The Worlds Strangest Coffee

We drove to a spice farm and saw all kinds of spices and coffee growing: Vanilla, peppers, cardamom, etc. The highlight however was seeing the mongooses in a cage. Wicked animals, very vicious, the kill and eat poisonous snakes. How do they survive eating poisonous snakes you ask? They have built up a natural immunity to poison. Wouldn’t that be great if humans could avail themselves of the mongoose immunity? Well guess what the Balinese do (they are so back to nature)? They keep the mongooses in big cages and collect their poop. They then dry the poop and add to their coffee. So Cliff had a cup of coffee with mongoose poop. So did others. They give away samples of their regular coffee and teas, you have to pay to drink the coffee with the mongoose shit. I don’t think this will be a big seller in the States! The coffee is called Kopi Luwak and you can read more about it by clicking here.

We then continued on a long beautiful drive up into the mountains. The countryside is all terraced with rice patties, surrounded by jungle. The rice harvest is going on and you would see people in the field separating the rice by hand. Every house has a temple portion with beautiful carvings and daily offerings. It is impossible to overstate the beauty of Bali.

When we got to the top of the mountain we realized it was a volcano that had blown its top. The top was now a lake (kind of like Lake Tahoe. We had come to see one of the most sacred Hindu Temples in Bali. Temple of the Lake Goddess. It is two very small temples set in the lake. If the water is low you can actually walk to them. Today it was high and we could only look at them. It is a wonderful setting. After walking around and taking pictures we started to head back and stopped for lunch overlooking hills terraced with rice fields.

It started to rain and it was an extremely hard downpour. It was fun to watch from the shelter of the restaurant. The thatch roof kept the rain out yet the fog actually entered the restaurant because like most Balinese buildings it had no walls, only a roof to keep you drive.

We proceeded to drive down from the mountain and out of the rain, arriving back to the city of Ubud where there was no appreciable rain.

Cathy and I then had a massage (naturally) and then a spa dinner. After dinner we went to a Shadow Puppet Show. The ancient Indian myths of the Ramayana and the Mahabharata are known to all the people of Indonesia and incorporated into their dance, music, theater and art. A full Shadow Puppet Show could last over 8 hours thankfully this was only an hour. It was extremely hot and humid in the theater.

The puppets are thin, made of leather. The only light in the theater is a gas fire behind a translucent cloth screen. The puppets are manipulated between the fire and the screen. Music, singing and percussion all live accompany the story.

We eventually returned to the hotel for drinks and bed.