With the world climate we are experiencing now, sickness, death, pain, suffering, panic, isolation, hardship, worry, uncertainty, all due to the devastating Corona Virus, I wish to show massive gratitude for our recent Bali trip. We left just a few days before the talk was for Aussies to return from overseas & returned all ok just before the ‘shit hit the fan’! Nine days later. We met people that arrived just a few of days before they had to return, one guy had a month in Bali booked only to have to return 2 days into it. One lady fly in for just 24 hours to say goodbye to her dying dog, knowing this would mean 2 weeks self isolation upon her return. We are extremely thankful that not only did we get our full nine day holiday in, we had an amazing experience & so be it were able to take advantage of all the positives of being in Bali at such an uncertain & worrying time.
The obvious positive was the virtually empty waves on offer, but we’ll get to that. It only rained a few times which was mainly nights. Being the wet season this is amazing. The only one time we got caught was after a beautiful sunny surf at Uluwatu on our last day. When suddenly if absolutely poured & we were stuck at Ulu’s for over an hour. This being while our plane was also leaving soon! It’s like Bali didn’t want us to leave & believe me, we didn’t. Riding the scooters around was a dream as not as much chaos, although we did just luckily avoid the Bali police on a couple of occasions. The restaurants were also very quiet & the service was great as usual.
For me, the highlight of the trip was the uncrowded perfect waves around! I had so many sessions but a few stood out. I’ve surfed ‘Keramas’, a world famous perfect right handed over lava stone & reef, 15-20 times over the years but the surf I had there on our first morning in Bali, in 6ft perfection, was the best I’ve ever had & with the least amount of people. It will stay with me forever. I also surfed perfect ‘KFC’s’, a fun A-frame peak over shallow reef, a while down the beach with no one out, twice. Got caught in a nasty rip for 20 minutes here. We travelled up the coast 10 minutes & I surfed ‘Cucukan’, a perfect right hand tubing reef, with no one else out. All these times in mostly perfect conditions with not a breath of wind at stages. When we got to Nusa Dua we found even less surfers were around. I surfed this awesome reef called ‘Sri Lanka’ outside Club Med with just a local Balinese guy out there in 4ft perfect fun waves. We took turns with waves & in between sets he gave me the surfing tips for the area including some secret gems. Then it was a gruelling paddle in through the rips in the channel. To finish off I surfed Uluwatu an old favourite. In peak times mid year I’ve counted over 100 people out. Because most of the island was flat it was one of a surfers only options so you would expect a crowd there but it was amazingly uncrowded & there was more Balinese out than westerners. Very unheard of here. It also really turned on for the whole times I was out.
So THANK YOU Bali for our nine day Bali adventure. Basically everything fell into place & everything went perfect. After 13 trips you continue to give us new amazing experiences. I do feel massive sadness & worry about the effect of Corona on Bali & send you love & pray for you. However, Bali will survive, then thrive & we’ll be back, again & again.
