Bali

Bali is clearly not the Bali of old, of the time before Bali was “discovered,” before Balinese women covered their bare breasts, before Ubud became exaggeratedly hip, before skyscraper resorts arose on the beaches. But Bali is still uniquely Bali … Hindu Bali, volcanic Bali, village Bali, sacred Bali, Bali with roads up and down mountainsides and along mountain ridges that rival the incline and hairpin turns of any twisted narrow roadway you have ever travelled on or dreamed of, with statues of gods and goddesses at every road juncture, before every bridge, in front of and inside of every home … all receiving gifts of flowers and incense daily … all a reflection of the genuine spiritual awareness and beliefs of the Balinese who walk with such great grace, their loads balanced on the tops of their heads … or precariously on their motorcycles …or somewhere in their hearts we cannot see.
We rent a car in Denpasar, that being a far less expensive option than hiring drivers and providing us with a much greater range of exploration options, especially since as a practical matter public buses in Bali might as well not exist for short-term travelers. So what if we go around in circles for literal hours trying to get out of Denpasar headed in the right direction toward Sideman … or that we spend hours inching along in mountaintop fog so thick and dense, so obscuring of our vision, that the best we can do is try to follow the faded white line on a wet roadway so occasionally steep that if we pause we cannot proceed up in first gear, the tires spinning madly, but must back down to flatter ground to get a running start. Joy does all the driving.
Sideman is well off the main road, in the mountains, amidst rice terraces and lush forest. From our guesthouse we branch out for day trips, most notably to the Besakih Temple, the most sacred of Hindu temples in all of Bali, which is built on the south slope of Mount Agung, the highest mountain in Bali and still an active volcano, having erupted about fifty years ago killing 2,000 people, its lava flow missing the temple by mere meters, but the spirit of the mountain resting quietly on the day we visit.
The bulk of our time in Sideman is spent taking short walks to swimming holes and across foot bridges over various rivers and on long steep rides up and down mountainsides, the only way to get from village A – with its particular vantage points, rice terraces, and temple(s) – to village B, with its particular vantage points, rice terraces, and temple(s). We happen upon festivals. We join pilgrimage walks. We spend a lot of time just marveling at the scenery, drinking beer or coffee at some roadside stand, trying to talk to the smiling people and admiring their children. We leave Sideman reluctantly.