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What a day of ups and downs, and not just steps. We set off on our buisiest day in bali yet. We started with three Hindu temples which all had their own charm. One old one big and one very pretty. All 15k to enter each so that added up. I also had to wear a dress to "keep local traditions alive". What they meant was to spend yet more money. Their good at that. We then went to a traditional coffee plantation wher they showed us how they process it aswell as mny other spices and fruits. The wierdest being the coffee made from beans that had been eaten by a catlike animal and then collected from it's s***e, cleaned and roasted. To be fair it wa good coffee but the best was the ginseng coffee. Bought some like. More manet but apparently the lady discounted us. Their good at that. Think it means we don't get fleaced as much as the Americans. They pay full whack for everything here! We pay half. Still to much but hey ho, it's more to them than us. It was beautiful there. Very quiet with no tourists.
Then on to the mountain for a spot of cheap lunch. Bulls***. After refusing the blatant tourist menu the chap reluctantly pulled out the cheaper menu which also had less 'government tax'. I ordered the cheapest meal and drink out of principal and katie ordered nothing out of her stronger principals. The view was ok but it was raining so a bit misty. Big old mountain like.
Then onto another temple after saying we didn't want to pay for a visit to the hot spring on acound of the monsoonlike weather. As if it would be worth it! We didn't pay for that either. The tight side surfaced againso we took the free option of taking photos from above. Better veiw actually!
Then onto the surprising highlight of the tour of 'real bali' the rice terraces.
Sounds boring but it was brilliant. Watched some Americans pay 35k to have a picture with a field worker, only for us to pay 5k straight after! Then overheard some Germans moaning they paid 50k! Funny. 'sarongs $1!' was all the locals seemed to be able to say and when one tried to lure us with 'sarongs 1k' that's about 10pence so we obliged only for the price to jump up to120k. We laughed and said on yer bike lass then for every photo after instead of cheese said $1! is that racist?....
Anyhow, the terraces were lovely and when we left them our last stop was to a tiny village where the herons live. They were cute but because we missed a stop due to weather we were a bit wary to see them all coming home so only saw a few. In fairness, you see one heron you've seen them all.
On paper (or screen) it doesn't seem like much of a tour but the journey to our stops was pretty, sometimes slummy, and interesting. Bob Dylan and jimmy Hendrix was the soundtrack of the day and some of the laughs included a video of me questioning Ugung about his c*** . He's got two you know but doesn't use them for fighting as he doesn't like to lose money gambling, being a good Hindu. Classic conversation.
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