Sea, Surf and Sun (sometimes...) in Bali's wave heaven of Kuta and Canggu.

Here I am, the final country on my trip: Indonesia.

I had very little expectations whatsoever before coming as the only information I had on Bali was a few "it was awesome" from some friends that had travelled here and the memories of the movie Eat, Pray, Love I watched ages ago. The little I expected was a relaxing and spiritual atmosphere you get in the kind of places where there are waves to surf and temples to pray in.

From the airport, I decided to stay a few days in Kuta just a stones throw away of the airport. This is a surfer's town: you surf during the day and you party at night. My hostel; the Funky Monkey was located in a very small street in between the beach and the main road of the city. The swimming pool was really much appreciated and the constant flow of people made it entertaining: I was always with different people sharing travel experiences and tips while having loads of free pancakes offered by the hostel.

Kuta at sunset. One of the only pictures I took in 3 days.

While this is not exactly what I was expecting, I was lucky enough to meet and hang out with amazing people. I am going to mention here couple of guys I was lucky enough to meet: Sahel an inspiring broker from London with Afghan decent and Maxime a tennis addict from Switzerland.

I spend the first 3 days surfing and partying with both before Maxime and I headed north towards Canggu (pronounced Chan-Gu) while Sahel moved with one of his friends towards the center of Bali to more mystical lands.

Beach in Canggu with perfect wave for my low level.

Canggu is much quieter even if the parties there can get insanely wild. The day basically follows the rhythm of the waves. Max and I stayed 4 nights in another great hostel (with pool and again great company). Sharing our dorm, a funny dutch guy that happened to be my neighbour when I was living in Hilversum (!!!) and Charly a Belgian citizen. The world got even smaller for our small crew when Charly and I were speaking about music.

Charly loves acid, a kind of music I have close to no knowledge of.... The only information I know about Acid is that it is very popular in Belgium and there is quite a large audience in Antwerpen and Brugges. This I know from my friend and ex-colleague Luca... Luca is a DJ known in the industry as Acidolido. Well, Acidolido happens to be Charly's favorite artist! 

Mind. Blown. Instant friends just like with Max and Sahel before.

We spent time hanging out and got to meet Sean and Chelsea, a lovely couple teaching English in China, discovering the area and the infinite party options dancing on the beach until the early hours of the morning.

The pretty poison bar in Canggu with its skatepark in the middle of it!

A week has gone by in south Bali in a blink. Time flies when you are having fun. To be honest I did not do much besides surfing and meeting people (mostly around a Bintang, the local beer). But this is what travelling is all about, isn't it? 

I saw yesterday a brilliant post card that sum up perfectly my mood these days. It said:

Never blame anyone in Your Life

Bad people give you Experience

Worst people give you a Lesson

Good people give you Happiness

&

Best people give you Memories.

I am so lucky to be piling up so many memories. It is going to be hard to keep them all in my heart.

I was so busy having fun and relaxing I took very little pictures... I managed to find 3 okish ones to illustrate this post.

I will take so many more in Ubud, where Max and I are heading next. Stay tuned!

Boracay - New Year's eve on one of the world most beautiful island

On December 30th and after my wounds cleaning ritual, we headed to the domestic terminal of Manila's airport. The place is "funny", looks like a bus station at best and is a little chaos. Local airlines are still suffering from cancellations around Christmas due to a typhoon that hit the archipelago. We have been VERY lucky with Jeroen that our flight had no impact because of this, well that flight at least.

We arrived in Kalibo just 30 minutes after schedule. Thanks to our smart move during the flight to buy a transfer from the airport to Boracay directly, we had nothing to worry about from Kalibo to the Hostel.

After a 2 hours bus ride (for only 40km ...), a small ferry crossing crossing the 1.5km sea between Caticlan and the island and a final 30 minutes mini van transfer we made it to the hostel for diner! 

Since Philippines is not really known for its food (nothing wrong about it, but you can be disappointed at times), we asked the receptionist - a local girl - for suggestions. Her answer came in a blink: "Go to Smoke". Smoke is a very small eatery located in a side street of D-Mall, the shopping center of the islands where a lot of bars / restaurants / handcrafts & souvenirs boutiques can be found. This mall is located in the very center of the island and leads to the main beach: White Beach. We would spend the large majority of our 4 days stays around that area... and NEVER too far away from Smoke.

This local restaurant is hands down the best food experience we have had in the Philippines (so far :D). Creamy oriental chicken, Tofu Salad, Fish soup, Curry chicken... you name it, it is amazingly tasty... and dirt cheap compare to the restaurant located directly on the beach. We would go to have a meal at Smoke at least once a day! 

The "street leading to our favorite restaurant: Smoke.

We made it back to the hostel and had a chat with a few travellers including this 52 years old Canadian (from Québec) that had just decided to change his entire life, sold everything he had to start travelling... and learning English. Very nice and wise person that was.

Soon enough we were already the 31st and it was time to get ready for the party and New Year's eve celebration. On that day, the beach was absolutely packed all day long. Locals preparing the fireworks and tourists making plans for the evening. After diner at Smoke, we went back to the hostel to meet up with Delphine (a swiss girl) and Tim (a Dutch guy) to spend the evening with them. We had decided to have a few cocktails at BomBom while the atmosphere on the island was getting really pumped! By 11, we had agreed to leave the bar, go to the 7/11 (a supermarket chain that can be found all over South East Asia), buy some drinks and find a spot on the beach that was already packed.

Drinks at BomBom to celebrate the end of 2016.

The night was very fun, between drunk tourists and happy locals. It ended around 4am for me after speaking to many people celebrating the first moments of 2017, being happy to be there and say goodbye to 2016.

Boracay has 2 main characteristics:

- there is a massive party scene (NYE was absolutely insane in that sense!!!)

- it is selected years after years among the most beautiful islands in the world (depending who runs the polls) and rightfully so. Check that ranking out for example (not to brag but we are spending holidays on the 3 Philippines islands making the top 5 :D :D :D keep following for more informations about these locations)

January 1st was a lazy day as for most of us I guess. Woke up for breakfast at 9am and went back to bed until 2pm :) It was then just the usual: Smoke for lunch and chilling on the beach. For diner we spiced things up going to a local burger venue for a very tasty double cheese / double beef burger.

We would get back into our adventurous spirit on the 2nd of January where we would go for a boat tour around Boracay. I have been a bit anxious about that one from the beginning. Since I cannot really go in the water (I do not want to have water on my dressings which would just add a bit to my recovering time) it took Jeroen and Brendon (an Aussie) to carry me onto the boat lying 50 meters from the beach in the water (my heroes <3, otherwise I would just have stayed on the beach and the boat would have left without me). The ride was bumpy and the other side of the island turned out to be very windy... and a paradise for kite surfers. We made a 4 stops: 1 snorkeling stop I would not take part on, a second stop on Laurel island, a third stop in a big rock right in front of Laurel island with couple of houses and plate forms to jump from (including a 10m high diving place I would I Love to try out) and finally a 4th stop back on Boracay (but the other side on the Southeast tip of the island for lunch).

That was it for me. It was way too tricky to go on and off the boat... I fell on my back on the ramp from the boat to the island on one of the stop trying no to wet my left leg. No harm thankfully.

Impossible not to speak about my wounds cleaning experience on the island... Pain is the most accurate word for this.The nurses would ever day rub a piece of cotton counting until 10. Not pleasant to be scrached on an open would. Thankfully the number of dressing I am having is quickly reducing and by the time we left Boracay, I just had a small one on the left ankle and another small one on the left elbow.

When waking up on the 3rd, it was already time to leave the little paradise.

Sunset from White Beach.