Ok I have spent 6 weeks at Lakey Peak Sumbawa and finally returned to Bali. I have been back in Kuta for a week now, there has not been much swell so surfing has been put on hold. The weather has changed from wet season to dry season so the wind has changed direction which means for the next eight months the whole west side of the Island will be the place to surf, as the “Trade Winds” have started
Trade Winds are winds which appear at the same time same places around the globe each year and for many years were how the trading ships sailed across and around the globe, these trade winds are what make surfing in Indonesia such a consistently great place to surf.
NYEPI festival,
this is the Hindu/ Balinese new year festival, there is a big procession through the streets with effigies of monsters and demons and these are then burnt on the beach at midnight. Then fort the next 24 hours no one and absolutely no one is allowed outside their homes hotels onto the streets. Supposedly the demons are roaming the streets at this time. Police dressed all in black to make themselves invisible to the demons patrol the streets during this time and you will be put in jail if you are found on the streets during this time. My friends Ruebyn Ash and his girlfriend Sophie Hellyer booked into a 5 star hotel for two days during his period so I joined them. Unfortunately the main pool was closed to keep the noise down and the wi fi didnt work. I was hoping to catch up on my Blog during this time.. Oh well..
However I managed to take some photos of the procession in the evening and some of the monsters being carried down the streets.
As you can see the streets of Kuta got pretty crowded, I managed to climb a tree and pretty much get the best view in the whole place. When I was climbing the tree leaves and bark were falling on everyone below and I was getting some pretty angry stares. Kuta is absolutely full of white Aussies and Europeans, but during this festival they were nowhere to be seen and I felt pretty out of place, culturally speaking. However when I pulled out my video camera a Sony vx2100 which is a brodcast reporters camera, the crowd below realised why I had climbed the tree and seemed to offer some respectful waves to me and smiles, so all good there. I have some pretty good footage of the event. (just a note Sony make great video cameras, the best in my experience, my camera works soo well in low light conditions and the footage came out just great) some of which will be going in my Indo surfing dvd which is well on the way now.
