fatigue as a result of Bali’s two-year COVID closure, but cobwebs and geckos also just come with the territory. It’s almost a detriment to book a private pool villa as a solo traveler, because you risk never leaving your villa for the whole time, hopping from bed to pool to lounge to room service table. Fortunately for me, I booked a massage which was waiting for me upon arrival so I trekked down to the Wana Jiwa Spa at Komaneka, a beautiful 5-minute walk through the jungle. A ginger tea awaited me as did my massage therapist. The treatment was perfect and augmented by the sounds of running water from the Campuhan River just behind the spa buildings.
Afterwards I relaxed on my pool lounger, sipped rose, wrote in my journal and had a delicious dinner of Balinese chicken and rice at the hotel restaurant
DAY TWO
With just a few days to explore Ubud, I was up early and had breakfast at the hotel restaurant once more. Perfectly poached eggs on avocado toast appeared before me, along with a cappuccino.
After walking everywhere in Europe, I decided to walk to the Monkey Forest in central Ubud. Now I understood why I was one of the only people on foot. By the time I arrived I was drenched in sweat and had been dodging mopeds and cars the whole way. I arrived to the sacred Monkey Forest and paid my admission which was the equivalent of $5 USD.
It’s important to know that there are monkeys almost everywhere in Bali, but there’s an enormous concentration at the Monkey Forest. There are also a ton of people who want to taunt the monkeys for photo opps or just to get a rise. Thankfully, there are Monkey Forest guides there to keep this to a minimum. The intention of the Monkey Forest is to provide a wildlife sanctuary for the monkeys and offer a protected habitat for them; it’s pretty apparent immediately that many visitors have little respect for this. At any rate, I strolled through the sanctuary keeping my distance from these guys, but certainly took more than a few pics on the way. It was my first time being up close and personal with a monkey! It’s best to go early in the day when the monkeys are a bit more relaxed and there’s less tourists along the paths.
After several overnight flights and a little bit too much fun in Paris, I was ready for some lunch and a private pool villa afternoon. I had dinner that night at Copper Kitchen & Bar at the neighboring Bisma Eight Hotel, which had a craft cocktail bar and a little bit more of a social scene than my hotel.
DAY THREE
I had a half day tour planned for the next day that I organized with the hotel (with a little help from Alexa West’s book “Solo Girls Travel Guide to Bali.” On my agenda were waterfalls, Pura Tirta Empul (the iconic Ubud water temple), and these swings I had read so much about. Plus, later in the day I had a planned session with a spiritual guide and healer.
Doni, the same driver that picked me up from the airport, was my guide for the day. When you listen to Balinese hospitality staff talk about what the last two years have been like for them, it breaks your heart and you want to just give them all of your rupiah. That said, they are hard workers with a strong sense of pride and are working for every rupiah they make. We decided to go to the closest waterfall so that we could squeeze all these adventures in one day. I had been relatively warned against Tegenungan, largely because there’s grander waterfalls close to Ubud and this one has some serious steps to get up and down it. I’m not sad I went though – even though we have quite a few waterfalls in our backyard in Colorado and there’s such a sense of power and nature when you’re staring at the face of a waterfall. And the stairs? I live at altitude, so they weren’t so bad!
Doni suggested we make a short pitstop at a silver making artisan en route to the water temple and I was quick to agree. My mom loves silver, so I wanted to find her something there. We went to a place called Prapen where I was given a full tour and introduced to all of the women who were responsible for hand making all of the jewelry within the Prapen collection. While there aren’t silver mines on Bali, there are on the neighboring islands of Sumatra and Java and most of it comes through there. They spelled out the whole process for me and then I peeked through all the cases and selected a pair of silver and turquoise earrings for my mom.
Now we were back on the road to Tirta Empul, which ended up being the highlight of my day. Doni had brought an authentic sari for me and looped it artfully around me so I could respectfully enter the temple. Serendipitously, there was a ceremony starting just as we arrived with many local villages coming to pay their respect to the holy water of Tirta Empul. Doni fully briefed me on the ritual of Hindu prayers and provision of offerings to the gods of the five elements of earth, air, wind, fire, and space. Tirta Empul is a special place and while its heavy on tourists in the water baths, you can still find peace and a deep appreciation for Hindu religion and culture.
From the temple, I wanted to see what these rice paddy swings were all about. They’re mentioned all over the place and on instagram everywhere. To be honest, I was a little disappointed. At Aloha Swings, even the ‘adventure’ swing, where you're harnessed in and fly out over the rice paddies, was a little too fleeting to me. It’s literally only about dressing up and getting a photo snapped for IG and very little in the way of a real experience. But, I got on that adventure swing, got the photo and headed back home.
I spent some time resting before my healer appointment earlier that evening and got a ride over to Wakuha’s house. We sat and chatted about dogs and Bali for a bit before getting started. If I were spending more time in Ubud, I definitely would have gone back to see Wakuha for meditation coaching, but as I only had one session we dove into the root issues. She asked me what brought me to Bali and to her house and I explained that I’d just left a deeply stressful and exhausting job and felt I was lacking confidence and direction as to what to do next. Wakuha quickly deduced that I was suffering from a pretty severe case of “I’m not good enough” syndrome, which was exacerbated by my experiences at work where I was so often told this, but was also deeply rooted in other parts of my life.
In one session, we clearly wouldn’t be able to conquer this, but Wakuha provided me with some pointed guidance on how to start reshaping my thinking, celebrating my talents and also accepting what I’m not good at.
DAY FOUR
After such a jam-packed day, I was looking forward to a day of rest. I started out with a wonderful private yoga session at Komaneka, which helped to ease my stress and focus on flexibility and my hip joints.
I spent the rest of the day between the pool and the spa, reading and resting–and reminding myself that a day of rest is okay!
