Bali, Ubud

On the way back from the river rafting I had been talking to the driver who was asking if he could drive us anywhere the next few days. I told him that I thought it was waste of time to drive from Kuta up to places every day only to return to Kuta in the evening. He agreed, at least so I thought, and the same evening we met with him and his girlfriend to hear what our options were. We had been thinking about taking a 5 day tour around Bali and asked if he could drive us around. He wanted to drive us to different places on Bali from Kuta every day, just the opposite of what we had been talking to in the car. Oh well.
Nils kept talking about a small city in the middle of Bali called Ubud, a little more cultural inspired town that should be cool. I wasn't really ready for moving to the country side while on Bali, away from the beaches, people are parties, but I agreed to go.
We didn't have a hotel, Wayan the driver told us he would help find a good hotel for us. I don't know what he expected we did for a living, but the first hotel we came to and asked about prices, it was around 380. 380.000 equals to around $40 or so. The clerk said 380 again, and then added dollars. Haha, thanks, but no thanks.
The next hotel just 20 meters away we met a young lady at the reception smiling all over her face when we walk down. We ask if she has a room for us, and yes, they had one and the price was 290 - we laugh a little and ask if it is dollars or rupiah. She laughs back at us, shakes her head and says, "Rupiah of course". Now we are talking. We found a place to stay, yeah
The place was kind of bungalow style but with neighbors on the side and on top. Our bathroom was outdoor! Shower and toilet was literally under the sun, quite interesting. We had a small porch with a view of a botanical garden, far away
The town of Ubud was very different from Kuta and seemed a little colder, very welcome now that we didn't have a pool anymore.
Here it was actually possible to really start relax, I didn't even know I needed it, but it seemed like the last weeks of non-stop partying had actually drained the body for energy, but now I had a change to recharge.
Nils was very firm on the post card situation and immediately went to buy for everyone. I don't know anyone's addresses, so consider yourself safe from receiving any obscurities, haha
Every morning store, car and motorcycle owners makes a little basket as a sign for good luck and places it in the alter nearby, in their car or on their motorcycles. This was not only in Ubud, but so far all over Bali. The Balinese people are really taking cleaning of the streets seriously. Every day they can be seen swiping in front of their shops and hotels to keep the place tidy. But the small offerings are not touched for some reason, sacred it seems.
During night there is not a lot of action in Ubud, but after some searching we did find a place that could serve as our little waterhole during late nights. They were making Mojitos to us and extending happy hour till late night. It took us a little time to realize that the happy hour offer was not buy one and get one free, but buy two and get one free... So we had to keep going longer to get our free drinks.
The place seemed to be the only place with a reasonable amount of people at night, so even during the few days we spent in Ubud we managed to increase their profit by many percent and become regulars. They laughed whenever they saw us coming, we must have made their boring evenings a little funnier too, haha
During the afternoon it was so relaxing to sit on the porch with a cold beer just doing nothing. I have become pretty good at that lately, but here I was able to take it a step further, haha. During stressful times, there were plenty of spas and massage places around the city to reduce the self-induced stress. Monkey and squirrels swinging in the trees, small insects buzzing around - the only problem was the amount of mosquitoes of here in the jungle, a fight for survival every day