Bali Tour Guide

Here is the Saranam hotel and restaurant. I particularly like the scenery and the location of the restaurant. Looking down from the hotel restaurant, you can see down below at the hotel rooms, rice fields, a fountain, green park with well groomed weed, and a small pool. At the background, you can see some rice terraces with coconut trees growing in the rice fields path and forest nearby. If you ask, where it is, I can tell you. It's in a village called Pacung, Baturiti. Looking on a Bali map, you will see it is about in the middle. Follow the trace to Bedugul, Lake Bratan, to North Bali. But don't go that far, Pacung is before Bedugul. From Denpasar, it will take about one hour or so. It's a convinient stop over, when going to North Bali tour. Breaking the long journey by ordering a cup of coffee or tea (if you don't drink coffee) is not a bad idea after all. Especially if you drink the coffee while enjoying the green scenery and cool temperature. Or if you arrive here

Ms. Tanya Lai said," I would like to get green coffee bean. Must be green, not roasted." Here it came again. Another authentic Bali coffee tour, a bit different from the last tour that I did with Karl. But besides those places now in Seribatu, and Perean village in Bali, I did not know any people who can supply good quality coffee beans. So, here was the adventure again. Roasted coffee only last for about two weeks, she told me. Raw green coffee can last up to a year. Well, if you roast your own coffee, definitely you must get the green bean. Going to the village was no issue for me. For her, it was a nice experience. I thought she really enjoyed walking through the village road and enjoying the views of coffee being dried in front of every villagers in this village. As long as you can see, you will only see coffee beans put on mats made of bamboo being exposed to the sun light. As we walked down the village road, we stopped at one of the coffee farmer house

I really like the way the local present portion of Ramayana epic in Kecak dance. They usually add few funny characters to enliven the drama. Like this Ramayana dance. You will meet some "bad guys" in this story who try to make you laugh along the show. They greet you in many different languages including English and Japanese. Some bad guys also have a "punk" hair cut like the one you see in the video. I took this video when I was taking my clients to Uluwatu. Uluwatu is an area where you can enjoy the beauty of Uluwatu temple standing on the cliff with the sun set behind. And at one corner of the cliff, there is a stage built by locals for showing the Ramayana dance. It is, just as you think, another tourist show. But this is different. Just see for your self the spoiler in the following video. There is an unexpected scene where Hanuman, the Monkey God, appears from a place that the spectators will never think of. Apologize for the "fair quality" of the vi

"We want to see beaches, we want to swim, we want to visit town and mountains, and maybe litlle bit shopping and we want to be back by three" said Patrick. Patrick is from Perth, Como to be exact. "We don't want to see Barong dance, and we don't want to visit temple" Sandra, the wife added. When I asked why, they replied. "We've seen Barong dance and we've visited all temples!" All temples? "Yes, we visited ALL temples." So, we decided to go to Nusa Dua beach first. On this tour, there was Patrick, Sandra, Michelle, Ben(Michelle's boy friend), and Harisson (grand son from other dauther who did not join the tour) I met Patrick a couple of years ago on a cycling and cooking tour. I was the cycling tour guide and since then exchange few emails. Patrick was an investment manager who invested in stocks and real estate."I have some staff working for me, but I also work, I also push the button myself." The drive to Nusa Dua

Some people ask me where I took the photo of the banner of this blog. As you can see there, it's a photo of rice teraces. I took this photo several months ago in Jatiluwih on harvesting time. There smokes flying on the air since after harvest, the Balinese farmers burn the remain of the rice plants. Ok, that's a quick post. I am at Jatiluwih now in the car waiting for my clients who are still busy taking photos. .

Jamie is a painter who were very amazed of Bali, of the rice field and of the banana trees. Why banana trees? I asked. Because it made him relax, he said. Huh? But a part from that, he and his friend Jim, were amazed by the Balinese ladies. Why? Because Balinese ladies have strong neck. They carry anything on their head. "Is this right, Putu?" He asked. "According to a book I read, it says that Balinese ladies are strong but Balinese men are artists because they can paint and carve." Well, refering to myself, I can't dance, I can't paint, I can't carve, I can't play Balinese music, I don't think it is quite right. But I can type with ten fingers, and understand a bit of html, php and css (if that counts). So, the last three days tours were great eye opener for Jamie and Jim. While touring they always try to spot Balinese ladies with who carry things on the top of their head. We saw a Balinese ladies with basket on her head. We also saw other thin

I don't know that a food without garlic nor onion can be edible (haha). At least in Bali, since here you usually have the basa genep (the complete spices) in almost all kinds of food prepared in Bali kitchen. Usually a cooking would have everything. Tumeric, onion, garlic, salt, chilli, pepper, galengal, and ginger are present in the cooking. When Ser Chim ( a client from Singapore) arrived in Bali, he pinpointed some of the restaurants which he searched from the Internet that served no onion and no garlic. I know the idea that onion and garlic are not good if you are studying meditation, but don't really meet a lot of people who avoid garlic and onion. Ser Chim was one of them. To start, we went to a small restaurant at Jalan Raya Kuta called Happy Budha. The restaurant looks like a shop more than a restaurant. When we stopped there, there were not so many people eating there. Well, there were about five tables around. As I looked at the menu, I just quite amazed because the