Today's Highlights:
-Yoga class
-Exploring the market
-Monkey Forest
-Legong Dance Show/nap
Today was finally a more relaxed day and came with the BEST activity of the whole trip! Guys, the monkeys! I don't know what else there is to say. But...I'll say more anyway
We started the morning in our nice little room at Made's Airbnb. Made is our new host and she is this spunky, hip, hilarious Balinese woman. And she has connections with anything you could ever want to do in Ubud. Plus her place is right by the center of town and is cheap cheap cheap. Win! This picture is right by our room at the door to her family temple:
We got free breakfast (bowl of fresh fruit and a delish grilled banana sandwich, of course.) We are seriously served bananas at least 3 times a day, cooked different ways. If you love bananas, Bali is the place for you! (sorry Brianna 😬)
Our new pad:
So this morning we decided we really wanted to try some yoga. We asked Made if there's a place she would recommend. Turns out "Radiantly Alive Yoga" was just up the street so we showed up at 9, hoping to find a class starting and we got lucky! Even though we kind of expected Balinese yoga, it was basically all foreign white peeps, living in or visiting Ubud. Still cool.
However, as we sat there putting out our mats and such before class, the guy next to me started doing these crazy inversions which made me a little nervous that maybe we shouldn't be in this class. When he busted out a one-handed handstand, that confirmed it. We were way out of our depth here. I went and asked the front desk about it and apparently this was the advanced class. WHAT?! That's the kind of thing you tell a person when they come to do a yoga class!
There was nothing we could do. The room was packed and the white guy hippie teacher with the beard braids was starting so we couldn't leave. We just decided to stick it out and do the best we could. And by some miraculous power, we mostly kept up with him! But let me tell you, I have never worked harder or sweat more in MY LIFE than I did in that class (and that's a big statement because I'm a girl that's pretty good at sweating, not to brag or anything). Plus we accidentally picked the sunniest spot in the room like noobs. Despite the pools of sweat, it ended up being really fun! And we were pretty proud of ourselves!
After class, a bunch of people stayed to mess around and show each other up with their insane inversions. We obviously won. One-handed handstand's got nothing on us, right?
Post-yoga snack break. This next picture kinda says it all. Oops...
Because we were already sweaty, we decided to take the long way home and explore the Ubud market for awhile. Those salesmen are good! If you even glance at something in their shop as you walk past, they somehow know exactly what you were looking at and pounce, trying to get you to buy it. Intense, but still fun!
We finally made it back home, showered (which was pointless because we started sweating again the second we stepped outside), and set off to the long-awaited, much-anticipated most exciting part of the trip:
Monkey Forest!!
I was preeeeeeety excited for this section of our trip and let me tell you, It did not disappoint.
Monkeys were EVERYWHERE! Whole packs of them running right past you, perched next to you, or jumping across the trees above you. It was one of the most amazing things I've ever seen. We were both mesmerized and could have stayed watching them for hours (and basically did). Before you enter, the signs at the entrance say that the monkeys may try to take things and if they do, let them have it. If you fight to get it back, they may attack you. I planned to follow the rules but still didn't think they would attack anyone. They wouldn't really let people in if the monkeys attack, right?
Wrong! Indonesia plays by different rules. Right at the start, a monkey saw a ticket sticking out of a girls pocket and grabbed it. She must not have read the sign because she grabbed it and tried to pull it back from him and HE BIT HER! Right under her armpit! We watched the whole thing happen and it was freaky, to say the least.
Coming straight out of that experience, you can understand my extreme fear/paranoia when about two minutes later I see this little guy following me VERY CLOSELY 😳. I started walking a little faster and suddenly he jumped up on me! As he perched himself on my shoulder, I just kept frantically going through the rules we read in my head, trying my hardest not to freak out (as evidenced by my face, I didn't really succeed):
Finally the little guy lunged at the huge water bottle I had in my hands (as big as him). I immediately let go of it and monkey and bottle fell to the ground together, and then ran off, together, up a tree. It was the craziest!! We even watched as he bit at the cap and messed with it until he got it off and then drank it! Poor lil guy was just thirsty.
So the first experience was kind of terrifying, but to be fair, it all happened in our first five minutes. After that, we got used to them and they lost their scariness and just became cute. Really cute. Adorable. We even started using other water bottles and treats we found on the ground to make friends with them and encourage them to interact with us. Worked like a charm :)
Even just watching them interact with each other was SO fascinating. There were lots of mamas with sweet babies holding on to their chest for dear life as the mamas ran through the forest. It was the best!
We watched them wrestle and play and steal each other's food and we loved it so much!
As if the monkeys weren't reason enough to be SUPER happy, the forest itself was beautiful!! The trees and stone bridges were incredible!
Basically it was a dream day! I really don't think anything else could top this.
We decided to end our night watching a performance of the Mahabharata (a Hindu epic tale). Robbie tells me it was pretty good. I wouldn't know. My $6 experience was spent, yet again, like this:
But here are some highlights Robbie took during my expensive nap.
Amazing day!
Gotta love those monkeys! Ohhh and the babies💞 Such cute little faces!
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