Day 7, Oct 16

We awoke for a 7am breakfast to the ubiquitous rooster crowing.  I could have slept until noon as I was still exhausted, but we had to depart early for another diving session to northern Bali. During the night, flower blossoms were intentionally sprinkled on the stone floors around the villa by the staff.  After a nice bacon and egg breakfast prepared by the staff, we left on a 2.5 hour van ride up the north coast of Bali.  We got some good view of fields, villages, and dogs – dogs were everywhere.

Unlike Lombok or the Gili’s which were Muslim, the Hindu’s on Bali prized their dogs almost like members of family and society.  Most of these dogs were muts, but all had a common medium-size muscular body build, short legs, and pointy heads and ear.  Each house usually owned 2 dogs, and their job consisted of guarding property.  While one dog was on guard duty, the other would go about its business trotting alongside the roads like it had some agenda or appointment to make.  They’d look both ways before crossing an intersection; it was almost like a dog lane next to the people cars and motor bikes, with the exception of women with baskets on their head walked alongside. Even dogs got carried on motor scooters, sat in the gas station attendants’ chairs, guarded businesses, and sometimes a dog lunch meeting was observed usually around a trashpile.   If space aliens visited, they might have a hard time determine who runs the place.

When a strange person (like one of us) walked around in the neighborhood, the dogs almost like burglar alarms would give us the old “woof, woof, woof!” or an angry “Grrrrrrr, rrrrr, rrrrr” at each home we passed.  They didn’t bark when familiar neighbors walked by.

Balinese dog off guard duty running errands; next stop is lunch.

The narrow roads could not accommodate 2 wide trucks passing, and the driver would pass everyone going slower by honking and crossing over to the oncoming lane and sometimes making the oncoming motor bikers move out of his way.  Everything was transported on this road, so there were numerous slow trucks that had to be passed. 

An interesting landmark appeared:  a 30-foot long statue of an elephant outside a restaurant or store, and it was supported by a earth mound below.  Either intentionally or not, the elephant seemed to be tired or exhausted and resting its weight on the earth mound below.  It reminded me of how I felt last night before bed. 

A landmark on the road to the Island's north side.

                                       Rice terraces on Bali.

Passing numerous Hindu temples, we crossed through rice fields and terraces on the mountains, enjoying some spectacular views.  Reaching the north side of the island, it was a desert with cactus and lacked the vegetation we saw on the south end near Ubud.  The volcano stood majestic to our south, with several plumes of smoke about 1/3 the way up which we speculate were active vents.  We crossed lava flows until we saw signs saying “Diving here” and “Hotel with Internet”. 

  The volcano on Bali seen from the dry north side of the island.

I learned we were going to dive on a wrecked ship, the US Liberty.  It was hit by a torpedo in World War 2 in January, 1942.  It was beached here until 1963 when the volcano erupted and the seismic movement rolled the ship over and into slightly deeper water submerging it from 4 to 95 feet from the surface.  It’s one of the most accessible wrecks in the world, and perfect for divers and snorkeling.  We walked 200 yards along a black volcanic rock beach, lined with hawkers trying to sell the tourists T-shirts, kites, and jewelry.

"Base Camp" at the Us Liberty Dive.  Hawker (right) gets into the picture.

Good posture pays.  Double tanking for the US Liberty Dive.

We had a snorkel guide who showed us the way to the wreck.  We swam out maybe 2 minutes, and just like those Titanic images on the Discovery Channel, the outline of the ship appeared in the clear water.  I was still surprised how close to the surface it was resting.  I dove down twice and grabbed its encrusted hull. 

  With the top just 6 feet below the surface, the US Liberty is now a fish hotel.

A diver allows a cleaner shrimp to clean the inside of his mouth.

Our guide brought a muffin, which we originally thought was his snack, which he put it in a plastic bottle and fed the fish.  The fish here were much larger than in Gili.  It was like they were on growth hormone or steroids.  The angel fish were the size of dinner plates.  The black or grey fishes were about 2 feet long, 1 foot high, and 3 inches thick and swarmed around us.   Their mouth could swallow any of my fingers.  Our guide told us to never touch them, and never hold your fingers out – keep them in fists to avoid attack.  It was a bit frightening to me with the large and newer mean-looking fish, so I put my hand safely in my pockets of my swimming shorts to take no chances.  The current was very strong, and we spent maybe 90 minutes exploring the wreck from above and fish around, and then went in for lunch when I saw Par and the other divers ashore, their air tanks exhausted.  As we waded ashore; we were again accosted by hawkers trying to sell us trinkets.  What do we pay them?    Buried treasure we found?  Should we go back in and capture a fish?  The thought crossed my mind they need to do something about this problem – give street vendors licenses and put them in one spot.  I’m more likely to buy a souvenir and more likely to have cash once I dry off and get my things together.  Indonesia is still developing, and will no doubt cross this bridge later.

Somewhere up top, the snorkelers skim the surface.

The second dive was away from the wreck, just off the restaurant.  We saw what appeared to be a sunken airplane; I believe it was a reef cage of metal made to look like an airplane to attract tourists.  In any case, this was a great last dive for us – endless fish, schools of hundreds of new and unusual fish, soft corrals waving in the ocean current with small fish making homes in almost every space.  The guide picked up a starfish, let the girls hold it, then he put it down on the bottom upside down.  We watched in fascination as it righted itself over in about 2 minutes.

 
 We headed back to Ubud with the driver kindly stopping for us to take a few photos of the rice fields, terraces, and statues.  I practiced taking photos from the moving van by swiveling the camera to take away the motion blur – it kept me entertained going for the 2.5 hours or so plus I got a few ‘drive-by-shooting’ images along the roadside. 

Elizabeth, who stayed behind, greeted us with gimlets and gin and tonics.  We watched the orange ball sun set over the valley.  We listened to timeless jazz from Stan Getz, the sultry voice of Madeline Peyroux, and magical electric harp music of Hillary Stagg.

Relaxing at the end of the day back at the villa.

The kitchen started getting a well-deserved good reputation for seemingly always perfuming the air with exotic smells around dinnertime.

Dinner tonight was fantastic again, a bit too spicy for me – chicken, etc.  We had the Ahlgren Semillon and Dai-Ginjo sake Kimiko brought from Japan.  We retired to our usual outdoor poolside patio overlooking the valley.  I fell asleep at 9 pm – each night, I was going to sleep earlier.  Par and Alan stayed up later and listened to a distant Balinese music from the rice valleys below.  In our bedrooms, we found fragrant cinnamon incense burning inside low-profile containers either under our beds or behind our dressers – again, put there by the invisible staff.