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Today it's no money no honey! Young men in Bali need to have at least a motor cycle if they want to have any hope of marrying. Bicycles are for kids and for grandparents.

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16 Days in Bali on a Bicycle

A good way to experience Bali..even for an old guy like me

1. Arrival

Surprisingly I have no problems reassembling my bicycle in a quiet spot at Ngurah Rai Airport. Simple really! Take it out of the cardboard box I had packed it in for the plane (free from my local suburban bike shop in Sydney), clip the front wheel on, attach the handlebars and seat, pump the tyres up. Done! 10 minutes! Attach the panniers, put the bike box in the airport left luggage office (Rp88,000 orAus$18, for 16 days storage) and I'm off.

Wait a minute - I see an airport ATM. I ride over, insert a Visa card, result Rp400,000 in pocket without touching the ground. Bali adventure no.8 begins.

I've arrived on Garuda and it's about 3pm. The idea is to avoid the major roads, ride up to untouristy Denpasar and find a hotel for the night. Tomorrow I'll meet other cyclists in Ubud to start our two week Bali By Bicycle tour.

This is a close to the action airport. The runway is virtually another street in Tuban (aka South Kuta). I exit the airport and weave through Tuban to Kuta beach. Checking out the listless surf and sauntering up Poppies Gang it doesn't seem worthwhile hanging here. I flee the tourists for downtown Denpasar.

My map indicates some back roads and quiet villages along the 15km ride. Perhaps the cartography requires a reality check. There is a South Bali conurbation of Denpasar-Kuta-Sanur a city swallowing 500,000 people. But no matter. Although the traffic is thick, the trucks fumy and the two strokes noisy - there are enough plusses to make riding a bicycle in Greater Denpasar a better experience that my bicycle commuting back in Oz.

• Two wheeled vehicles are recognised as legitimate traffic.
• Motor bikes constitute more than 50% of the traffic, and they're not going much faster than bicycles anyway.
• There's a flow with which you just go.
• Most people remember when they rode their bicycles in the days before Bali became relatively prosperous.

2. Denpasar

You only need to head 400 metres towards Denpasar from Kuta’s Bemo Corner to be the only tourist.

The only real problem with Denpasar traffic is the system of one-ways and circular roads. It's like Canberra, in that your basic ingrained logic of compass based navigation is denied. You often need to head north to end up going south. OK you can go up a one-way street the wrong way on a pushbike - but then you can also get very squashed - even in polite Bali.

I drop in at a small hotel/losman (Nakula Familiar Inn) in downtown Denpasar. A simple comfortable room with balcony is Rp40,000. Good value. Cold water mandi - great! I can never understand why anyone would need hot water for washing themselves in this climate. I complete the coolness with an iced Durian drink and soto madura at a warung on nearby Jl. Veteran. Yummy.

The bicycle parking area at the Tara Dewata shopping centre just south of central Denpasar is a bit sad. Off to the side of the huge motor bike section are a couple of dozen rusted cycle stands. As the young bikers jostle for limited spots for their Hondas and Kawazakis, Reppy (my bike) joins a well-loved paint-free bicycle from the Dutch era and a pink children’s bike. The parking gate lady rips off a ticket. The fee is Rp50 (1 cent) - but she reports that they just go through the motions and nobody actually bothers collecting it.

It is clear that the day of the "sepeda dayung" is over in urban Bali. Today it's no money no honey! Young men in Bali need to have at least a motor cycle if they want to have any hope of marrying. Bicycles are for kids and for grandparents - not for the economically active.

While Denpasar may be heading towards metropolis status the centre of the city hasn't changed much since I've started coming here. It's been forgotten. The new malls are on the outskirts near the middle class housing. There is still a distinctively Chinese feel in the central shopping streets. There remain horse drawn dokars. It has Bali's biggest people's markets as well as an Islamic quarter with impressive mosque. It feels and smells quite like Java in here - but less desperate and chaotic.

One thing about Indonesia - no matter how substantial the city the chooks will still wake you up. After the Nakula's hearty nasi goreng I was ready for a pleasant morning ride under cloudy March skies up to Ubud.

3. Ubud

It only takes ten minutes from central Denpasar to get into the "hello mister" zone - where a westerner (bule) is a novelty. Pointing Reppy north we go up into the rice fields (sawah). "Tolong pak/bu/dik, arah itu ke Ubud?" - "Please, which way to Ubud" I rest under a huge banyan tree - and wonder whether the wee I just had against its sacred trunk constituted some sort of serious sacrilege? Doesn't a bottle of water go fast here? I must get hotels to do refills. I can see why the rivers are suffering from plastic Aqua-bottle-nightmare!

A couple of tourists descend with Pentax from their chauffeured Kijang probably believing they are in the middle of nowhere, in the heart of a beautiful foreign and forbidding land, and along comes a middle class web producer looking like Monsieur Hulot whistling "This Old Man" on a push bike in front of their lenses.

Just 90 minutes of leisurely riding in low gear and I’m already entering the Monkey Forest from the Nyuhkuning side and readying to settle in next to the pool at Artini 2, Padang Tegal, Ubud. This is so easy. I head to Milano Salon for a haircut and shampoo (neck massage included). I'm told most of the male staff are currently in Sydney for Mardi Gras. My gay friend always had such a good time at Milano. Then I’m off to Bodyworks for the complete body and oil job. Refreshed (or rather pummelled) it's back to Artini to wait for the other bicycle crazies.

From my point of view the good thing about Ubud is that it doesn’t seem to have changed much in the 22 months since I was last here. I guess that's because of the now seemingly permanently depressed state of Bali’s tourist industry. The bad thing is that where there has been change it had invariably been at the top end of the tourist market. Is Ubud becoming the playground of the wealthy Americans and Japanese and their hermetically sealed luxury villas at the Four Seasons, Ibah, Kupu Kupu Barong, Amandari and the like?

It is early March and there aren’t many tourists about. Young Japanese seem the biggest group.

It was depressing to find the inevitable - the last remaining rice field on Monkey Forest road (opposite the soccer field) was now a group of buildings. So well blended in that I couldn't identify which buildings actually replaced it.

I must confess that I've grown tired of Ubud. While I'm not one of the old timers who were there before the age of electricity, I have seen it change considerably in the past decade - and become largely a collection of shops selling regular tourist paraphernalia and pleasant but undistinguished restaurants. I have trouble finding the basics - a hardware (toko alat-alat) shop where I can purchase and Allen key for my bike, and a copy of the Bali Post (the local Bahasa Indonesian language paper).

I meet up with the Bali by Bicycle tour leader David. He tells me that there is just one other person on our tour (a Canadian , Lorraine). Just the three of us! How pleasant. This tour could accommodate up to 12, but that number of cyclists arriving at a small village would seem like the Tour de France peletant. The joy of the bicycle is that you have a small, quiet footprint. You can engage much more easily than if in a motor vehicle. It's so easy to stop on a whim. But to have a dozen cyclists would destroy all that.

4. Gianyar

The suggested itinerary includes a ride to Gianyar for those arriving early. Gianyar, the regency capital and is only about 15km away. David recommends an evening meal at the local market as a warmer. He has business to do and Lorraine's plane hasn't landed, so I head off to Gianyar alone.

Ubud to Gianyar is a busy road - but not too bad on this Sunday evening. Just outside Gianyar I stop at the grassed centre of a roundabout to have a drink and simply lie on the inviting grass. A roundabout is always an excuse for the construction of one of those tacky garish statues that Indonesia does so well (or badly). After saying hello to the kaki lima (mobile food) guy and the families enjoying the sunset I head into town to the night market. While eating simply at a market warung (bakso and tea Rp3,500), I realise that I had left my bike helmet at the grassy knoll. It is now well and truly dark. Rushing back I am greeted by a smiling father waving my red hat. I suspect he is actually awaiting for my return to return the helmet - as everyone else has left. I am reminded me of what it is about the people here that draws me back again and again.

For those thinking of cycling this road, or riding out to Goa Gajah, it should be noted that there is a very serious hill near Goa Gajah.

It had been a big cycling day (Denpasar to Ubud and the Ubud-Gianyar-Ubud) - so I flake at 9pm.

5. Petulu and Padang

The next morning (pagi) I run into Lorraine from Canada in the swimming pool and we go shopping for the basic Bali pre-requisites - sarongs. Pleasantly she's a hopeless but cheerful bargainer. Then we're off for a three hour walk in the rice-fields. We start just past the Griya restaurant on Jalan Raya towards the Campuan side of town. The path weaves north for about 2 km. You then cross an irrigation channel bridge cum sluice gate and arrive back in Ubud near the Lotus Cafe. I guess 5 km max. The farmers and locals wandering and working along the way seem cheerful and welcoming - and very willing to help me practice Indonesian. The path is in fact wide enough to also make for a pleasant bike ride.

In the afternoon (sore) David and a local guy/guide (Made) join us for our first group ride - out to Petulu via the quiet Sakti road. Here we are to see the big egrets coming in to roost at sunset. I'm a bit under-whelmed by the sight of big white birds weighing down the branches of small trees. However while resting outside the local Kaja (closest one to the mountains) temple we engaged Made in an informative discussion of the use of the kulkul (warning drum) in the Balinese temple and various Balinese religious concepts.

There's this rustically cute warung plonked in the Petulu rice-fields where you can watch the birds arriving and settling in. Binoculars are supplied. However it's easy to quickly forget about the birds as this is a really pleasant spot to eat local junk food, drink Bintangs and shoot the breeze with Made and the warung guy.

Back in Ubud David suggests padang for dinner. Padang food originates from the city of the same name in Sumatra. Legend has it that as the women within Padang's Islamic Mingangkabau culture hold all the property rites (somewhat unusual), and thus have the upper hand - the men are sent all over Indonesia to earn an income to send home. These blokes seem to be good cooks. The padang rumah makan (literally eating house) in Jl. Raya Ubud, close to Jl. Hanoman is just great. They do tremendous plates of the tastiest food for Rp12000, including drinks! There are lots of different soya stuff, rendang, fish, chicken, prawns, the tastiest eggplant and other veges. It’s very spicy but generally not so hot. Just check out any small red and green objects before swallowing. Balinese Padang is served different than in Java. In Java you get plates of pre-cooked food placed in the middle of your table and then you select and eat from the plates you want. You just leave the rest for another customer. Here you just select what you want from the dishes on display in the window - just like at padang places in Sydney. In Java you get stacks more offal - but as far as I'm concerned (my wife disagrees) there is a good reason offal sounds like awful.

Another reason I keep coming back to Bali - cheap, tasty, high quality food either from Padang rumah makans, kaki limas (literally five legs) or warungs (literally humble shop).

6. Digression about Construction, Civilisation, Claustrophobia and Coinage

Obyek Wisata means Object of Interest To Tourists. Whenever I see this sign in Indonesia I am immediately filled with anticipation of disappointment. The Borobudor notwithstanding, the Indonesian desire to make tourist objects out of the mundane is sometimes a little too try-hard

If I want to see historical monuments I'll go to Florence. When I think of the pyramids of Egypt I first think of the world's most striking evidence of slave labour. The Italian preoccupation with statues and cathedrals is to my mind more a way of a continuation of the Roman style of giving them bread and circuses - rather than the proof of a high culture. The ordinary folk remained desperately poor while the rich played with their artists. I read once that the civilisation that built the Borobudor soon after collapsed because the people just left - holus bolus - to escape the servitude.

I admire the Australian Aborigines. They have lived in the one place for probably one hundred thousand years and their imprint on the land is extraordinary minimal.

Part of the attraction of Indonesia is the relative absence of this historical evidence of mankind's inhumanity to each other. There are no colossal objects dedicated to the gods. [The possible exception is the Bali Beach Hotel at Sanur - dedicated to Bali's former demigod, and Mega’s dad - Bung Karno]. The most significant religious structure on the island, the mother temple of Besakih, is a modest (and largely wooden) structure. It is granted that Balinese women spend considerable hours each day making offerings to the gods (which the dogs instantly gobble up) and work preparing fruit and carving banana leaves to be carried on their heads to the temple (but returned home for the family to eat the next). While this may be considered wasted effort in our system, it is internalised by the people as a useful activity.

Although I'm a graduate of history, I don't come to Indonesia to look for monuments or indeed evidence of history. Most potentially historical structures in Indonesia have been constructed from wood and under the damp tropical climate have rotted away long ago.

I wonder how long before the hideous concrete statue at the entrance to Ngurah Rai airport will be a Obyek Wisata?

As someone who suffers claustrophobic fear of the speleological I wasn't much interested in entering the Goa Gajah (Elephant Cave). However this turned out to be but 20 feet of T shaped cave, so unsubstantial that my pulse didn't go up one beat. As usual at Obyek Wisatas we spend most of the time negotiating with various locals from the guiding profession. After a ten-minute lecture by an earnest school student, cum future Indonesia politician and businesswomen, I was none the wiser on why there was an elephant cave built on an island where there have never been any elephants - and which would accommodate only the smallest of baby elephants.

On pondering the characteristics of the typical Indonesian Obyek Wisata I come up with:

• One modest piece of rock that has a somehow survived history's lacerations. Usually dug up by some bored Dutchmen after the locals had long forgotten about it.
• A gaggle of guides who will spend more time with you negotiating the fee than guiding.
• At least 100 shops selling stuff that 99% of tourists have seen elsewhere and have long ago made a firm commitment not to purchase.

But on the positive site it is a place to :

• practice Indonesian
• get photos taken with the locals
• get your photos taken with other tourists - especially groups from Java
• meet other English speaking tourists and travellers
• try to look half decent in a sarong.

After Goa Gajah we cycled to another Obyek - Yeh Pulu. It's a nice walk through rice fields to old rock carvings. This one is recommended, as I'm sure the lady who cleans the rock will be there. She is an eighty something actress with a smile almost as wide as her height - which may be 4'3". Her earlobes indicate a previous interest in very heavy ornamentation. It's great to see how the old in Indonesia just seem to get cheekier and mischievous - while in the west - where their wisdom is not appreciated, they just fade into the background.

At lunch I exchange some rupiah with boys who had Australian coins. Later on in this trip in the middle of nowhere a guy wanted me to change a French 10 Franc coin. This made me reflect on the frustration Indonesians must feel in relation to these tips in coinage. Nowhere in the world can coins in one currency be exchanged for notes in another. Indonesia is no exception. An Australian $2 coin cannot be exchanged for Rupiah unless you find an Australian tourist willing to do the exchange. This guy with Rp15000 worth of francs (a fair whack of money for a Balinese) will have a frustrating time waiting on both another French tourist - and one that he can engage in an exchange (he doesn't speak French). Am I silly in saying such tips are cruel and thoughtless?

7. Massage and other Cultural Stuff

Returning to Ubud our tour leader David recommends Nikki's Salon in Ubud for a Mandi Lulur. It's been a hot cloudless morning. We've only ridden for 15km - but I'm ready for some more pampering - although feeling guilty for overdoing it.

At Nikki's after a standard Bali massage (clearly the world's most un-sensuous form), I get rubbed with Lulur (sandalwood I think), which is something like being scrubbed with gritty mud. Then I get covered in yoghurt - which tastes good, although the masseuse wasn't keen to eat it off. I get hosed down and plonked in a oily bath with floating petals. Not a bad way to spend a couple of hours flirting and practicing parts of the body in Bahasa Indonesian. However it took this body a couple of days to recover from the battering given by the 30 kilo artisan from Surabaya.

At night Lorraine and I went to the mandatory cultural event of Ubud - traditional dancing at the palace or pura. Tonight was barong. I'd seen this or the kecak or legong at least half a dozen times. It's always so well done. The audience is always substantial and appreciative. The cast always seem to be thoroughly enjoying things, except perhaps for the gamelan guys pummelling incessantly away on this instruments.

Although Indonesia is said to work on jam karet (rubber time) these dances are tightly scheduled. Halfway through the performance a bit player pulls up on his motor bike walks around the back - two minutes later enters the stage on cue as a monster - exits - replaces motor cycle helmet and away.

Is this touristic culture? Would these dances still be vital in Bali if it weren't for tourism? Does this cultural tourism preserve and reinforce the value of the Balinese cultural forms, or dilute it? I suspect the former. At the end of the barong they throw in a bit of English and Japanese for the audience's humour. Is this cultural degradation or not? I think it's just audience acknowledgment and that inimitable Balinese spirit of showmanship and fun.

I've heard that the kecak was actually inspired by Walter Spies in the 30s. He was commissioned to make a mumbo-jumbo exotic movie and thus got some local guys to put on a show he choreographed. The locals took to it and decided to practice and put on a regular kecak show - and it has now become the most popular type of dance performed for tourists. It is clear that the guys like doing the kecak (and as is it unaccompanied you don't need to give the local gamelan orchestra a cut). I guess it also provides a healthy supplement to their day job income. And while it may have been inspired by a gay German, it oozes Bali.

8. On The Road To Tanah Lot

It’s day five in Bali and none too soon to be heading away from Ubud. Our immediate destination is Tanah Lot about 35 km away on the coast. There are ample quiet village roads to follow.

The following strike our attention:

• This is a the land of a million warungs
• It's Ogoh-Ogoh building time
• The Balinese don't seem to like Pemulungs

8.1 Warungs

David - the intrepid leader in our party of just three cyclists - confesses to a sweet tooth and voracious appetite. Therefore we need to stop at least once an hour at a warung or kaki lima to consume cokes, kopi susu and eat sweet sticky things. These explorations are inevitably entertaining with the village locals finding us a great source of amusement - especially the ravenous David in thongs and board-shorts with his cheeky manner and streetwise Indonesian. The great thing about cycling is that you quickly work up the thirst and appetite to complement these frequent warung stops.

At Tanah Lot, in the car park, we make a marvellous discovery - kelapon, the ultimate Indonesian sweet. If the rest of this holiday had been simply wretched the discovery of kelapon would have more than compensated. Kelapon are small bright green or pink balls filled with palm sugar. The sugar liquifies with cooking and you need to be careful to pop the whole ball into your mouth - otherwise everyone else around gets sprayed with the brown liquid. I've got the recipe if anyone's interested (sticky rice flour, water, food colouring, oil, palm sugar, grated coconut). Kelapon costs Rp1000 for about 6 balls. Check it out at a warung near you!

8.2 Ogoh-Ogoh

As I write this it's Nyepi eve today (March 23) so I guess the Bali Travel Forum will be full of Ogoh-Ogoh sightings. When I was in Bali last week Ogoh-Ogoh construction was full steam ahead. The young men in every village seemed to be at work with sculpturing these huge sort of scary, sort of friendly monsters. A cane framework is created, covered with paper mache and then painted. The size of the Ogoh2 seems restricted only by the height of the ceiling in the local village bale (open air hall). There were quite a variety of Ogoh's but all I saw in their final stages of preparation carried a purple or dark red colouring.

Somehow in the village of Belumbang I ended up being one of the donors to the local Ogoh-Ogoh fund and proudly was able to write my name on the list of benefactors taking pride of place at the village banjar bale. I'm sure that later there were lots of "and whose this guy on the list" questions.

I never really got to ask about the significance of the monsters - but I guess they are friendly monsters who are used on Nyepi eve to frighten and chase away evil spirits. Anyway all the young guys seemed to be having loads of fun creating them.

Here is something about Ogoh-Ogohs I've plagiarised from the web: http://www.balifolder.com/reference/dance/06,08.shtm

Once every fourteen months the Balinese celebrate the New Year holiday, called Hari Nyepi. This is the time of cleansing and renewal, a time to clear up old debts and a time to be reunited with members of one's family.

On Hari Nyepi it is the rule to stay home quietly. Older people fast and meditated, and no one is permitted to make any loud noise. On the contrary, New Year's eve is a very lively occasion. In many villages noisy purification rites designed to frighten away the buta are held, and every family sets out large offerings for the buta outside their house-yard. In a sense the entire island to be swept clean of demons on this day.

On the New Year's eve a group of men from the village went around the village specially the graveyard, the crossroad, and the specialty paths favored by buta as they go about their troublesome business. They performing a kind of action like frightening and sending away the demons by means of a giant doll.

Most of the villages, make this giant doll. The performance of sending away the demons accompanied and followed by women and children bringing torch and musical instrument made of anything, from wood, bamboo, etc.

In some villages, this march is accompanied by gamelan gong. In some villages there are also a long cannon made of bamboo which making a lot of noise and very loud too.

8.3 Pemulungs

Commonly attached to the outer walls of Balinese house compounds, and sometimes at the entrance to the village itself is the sign "Dilarang masuk Pemulung". Pemulungs - do not enter! Who or what are pemulungs? Well it turns out that pemulungs are people who collect rubbish for recycling.

This is what I've been told…..In Bali pemulungs are usually from East Java. They scour the island in the quest for recyclable tin, aluminium, glass, steel, plastic…whatever they can gather of value to send back to processing plants in Surabaya.

But the Balinese don't seem to like them. It seems that they have the reputation similar to gypsys who used to visit my home town when I was a child. It was said that the pemulungs steal things (or at least take recyclable things that are still being used). Perhaps this reaction is largely a reaction of ignorance towards outsiders.

One guy told me that it's not that the pemelungs are hated or anything, but simply that the Balinese villages have their own practices for recycling and don't need these outside pemulungs. I'm not so sure.

Another small digression. In one of the hotels we stayed, Lorraine’s refillable water bottle (the type you find on bicycles) which she had brought from Canada was discarded by staff together with a couple of Aqua bottles which were in her room. The desk guys happily reported that nothing could be done to retrieve them as they had already this morning been chucked into the river.

One thing we consistently asked for from hotels/losmen was that if they could boil up some drinking water so that we wouldn't need to create Aqua plastic bottle waste. For most this was an alien thought - and they wouldn't do it. It was not understood why this should be done when the hotel sold bottled drinking water - even when we explained we would pay an equivalent price for the refill.

It seemed clear that the need for recycling was not generally internalised by people in Bali in an age when so much of what is disposable is no longer biodegradable. I suspect that one way that things could be improved (other than getting rid of thirsty tourists or forcing them to drink Bintangs) in order to lessen the impact of plastics would be the encouragement of pemulungs to ply their trade.

Since returning I've done a little research on the web regarding pemulungs in West Java. They are clearly social pariahs at the bottom of the economic heap. All this makes me think that for those organisations trying to improve the state of things in Indonesia - much could be done in promoting the activities of pemulungs - for mutual profit and a much cleaner landscape.

8.4 Tanah Lot

Tahan Lot is perhaps Bali's Obyek Wisata No.1, so it's well covered by others. We got there early afternoon (rather than the recommended sunset) and as expected found a few hundred shops selling crap and lots of pushy kids, who could have been just released from a seminary for Mormon missionaries, persistently pressing postcards and shell toys. The scenery reminded me of the coast of New South Wales where I live. Worth a quick look and off - after lingering for kelapon.

Our itinerary said overnight at Tanah Lot. But we suspected it would be pretty bleak once night fell, the T-shirts were locked up and the car park emptied. So we headed cross-country to TibiBiyu.

9. TibiBiyu

TibiBiyu is a representative Balinese village without any Obyek Wisata. On our way there we got our favourite photoshot of the holiday - a line of 60 women sitting on the footpath opposite a temple in a small village in their finery - just waiting. Waiting for some guy to prepare things in the temple and then they would go in and do their thing. We had some good-humoured banter with them.

TB is a village with the smallest possible tourist footprint. Usually the presence of tourist accommodation has flow-ons for the rest of the village (restaurants, warungs stocking toilet paper etc). Not so in TibiBiyu. BB's Bungalows are just four rooms looking over the rice fields towards the ocean in the distance and run by an ex-Australian painter.

What was interesting was her attempt to enter Balinese culture and then the realisation that it wouldn't work. She had married and divorced a local, was now an Indonesian citizen - but seemed somewhat different and distant from the locals ("they" not "we").

Three things I learnt there:

• Being a Balinese woman in a small village means playing a very proscribed role - including the time consuming activity of preparing offerings.
• The village community controls your life, making many of your decisions for you.
• People commented that she hadn't yet learnt to paint - because after many years she kept experimenting with different colours and styles. In Balinese terms once you've learnt to do something - then you just do it over and over again exactly the same way each time.

From BB's it's just a five-minute cycle through the sawah to the black sand beach and impressive (read wild) surf. The rice-fields go right down to the sea. We were the only swimmers. Where the vehicular road met the sea the main activity was riding motor cycles along the sand with your babe on the back. And yes there were plenty of warungs established in the sand.

This is an excellent base for gentle cycling to nearby villages. Definitely recommended for a quiet couple of days far from the maddening crowd.

10. Penebel...Where's That?

TibiBiyu is a kilometer from the coast and about twelve km south of Tabanan. We've decided to throw out the itinerary. Here we discuss two options for our next destination.

David the tour leader is excited about the possibility of going west to Balian Beach. He has a strong surfie streak. I prefer the mountains. I'm worried...as it is clear from my map that there is no alternative way to Balian Beach than to take the busy road that links Denpasar and Tabanan with Gilimanuk and ultimately with Java. Taking this industrial road with its heavy trucks and huge buses could well make for an unpleasant bike ride. David suggests we just put the bikes in the Kijang (the van) which Ketut drives around carrying our luggage. However I'm a bit more of a purist, and uncomfortable with taking transport when the purpose of our trip is to do as much as possible by bicycle.

My alternative is to head towards the mountains. I remember corresponding with the owner of an inexpensive hotel at Pacung in the Bali Travel Forum and so suggest that we head there. Unfortunately I've forgotten the name of the hotel. I guess that the hotel is the Taman Sari Bungalows at Dukuh (from the Rough Guide I was carrying). Dukuh is just out of Penebel. However I was wrong and the hotel I had sourced on the Forum was (I have just discovered it's name by doing an archives search on BTF) the Pacung Indah.

So we head to Penebel. We like the idea of going to a place we'd never really heard of. Penebel is 28 kilometers straight uphill from TibiBiyu via Tabanan (which these days must have surpassed Singaraja as Bali's second biggest city). This is a mean constant climb.

After a greater than usual number of warung stops we get to Tami Sari Bungalows, Dukuh - just before our thighs collapse. We discover a pleasant Indonesian style hotel in well-kept gardens, but given its location, it has failed to take advantage of the potential for glorious views - both south to the sea and north to the mountains.

What do you do overnight in Penebel/Dukuh? We are told the only tourist attraction around the place are some hot springs. So we get into the Kijang and Ketut conquers some unbelievably neglected roads through lovely countryside so that we get to the springs at sunset.... shook up but ready to.mandi!

There are about a dozen warungs at the springs - most of them a combination of shop and massage centre. There are open-air beds for getting rubbed down after your dip under the warmed pipe water. There is lots of jamu (local medicinal concoctions) here and bright charts showing various red and blue lines that run through our bodies. I doubt whether this place would see more than a dozen or so non-Balinese tourists in a year. There are public male and female showering and scrubbing areas - so we take off our clothes and get thoroughly refreshed...and appropriately divert our gaze.

David had noticed a Playstation centre on the way into Penebel and thought that that would be a good nights entertainment. However by 8pm it (and the rest of Penebel's fundamental shopping area) is well and truly closed. David lives in Kuta...and I can see he needs his modern entertainments. But his spirits jump when he spies the only thing open in Penebel - a kaki lima selling his absolute favourite sugar hit - Terang Bulan (literally bright moon = moonlight). In Java I had known and loved this as Martabak Manis. Its thick chocolate pancake I guess. Appropriately it was almost purnama (full moon) and time for Kuningan.

11. Kuningan

The next day heading back to Ubud we end up getting lost and going twice as far as we need to. But who cares? It is Kuningan eve so there were lots of Barong activity in villages and preparations are being made for the Hari Raya (big day).

According to a web entry "The Barong is the magical protector of Balinese villages. As "lord of the forest" with fantastic fanged mask and long mane, he is the opponent of Rangda the witch, who rules over the spirits of darkness, in the never ending fight between good and evil". The happy barong boys were busy parading village streets cleansing the place of evil spirits. These are the Ogoh-Ogoh artists' little brothers.

Back in Ubud for the big day we head three kilometers to Mas in the afternoon for the Kuningan festivities. According to one of the temple elders there people descend from all over Bali to Mas for Kuningan. It seems to be true. Outside the temple there is a tent city of those shops that spring up at significant Indonesian events, selling socks, cassettes, children's toys and the like - and of course stacks of warungs serving delicious food. David's Indonesian girlfriend joining us for the day a buys a radio for Rp30,000 and some boyband cassettes.

There were thousands of Balinese in their best yellow (Kuning = yellow) arriving in what was now torrential rain. Guys quickly went to work building irrigation ditches so that the whole place would not become a sea of mud. Ladies in their highest heels and tight skirts try to traverse swelling lakes.

Guess what we do? We establish ourselves in a warung serving cold beer and cokes and some very tasty sote madura. So we hang out for the afternoon until it clears. This is certainly the biggest and soggiest religious celebration I had experienced in many trips to Bali - or anywhere.

I was surprised to see quite a few western people also enter the temple in full costume. It looked like they lived in Bali and were taking it all very seriously. Some had Balinese partners. This made me reflect that although I could respect the Balinese religion my profound sociological imagination and fundamentalist atheism would never allow myself to submerge myself in the culture in this way. But then maybe in Bali you just forget about all that and like the locals…go with the flow.

12. Batur

This was the day that I had feared since first reading the bike tour travel brochure on the web. That brochure declared the whole trip to be "challenging". But I knew that at least for today that adjective would certainly come into play. When last heading to Mt Batur (in a Kijang) the vehicle's lower gears failed to lock in and we almost didn't make it.

Above Ubud towards Batur the rise is an exponential curve. Four times previously with family and friends I had gone to the Batur rim at Kintamani and cycled back to Ubud (a wonderful trip). But we had aways piled the bikes any way we could into/upon transport for the upwards journey and then left the driver to admire the view and return alone. Today for the first time during our tour (in rainy March) there is no cloud cover. Starting off from Ubud at 9am there is considerable bite in the dry heat already. In his wisdom our tour leader declared we will just go half way (15km) by pedal and then pack into the Kijang for the remainder.

That 15km became tougher as the exponential curve came into play and the Blue Buddha Cafe at Pujung was, as always, a welcome and worthy destination.

This restaurant-cafe-accommodation-spot off the beaten track in a village without any other tourist interest (except the fact that everyone is busy carving stuff along the road - mostly ugly cats) had always been an enigma. I was specifically interested in the two drunken Englishmen who owned it. Four times I had asked the Balinese staff who these guys were - and each time I seemed to get different answers. But for some reason I wanted to be convinced that they were aging rock start from the acid laden seventies - perhaps Nobby from Slade, or Stevie Marriott's less successful brother. Perhaps these were guys who had escaped to Bali to eat mushrooms and/or avoid the retribution from the Kray brothers.

The Balinese people at the Blue Buddha proudly announced that they had bought out the pemabukan (drunks) - and that the English owners had just gone silly. Hope they got a bargain! You could do worse than to stay here for a couple of nights in the rice-barn style rooms with glorious views.

At the rim of Batur we fixed the wheels back onto and bikes and descended quickly down the caldera slopes to settle into lunch at a hotel at Kedisan on the lake. Then were placed the bikes inside again and we headed off to the start of the climb on the road to Toya Bungkah. It was early afternoon and the clouds were rolling in. Not the best time to hope for a vista at the top - but we are ever hopeful types.

People often say there are Mafia in Bali, such as the Mafias of CandiDasa and Lovina. The idea there is to divide up dive spots, fix prices for tours to these spots and even snorkels at a quite high level and enforce a system where no-one would be game to undercut the price. The same system applies at Batur. There is an enforced necessity to have a guide go with you to climb the mountain and there is a fixed price. No bargaining is entered into. I prefer to call this a trade union. This is exactly how many of us in the west obtained our decent living standards. Workers united will never be defeated! Also our guide, Wayan, reported that there were 60 guides in the pool and we were the only people climbing this afternoon. When it gets cuts 60 ways that Rp50,000pp (I think that was the price) seemed cheap.

We were also accompanied on the climb by Nyoman. He was the drinks guy. Nyoman accompanies you to the top and his Cokes and Sprites accrue in value as the climbers get thirstier. At the summit these humble Rp3,000 cokes could be worth Rp15,000. It seemed cruel to force Nyoman to go to the top so I tried to bargain for three cokes at the bottom for Rp10,000 each - but no, there were ethics here. He loved his job, he said, and that job was to climb the mountain (and come down again) at least three times a day - tourist numbers permitting. There was no point in trying to purchase at the bottom.

It's quite a steep climb. It took us a bit over an hour - which Wayan said was very quick...he said "like a world record", but Balinese always like to give the most positive feedback. As we ascended the clouds rolled in, enveloping us, and then burst open. We were drenched, cold and muddy by the time we got to what was apparently the top. It had been a tough climb (but with only one smoko stop). Wayan, Nyoman and David our surfie leader - of course all did it in thongs.

And guess what was at the top. A warung! Actually there were two warungs, plus two others recently blown to pieces in a windstorm. Trouble was we were in the middle of a cloud in belting rain. The visibility was one metre. The owner of this very comfortable if simple warung was a very tall Balinese man - we called him Pak Tinggi (Mr Tall). It seemed appropriate that he was at the top of a mountain. We whiled away an hour or so eating Pak's food, some kopi susus and of course those Cokes and Sprites. We used Pak's small kitchen fire for warmth.

Unfortunately we'll need to wait for next time to catch the view. But it was great rain [This writer was born in semi-arid farming country in Australia where rain = money and thus is always crazy for rain].

Two final things. There are monkeys running around the volcano. The lady who ran the other warung had been to New York City - according to the claim on her T-shirt. David our leader promised a pleasant surprise once we walked down the mountain and into the town of Toya Bungkah.

In Toya Bungkah there's this huge swimming pool at the lake. It's the "lipless" type made of designer rock and usually experienced only at five star hotels. There were two ancillary pools with heated water and spa jets. Tickets cost a hefty Rp30,000. Apparently they never got around to building the hotel due to the monetary crisis (just the pools).

The spa pools were packed with locals of all ages (who clearly wouldn't have paid the entry fee). Almost all of them seemed to be in the massage-you-while-you-sit-in-the-pool business. Anyway this was all very pleasant - even though it was still raining.

So not much cycling really today. As night feel Ketut drove us in the Kijang out of the caldera and towards the east - to Sideman for the night.

13. Sideman

What's a losman? Is it a cheap hotel, or a small accommodation place where you get to know the family? What's the difference between a losman and a homestay, and a losman and a hotel? David our tour leader reported that our accommodation at Sideman was in a losman? It looked like a hotel - about six very comfortable rooms overlooking a glorious agricultural valley. The rooms were all different - with my room being particularly luxurious (but then I'm the oldest). For mine this was the most luxurious accommodation of our trip - but with cold water (which is just fine).

Forgive me but I've forgotten the name of this losman/homestay/hotel. But I can tell you this - stay there at least overnight. It's on the Tabola road out of Sideman - on the right shortly after the mosque (yes the mosque!). The owner's name is Nyoman and he is a local school teacher. He has three sons, wife, and a gorgeous 86 year old mother. We arrived at night and joined the grannie and the kids watching Pokemon on the TV in their living room. This seemed like a losman thing to do - or was it more homestay?

We ordered dinner. It was a huge smorgasboard of beautiful Indonesian food. It cost Rp30,000 each but after this meal of rice, meats, vegetables and tofu we couldn't move.

The only other traveller at the losman was graduate student of journalism from Yale (Randy or Chuck or something). He was writing an article on another American who was experimenting with growing diverse crops near Sideman. The idea was to increase the variety of crops in Bali - partly to prevent soil degradation, partly to introduce naturally grown crops without fertiliser, and partly to increase the diversity of the agriculture.

One suspects that the Balinese approach to agriculture is similar to that towards painting - once you've learn't how to do it, you just do the same thing over and over again - but perhaps not quite. I noticed particularly in this trip - perhaps because on a bike you're closer to the detail - there seemed to be very large numbers of bags full of urea on the roadside. My dad (who at 77 is still a wheat farmer in Australia) reports that urea is a slow release fertiliser which is sown deep into the soil - in contrast to gypsum or superphosphate which is laid near the surface. Anyway there seems to be a hell of a lot of urea used in Bali - perhaps a rapidly growing amount? If so, this points to non-sustainable agricultural practices.

People told me that rotation was widespread in Bali where farmers planted legume crops for nitrogen replacement (especially kacang - ie. beans and ground nuts). However I reckon that 80% of the crop 80% of the time was rice - and with newer strains promising three crops per year - as opposed to two for traditional Balinese strains - the bucks semed to be in padi, sawah, beres, nasih (ie rice!)

David is disappointed in our vista at Sideman because we aren't looking over the manicured padi shimmering under water he had remembered from last time here.. There are lot of beans out there this year. Maybe new agricultural practices are happening? But deep down I reckon that a few years down the track the American agronomist's pioneering farmhouse will be covered in long bean vines and his presence would have been thoroughly forgotten. The Balinese will have taken the little that they needed and rejected the rest. Just as they have done with Hinduism, Buddhism, western philosophy, Walter Spies' kecak etc. This is the essence of this "syncretist" culture - adopt useful bits, filter the crap out. Retain the essence of one own culture.

In Bali and Indonesia the word "sari" is attached to very many things. It means "essence" and in the west we really don't have an equivalent. It means that things have a source or centre from which wealth or richness permeates. In Bali I believe this centre is very strong. This can be frustrating for those wanting to change the culture - whether it's the communists in the 60s or environmental agriculturalists in the 00s.

In the morning we look across this glorious agricultural valley towards a summit and its temple. David our leader suggests that we take a guide and go ride our bikes to that temple. Lorraine and I are buggered. After many days of cycling (and yesterday's mountain walk up Batur) we are stuffed. But David has a mission - and that mission is each day to inject some money into the local economy. We are enticed to ascend by bicycle to the temple by his opinion that no tourist would have done it on bike before.

We now know why. The four km to the temple at Luah gives meaning to the word pushbike. These are 1 in 2 gradients. At the warung near the top I buy a durian for Rp10,000 and attach it to my rack. For the next couple of days (until eaten) this was a constant source of mirth to the locals - a "bule" cycling in the middle of nowhere with a Durian in tow.

David the organiser has decided to stay at the losman/homestay/hotel and play scrabble with the kids (Indonesian and English only - no Balinese words allowed). Wise guy.

Wayan is our teenage guide riding David's bike. Being paid handsomely for leading us, he wants to make the most of the trip by returning us to Sideman on another road (can't have the tourists bored by retracing their route). However he fails to add that the four km outward trip is to be followed by a 35km return trip that would take us via Muncan, Selat and Duda - and be mostly uphill. Indeed we reach spots where you can start the climb of Gunung Agung (an activity for the complete masochist).

We were becoming just more buggered and although we have enjoyed a dip in the irrigational canal and the views - we just need to return to Sideman and flake.

While dipping in the canal I noticed a local gentleman washing with a very circumcised penis. Yes I know I should have diverted my eyes - but it was extraordinarily circumcised. This started a bout of questioning. When meeting Balinese from this point on the polite conversation went like this - "what's your name, how old are you, are you married, how many children, are Balinese men all circumcised". Now when in Bali you'll notice that people always give an answer (just to please) even though they may not always have the knowledge to answer accurately. We were surprised that given that the knowledge base would be fairly strong for this question - we still got various answers.

We concluded (after interviewing a considerable percentage of the population) that Balinese men are uncircumcised and that the guy having a wash must have been a Muslim - who perhaps would have turned up at that mosque near the hotel/losmen/homestay at sometime.

We said farewell to Sideman and headed towards Tirtangganga.

14. Tirtagangga

My experience has shown that it is best to avoid eating at places where eating is not the main point of being there. Today we're on our way from lovely Sideman to Tirtagangga. A side road leads to Wates and onto Putung. At Putung there are magnificent views high over Candi Dasa and the ocean beyond. Specifically there are views from the restaurant of the Pondok Hilltop Resort. I believe that hardly anyone every stays overnight here. The place is neither a pondok (a simple hut) nor a resort, but rather a particularly boring and poorly maintained Javanese style hotel. Anyway in spite of the fact you can relax with vistas of the shimmering ocean and its associated shipping - all the way to the islands of Nusa Penida and Lombok (as well as the land to the south as far as Sanur) - the food is at least half decent and reasonably priced. It is one of the few places in Bali that we found quite busy with tourists.

For bicycles the road from Putung to Amlapura is an inviting 15km of downhill through sheltering forests and then opening out to flat farmland. At Amlapura my bike lost a bolt connecting its rack to the back wheel frame. I almost lost my Durian. Much to the surprise of David and Lorraine I had actually bought some standard bike screws for spares (predicting that Bali's rough roads would try to shake Reppy's frame to pieces).

We stopped at a soccer field for repairs. There must have been 500 spectators for this match between teams of teenagers. Interestingly one side of the field was completely covered in water for its full length - and the players clearly favoured this to the higher dry side. Anyway 50 of the 500 spectators decided that they must supervise and carry out the repairs to my bike. That completed, the road from Amlapura to Tirtagangga may be just seven km, but you do it pretty tough on a bike.

Friends have always raved about Tirtagangga. I find the pools pleasant for a swim but nothing spectacular. For me it's a place for a half hour stop on the way to somewhere else. We stayed overnight at a hotel about 300m further up the road from the pools. It looked over spectacular sawah and down to Amlapura and the ocean.

This small hotel seemed to have a confusing variety of names but was now signed as the Prima something or other. There were three guys who run it. One, Nyoman is a very good masseur. He lives alone in an actual pondok located in a rice field a hundred metres from the hotel - and reckons he spends his time seducing widows. I believe him. David took to the youngest guy and "christened" him Anak Buah (favourite child). The staff here are good fun. Stop for happy times.

Enough of mountains and water palaces! It's time to go snorkelling. The ride from Tirtagangga to Amed is another pleasant (read mostly downhill) activity.

15. Amed

Most people who stay at Amed don't stay at Amed. Amed is an area rather than simply the specific village of that name. The road goes from headland to beach to headland to beach. It's pretty tough travelling on the bike and we walk up a couple of those headlands. We decide to stay at Lipah - a considerable count of headlands beyond Amed. However Lipah can be considered the centre of the Amed area.

It's pretty basic around here with few tourists. From our hotel (well rooms at the back of the Tiyung Petung Cafe) we walk through a bean field, past some cows and goats and fishing boats (prahus) to a quite pleasant beach. You can snorkel straight off the beach and there are plenty of fish.

I'm never kind in assessing Balinese coral because I've spent time at the extraordinary Heron Island in Australia's Great Barrier Reef and also in the Solomon Islands. But this is pleasant enough.

I had this vision from the number of posts in the Bali Travel Forum that Amed had become the fashionable place to go to in Bali. But is clearly hasn't. It's very basic and very quiet. But there are money-changers scattered along the road and massage ladies on the beach, although both somewhat desperate for customers.

Three km further on from Lipah a Japanese ship rests just six metres from the beach and a metre of so down. I thought this was strange - and that the locals should have been more entrepreneurial and have towed that ship out to sea. This way they could make an industry taking the tourists out to view it on their fishing boats. Apparently the locals in fact had towed the ship into the beach so they could strip all the goodies off it. Makes sense! Anyway this was in my humble opinion the best place for snorkelling I'd experienced in Bali (out of Tulamben, Lipah, Candi Dasa, and the Gilis - which are off Lombok). Not just for the fish life around the very shallowly located ship but also the reef a little further out.

There's a brand new and cheap (70,000Rp) hotel overlooking the wreck - the furthest hotel along the Amed coast. It's called Eka Purnama. The rooms are set high on the headland. Brand new and with wonderful views I reckon this would be the best place to stay on the Amed coast.

After the Eka Purnama the road become totally unroadworthy for four wheeled vehicles. It's here we start the journey which just left the locals incredulous. "You are going to cycle from here to Seraya - you're totally crazy".

16. To Seraya

It seems nobody cycles on the sea road between the Amed coast and Seraya. The concept of tourists doing so results in quizzical expressions and laughter. Mustahil! (impossible!)

From Amed to return back to Amlapura and places south the map shows two routes - the main road via Culik, Abang and Tirtagangga - and a winding route by the sea through Seraya. From our starting point in the village of Lipah the road past Amed is at least twice as far as the short cut to Seraya. So let's tackle this shorter route!

OK so the road is not roadworthy for cars and buses - but motorcycles take it - and we are their two wheeled brothers. It's only 30 km to Seraya, where we know that there is a fine road leading to Candi Dasa - today's destination.

The cloud cover today is nonexistent, presenting a fine vista up the steep slopes of Gunung Seraya. The sea is like shiny blue rippled glass stretching to Lombok and its Mt Rinjani. There are a few major ships heading through the Wallace Strait and hundreds of tiny wooden fishing boats meandering about.

They don't grow rice here - but it's the end of the wet season and there's lush greenery. Tiny houses dot the steep hill slopes. There are beans, the picking of ripe custard apple type fruits, tiny grey fish being left out to dry. There's goats, and cows and if you look carefully, happy pigs in their bunkers. Unlike inland Bali, temples and banjar bale's are hard to find. The few temples tend to be very modest constructions on headlands - and newish. I'm thinking that this is a area where the poor have gone to eke out a living. The new territories? The wildish east?

The road was covered in bitumen once. You can still see bits of it. However it's not the gravel and holes that are daunting. It's those ups that follow the frequent downs. We ride down from a headland through a modest collection of houses, up serious slopes to another headland, down to a modest collection of houses..... It gets repetitive. The ride up to each new headland seems steeper. There is no breeze. The morning cool has rapidly dissipated and the full heat is on. The road gets worse. There's absolutely no traffic.

We do this for ten km - up - in 1st gear or walking (same speed). Finally, 300 metres above the sea, we collapse at a warung. Fortuitously this warung has a large plastic bath sitting out the front. If you actually make it to the warung you are rewarded with a mandi.

We conclude we were now in the Balinese version of Appalachia or distant hill town in Tasmania. It was difficult at the warung to communicate in Bahasa Indonesia. People here only seem to know Balinese. They seem truly isolated, poor and perhaps simple people.

We struggle on. Now the road leads depressingly inland and further uphill. I am feeling the sort of physical exhaustion which I know if we are to continue I will be need to do some serious recovering later. It was now 100 metres between rests. In the middle of a village on a hilltop we just collapse on the road. Eighteen kilometres through our 30km journey we called for "transport".

The one thing about Bali, no matter how desperate one's predicament there's always a solution, and a service. The locals quickly appreciated our desire to throw the bikes on the back of a truck and admit defeat. Quickly a truck and owner was located and the fare of Rp60,000 negotiated.

Sitting on a lovely pillow (disguised as a bag of rice) in the back of this truck was sooo comfortable and luxurious. I guess it took an hour to get that last 12 kilometers along the road that the Balinese Dept. of Roads has forgotten about. Locals assured us that the road will be resurfaced by the government next year. Sure!

Some Danish cyclist contributed the following on the web : http://www.dcf.dk/touring/bali.htm From Candi Dasa I followed a rugged 80 kilometer route that hugged the wildly scenic shore of the Seraya Coast. Though many roads in Bali are potholed and eroded, this one was so badly worn that motor traffic was virtually nil. Yet my mountain bike easily negotiated the ruts and holes.

This cat's in a different league to us! Man United vs Rochdale.

17. Candi Dasa and Tenganan

At Seraya we enjoy the luxury of a beautiful five km downhill ride on perfect roads towards Candi Dasa. But we are feeling lazy now and after meeting up with Ketut in the support vehicle we decide to call it a day for riding, and speed through the hilly BugBug area to CD. At lunch at a restaurant in CD we seem to order all the drinks available from the menu.

To help recover from our day of pain and defeat David, our intrepid leader, has negotiated US$15 per day including breakfast at the Prima Resor Hotel on the beach and with a lipless swimming pool. There's even TV. Total flake-out. Luxury!

At night we watch a crappy movie at an overpriced CD restaurant owned by a fat, arrogant and patronising Aussie. Enough of the civilised tourist stuff - back to the villages!

Next morning we do some snorkelling (OK, not great) and leave Candi Dasa - the place that wrecked itself in trying to become a tourist resort. Notice the mortar in the hotels is made of coral! Is that stupid - or what?

The road from Candi Dasa to Tenganan slopes up gently for four kilometres. Along shaded roads it's a pleasant ride to a pleasant place. I suspect that in the not too distant future the 30-year-old try-hard tourist strip that is CD will be reclaimed by the sea, jungle or the volcano (Gunung Agung) looming up in its rear. I also suspect (hope?) that the thousand-year-old Bali Aga (original Balinese) village of Tenganan will remain very much as it is today.

Tenganan is quiet,organised, neat, tidy and clean. It is totally acceptable to matrons in coaches arriving from Nusa Dua and the Amankila (the super costly hotel nearby) crowd. In the "back streets" it is serene. The houses are terraces of mud brick along grassed streets. All vehicles remain outside the village gate. The buildings appear old and simple. There is none of the flamboyance of buildings in wealthy Balinese places like Celuk (famous for its wealth from silver work).

My guidebook informs me that Tenganan indeed is considered one of the wealthiest villages in Bali. At first looking at primitive wooden structures and cracked house walls this seems absurd. However once you enter the houses you can see why. Almost every one is in fact a shop stocked chock-a-block with textiles, wood-carvings, antique swords, woven mats, dan lain lain (etc). The whole pot pourri (but thankfully free of T-shirts and Bali bags).. At the back of the shop area are very comfortable living quarters.

The tourists are laid on for Tenganan. Obviously once folks get to CD the first thing they think of - after seeing that the beach was long ago washed away after the coral reef was crushed for mortar, and the lagoon is smelly - is what to do and see. Go to Tenganan! CD is perhaps really just the gateway to Tenganan - because there's no accommodation at the latter.

Tenganan is contented ladies selling wares. There's no need for that desperate and counter-productive hard sell of Kintamani. I guess it's sad that this Bali Aga village has become a shopping mall. But this is the only place I know of where the remaining indigenous minority have both kept their social structure together and created greater wealth compared to the more recently arrived ethnic majority.

It is a pleasant place for a lazy morning. Note: Cost of parking a bicycle in the parking area outside Tenganan's gate is 100Rp (Australian 2c).

18. Padang Bai

Today's destination is Padang Bai - an easy ride of ten km from Tenganan.

En route - about four km from CD towards Padang Bai there is a simple but modern rumah makan on the inland side of the road - about 1km before Manggis. The two ladies running the place were very shy, and spoke no English - but made some of the best simple/healthy Indonesian food I've ever had. Eat while laxing on a raised platform with fields all around and views to the sea. Special!

You need to want to go to Padang Bai to get there. There's one road in - same road out. The place basically has a single purpose - to transport people and things between Bali and Lombok. It seems that every hour, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week a large ferry arrives. Every hour....a similar one leaves. This gives the place an industrial, shift-work feel. The bright harbour lights reflect in the bay all night. Ship horns make their regular reassuring announcements of arrival and departure. There is a rhythm at the wharves. One moment nothing is happening, just folks lazing around, waiting. Then rising activity as vehicles and touts arrive and the ferry arrives to disgorge its cargo of Balinese, Sasaks from Lombok, tourists, travellers, and produce. The target of many is the travellers who may well need accommodation and transport services.

I really like PB. It's a solid place. Facing the bay there's an esplanade of cheap but comfortable hotels. The harbour coexists with its gentle beach. The sun rises over the water. The town is compact. It has a mosque. However there isn't much entertainment laid on for you. The best we could find was a Playstation centre which stayed open until all the players got tired.

If you walk south past the docks and up a hill there is a unmarked track to the left which passes a rubbish tip. It's 100 metres to the headland and then down to PB's "back beach". It's just lovely and has not yet been identified as an Obyek Wisata. We experienced it busy with basking French and Italians. There's white sand, some surf, and, or course, three simple warungs nestling in the sand.

Padang Bai was as busy as Candi Dasa was dead. The other tourists I talked to in PB seemed settled in. Unfortunately we were due to leave the next day. It just seemed like a nice place to linger for a while.

19. Mega

It is the final day of our Bali by Bike tour. Ubud is the destination. From Padang Bai we elect not to ride the bicycles. There is no option here but the main road past Semarapura (the new name for Klungkung) and Gianyar. This is a heavy trafficked route with trucks from the Padang Bai ferries and elsewhere, including the large petroleum depot nearby. Jalan Fume!

In the support vehicle we visit driver Ketut's family in a village near Semarapura. What hits us is the number of people Ketut is likely to be supporting on his irregular income. Not just wife and family but younger brother learning electronics, his aging parents and probably other relatives and in-laws who share the simple buildings in the compound. At the massive Semarapura market I buy some temple umbrellas (with poles removed) to replace those now faded in my garden back in Sydney. This was to be almost my only purchase of souvenirs on this trip.

Back in Ubud the other cyclists, David and Lorraine, have decided to head later down to Kuta. In something like eight trips I have only spent one day/night in Kuta. I ended up fighting with some guy staying in the same hotel who thought all the guests needed to share in the live broadcast from his verandah of a Collingwood-Carlton football game. However I thought it'd be worth to give it a go and spend the last night there.

Ubud to Denpasar downhill on a bike is less than an hour. On the way at a place called Jelaka, while resting outside an oddly located shop full of wooden objects for tourists, I get asked whether I like Megawati - by a twenty something shop assistant. Within five minutes there is a group of ten women discussing Gus Dur, Mega, Akbar Tanjung, Amien Rais, Islam in politics, endemic corruption and future hopes for Bali and Indonesia with me. Such a change. This political discussion would not have occurred just a couple of years before. The bottom line of our conversation seemed to be that nothing will be righted in Jakarta until Mega becomes the leader. She is the symbol of hope. Perhaps a cult figure. She will assist all the ordinary folk, irrespective of religion, to reach their aspirations for education, health and wealth, and stop the break-up of the nation. Her continuing silence is but an indication of her superior position above the babble of the politicians at the trough.

This level of faith and hope in Mega worries me. She will probably gain the presidency soon after the second memorandum passes the parliament - but I feel the corruption of those around her (especially her husband), her closeness to the vile military, and her lack of intellectual savvy - will dampen these hopes. When that happens there may arise real divisiveness in Bali's socio-politics.

On the outskirts of Denpasar I drop into the only PDI Perjuangan retail outlet in Bali. This is the Ibu Mega party's shop. In the general election of 1999 PDIP took 90% of the Balinese vote. In no other province in Indonesia is one party so dominant. Balinese people, especially young guys, very frequently wear PDI Perguangan T-shirts when out and about. It's almost fashionable. The angry black bull's face with the white nose on bright red background is a striking symbol. There are a great variety of styles. When last in Bali - during election rallies in 1999 - I witnessed a black background variation on a large group of serious bikie/heavy metal dudes. The bull has an edge, a toughness and a resilience that contrasts with the docility and blandness of political symbolism in Australia, or for that matter the paternalistic symbol of the Golkar party's banyan tree.

Perhaps the PDIP has one of the world's most successful use of political party "branding" - beyond what an advertising agency could have thought up. Granted - Suharto's Golkar T-shirts can still be seen about. They have been freely given out to voters before each election. They are most commonly seen stained and worn by women washing clothes in the irrigational canal (the shirt you wear when the others are in the wash) or by farmers in the fields. One thing about those Golkar shirts - they were good quality.

I bought a few good quality PDI Perjuangan shirts and some Mega stickers and headed through Denpasar to Kuta.

20. Kuta

In Kuta we stayed in the Hotel Lusa along the quiet Jalan Benesari. For Rp90,000 this seemed just excellent value for an excellent location betwen beach and main drag. By the way... lusa means day after tomorrow.

I've now concluded that if I'm not camped up with a hotel full of loud Aussie booze and noise fanatics then Kuta seems pleasant enough. In touring the whole Seminyak to Kuta strip at 2am on a Saturday night (by bicycle) I noticed the following:

• The rock, roll and booze heartland of Kuta is a pretty limited little section of Jalan Legian.
• While it may be the most touristy place in Bali, the Balinese still greatly outnumber the tourists. They live in the lanes (gangs). You can certainly spend a lot of time making Balinese friends here.
• Kuta seems to be the place where the young citizens of greater Denpasar like to spend Saturday night.
• There are many people from other parts of Indonesia in Kuta, both as residents and guests. So you get exposed to more of Indonesian culture - not just Balinese.

I came to the realisation that if I was ever lucky enough to settle into Bali and spend a year or so here, working, or just studying the place, or practicing Bahasa Indonesia I would actually choose to be in or close to Kuta. The back streets are still largely Balinese, quiet and charming. The locals are still like people from the villages - but more worldly. There seems to be lots of long term travellers here - including many surfers from Japan and Australia - who rent accommodation for months. There a plenty of people who want to share my interest in Bali and Indonesia.

The reality is that I could never become totally immersed in Balinese culture and society. I could never throw on the sarong and go to temple at Kuningan -and mean it. I would always be an outsider. We are bred very differently and there is always a gap in the way the two cultures perceive the world, others and most importantly ourselves. Kuta provides the possibility to move easily between the western and eastern worlds.

And Kuta is a great place to ride a bicycle in.

My trip finishes simply by goodbyes to my great cycling companions, riding to the airport, extracting my bike box from left luggage, packing the bike back into its box, a final Indonesian meal upstairs at the terminal, and on to the Garuda flight back to Sydney.

A very satisfying trip.