Amed - My Favorite Bali!

After our tour around the island, Made brought me, as planned, to my favorite spot in Bali - a portion that has been collectively named after its closest village - Amed (map).  In my visit last year I had the good fortune of scoring a beach-side bungalow here that framed my love of this area by the good experiences I had here.  One highlight of last year's trip was the opportunity to go fishing with a local fisherman Nengah and enjoy his and his wife's fresh fish cooking in their local "Waroeng" - restaurant.  

Returning to the restaurant this time, Nengah greeted me like a long-time friend and we made plans to repeat the fishing trip the following morning - another 4:00am start, proceeding to the far-away drop spot of the net by sail, and watching a spectacular sunrise as Nengah hauled in the net -- this time yielding 70 mackerel.

Once again I marveled at the community of fisherman on the shore -- and looked forward to having one of the mackerel for dinner. 

After we returned from fishing, Nengah invited me to his childhood home where his parents/family still live (I had met his dad, also a fisherman, last year -- but this year Nengah and his dad are establishing a huge chicken egg operation.  Intensely interesting to talk about the business during our visit:

You can imagine my pleasure when Nengah invited me to share in the fish feast at his home with he and his wife rather than at the restaurant.  It was another special meal -- in keeping with all the Balinese traditions including eating by hand (at my request - as utensils were offered).  The only tradition I didn't keep was keeping quiet while eating and visiting afterwards -- there were too many fun questions to ask and things to learn about Balinese life.

After dinner I arranged with Ningah to borrow a scooter and snorkel gear for the remainder of my stay.

The next morning I bounded out on a scooter adventure over the coastal route east of Amed that was itself exhilarating as I proceeded first along the coast and then over a mountain, watching life in the villages -- including many children walking and riding to (and later from) school in their uniforms.  People, especially the children, showed their happiness and friendliness throughout my journey.  I felt like the old commercials for Honda motorcycles: "You meet the nicest people on a Honda!" 

And it was during this journey along the coastal route and over the mountain that I happened to take a "road less traveled" that happened to lead to another meal at Nengah's house and a unique spear fishing adventure.  I'll tell the story in my next posting -- but a preview is in these photos of the special snorkeling/spear fishing/family dinner - day.