Tuesday March 24, 2026
Hi All! We are docked again in Bali. Today is a “turn over” day where a few hundred people will leave and a few hundred more will join us. We just completed the segment they called “Kiwi Charm and Aussie Delights” that went from Auckland, New Zealand to Bali for 18 nights and covered 4,049 miles!
We now embark on our next segment called “Spectacular Asia at Night” that goes from Bali to Singapore for 16 nights. We’ll also be doing our first Overland Tour during this segment. We’ll leave the boat for a few days and visit Angkor Wat in Cambodia. Can’t wait!
But first things first, we had a 6 hour tour today called “Balinese Cultural Experience”. We visited a Balinese House Compound in the Batuan Village, a Wood Carving Gallery, had lunch and watched a Balinese Dance Performance. It was a fun packed day!
A Balinese House Compound, in essence, is a cluster of buildings enclosed behind a wall that all generations of a family live in together. In Bali, houses and land are passed down from generation to generation. Each compound has its own temple within the walls.
The one we visited today was a family of very modest means but some of the compounds can be very elaborate. We met the grandparents, who were 82, as well as a few of the children. We even got a picture “praying” next to the grandfather.
After that we went to a wood carving shop where they intricately hand carve various types of wood into these amazing pieces. They use Mahogany, Sandalwood, Ebony and even Crocodile wood (I’m not joking!). The prices were reasonable but not as cheap as the $5 sarongs the street people were selling right outside!
We then went to a hotel in the Ubud region of Bali called Laka-Leke. They greeted us with song and dance and were so welcoming. It was such a beautiful and peaceful setting with lots of water fountains and an open air restaurant.
Before they served us lunch we got to try our hand at painting some eggs that had pre-etched designs on them. Thankfully the professional painters finished them up and we got to take them home as a gift!
We then had this amazing lunch! They gave us 10 different items all displayed so beautifully on banana leaves. It was like a work of art and so yummy. There was chicken, rice, shrimp crackers, egg rolls and more. It looked so good I didn’t want to eat it (but I did!). They also gave us dessert of fruit and these little coconut covered brown sugar treats. Sooo tasty!
During lunch they performed the traditional Balinese Dance called Barong and Rangda. It’s a story about two powerful kingdoms, the Sunda and the Upasanda. The two kings fight over a woman named Nilottama. (Sound familiar, two guys fighting over a girl? Lol).
The Barong and Rangda symbolize opposing forces, Barong representing the light and Rangda representing the dark. But as they fight they take on both light and dark. The Balinese aim in life is to maintain balance amongst the dark and light energies that exist all around us. Not a bad life philosophy!
We then got back onboard and got ready for dinner. I’ll do another post tonight.
The Wandering Italian 