Location: Benoa port, Bali, Indonesia

Indonesia is the world’s most populous Muslim country, yet the island of Bali is over 80% Hindu. There are temples everywhere, even in the middle of the street. Bali roundabouts are especially visual, such as the statue of Rama in the middle of the road near our port.

I choose the “Bali Arts and Crafts” tour. Traffic was dreadful, with the vast majority of our bus travel on single-lane roads. Bali drives on the left. Bali is also a moped country – thousands upon thousands of the noisy, traffic-rule-ignoring, polluting things.

Buildings were right against the road, built with thin red bricks or gray stone. Most had some kind of family shrine facing the road, and I liked the entry ways.

We visited crafts shops for batik, jewelry, painting and wood carving. I say “craft shops”, but they were really “buy our stuff” shops – I would have preferred more technique explanations, but the wares were very nice. I didn’t need any cloth or jewelry, but there was a nice range of paintings (how would I travel with a painting?), and it was really hard to leave the wood-working shop. Fortunately for my wallet nothing was exactly what I “needed”.

However, I fell in love with the doors. Their doors alone were more fancy than my entire house.

There are also small daily offerings to the gods, or “canang“, everywhere. I had to pay attention to not step on any.

Coming Soon

I’ve been asked several questions, many from my friend Kristen’s school class (I’m 53 years old, and now I am “show and tell”). I’ll start answering questions on sea days.

Next: Sandakan, Malaysia