Father's Day in Bali

Brunch, wakeboarding, and giant garudas, and kecek dance

For father’s day, we went out to the beach and had a nice brunch with out toes in the sand. Bali actually has really good western food. We went to “Soul on the Beach” which had a great Marlin gravlox eggs benedict and truffle scrambled eggs. Yum.

Then we joined several other families for a fun (though quite rushed) day out. We started at Bali Wakeboard Park where the kids played on a large inflatable structure in the water while Mama Bear and I tried wakeboarding. They have a cable line that runs in a large loop over the water pulling tow ropes. Instead of wakeboarding behind a boat, you get a tow around the lake.

It was our first time, so we spent most of the time practicing on a small beginner line. It was a bit crowded, so we didn’t get much time, but we were both able to stand up on the board. It was a lot of fun. We actually came back another time when it wasn’t so crowded so we could practice more. We were able to do the full course which is really tiring. Our arms and neck were SO SORE the next day.

But after the quick wakeboarding adventure, we went out to GKS, a new are being built around a giant garuda statue. This felt like the Hindu version of the giant buddha we had seen in Taiwan. We didn’t have time to fully explore, but the GWK festival park is being built out to have lots of cool statues and cultural performances. The garuda statue is… not the most beautiful or peaceful of shapes, but it is large. You can see it all the way from the beach in Sanur as there are not many tall structures in Bali.

We ended the day at the Ulawatu Temple, or more accurately, the Kecek fire dance show overlooking the Uluwatu Temple as the sun set beside the cliffside. It’s a super beautiful outdoor setting to watch the balinese version of the Ramayana, the most important play/story in Hindu mythology. The “music” for this version (indonesian music is normally performed by a band that plays almost all percussion instruments... lots of xylophonic instruments being hit by hammers) was done by a large group of half-naked men doing “Kecek”. This is basically using the syllable “Cek” to build a complex symphony of rhythms that serve as the beat that drives the drama forward.

It was a great show with evil kings, a garuda, and a white monkey warrior that kicked giant balls of flame around with his feet all while the Kecek band moved around acting as part of the play as well as the band. What a great day!