Back to Bali

I had planned to stay two full days, at least, on Nusa Lembongan.  Then again, while it was a nice island, it just didn't quite live up to my expectations.  Honestly, going to the beach on a Thai island last summer has probably ruined me to all normal beaches for a while; they all seem bland and boring compared to Ko Phi Phi.  But then again...Bali is so hyped.  Everyone I talked to said, "Bali! It's amazing! You'll love it!", and every guide book and travel book touts it as a paradise on earth.  I know a big part of my apathy is my lingering whatever-weird-illness-this-is, but honestly I'm just not seeing it yet.  Maybe I've just been to the wrong places, but the sand is coarse and neither white nor black (although I did see some black sand, or rather, dark gray, from the bus on the way to Denpasar).  Here on the island, the swimming area is way over on the other side, and the water outside the bay was so rough I got seasick going snorkeling.

I didn't want to do any further snorkeling, not if it involved getting into any more small boats.  My plan was to rent a scooter and take myself over to the swimming beach for a while, and then poke around the island a bit and maybe find a nice place to watch the sunset, if it happened not to cloud up by then as it usually seems to in the rainy season (another disappointment...the sunsets I've seen haven't lived up to the hype of Bali's famous colorful sunsets, either.  It's mostly been hazy).  But I still just felt...tired, apathetic.  Yet again I felt like maybe, maybe it wasn't just illness's effect, but the place that was boring--if I just moved on, in the next place I'd feel alive again, would be so wonderful that I'd feel like enjoying it.  So I scrapped my plans for renting a scooter.  After a day and a half, I was tired of sand.  Tired of water.  Tired of the heat (the air con was rather pathetic).  I got a ticket on a boat back to Bali. 

Once back on the larger island, I got a taxi up to Ubud, a fairly small town that is the cultural hub of Bali, and its second-biggest tourist draw.  This was the place that had intrigued me most when planning my trip to Bali; maybe here I would find what I was looking for.