April 11th exploring Pura Tanah Lot and Kuta area

After a fairly late start we headed NW up the coast about an hour to visit the temple of Tanah Lot. The drive was initially past wonderful furniture and home decor stores which were fun to drive by.  Then the road was more into the countryside with rice patties. The Hindu temple was founded by a wandering priest from Java and is dedicated to the God of the Sea, there is an interesting legend associated with its founding and the reason why and it has coral sea snakes guarding a holy spring. It is one of seven sea temples along the Balinese coast. This temple is known to be beautiful at sunset - when it is also mobbed with bus loads of tourists so visiting during the heat of the day greatly reduces the numbers of visitors enjoying the temple.  There was also a snake exhibit area which, had Jonathan been with us, we would have visited. Many tourist stalls selling souvenirs and hats lined the walkway to the temple, which detracts from a pilgrimage being made to the site.


We then drove back south, dropping our Canon camera off and changing into our swimsuits to go to the popular beach of Kuta. Kuta, the area which in 2002 and 2005 there were bomb attacks on tourists. We walked on the beach and quickly decided it was not of interest.  The beach was narrow and there were only plastic chairs to sit in, for a price, and the vendors out numbered those on the beach.  True it was at the peak heat of the day (2 pm) so most people were all under the trees in close quarters.  The waves were not good for trying to surf so we had lunch at cafe and then had our driver take as back to Seminyak beach.  We enjoyed another session on the surfboard and then watched a beautiful sunset while having a foot massage.  Foot massages are much better in Chiang Mai so won't do that on the beach again.

For dinner we went to an amazing Turkish restaurant called Tulip. One of the other visitors at our guest house who was in Bali because her niece was getting married here had taken the bride and groom to this place the night before and raved about it. The niece is a chef in New Zealand and she loved the food as well, so we thought we should go try it. The ambiance was lovely and the food excellent. The orange souffle was eaten way to quickly! Yummy!