Day 12 – Best Ubud Day Trip Itinerary – Rice Terraces, Temples, Waterfalls
Good day, humans. Day 12 wrap. You can probably see from these shocking looking eyes I’ve got at the moment. Didn’t get too much sleep last night. Uh either did my wife. Just um little bit stressed and tired. Yesterday was epic. Such a good day. [Music] Someone’s come and put that there in the middle of the night. Anyway, uh so yesterday was epic. We had this huge day. We got this private driver uh which cost us 70 bucks for a day and it was the best best idea and we went on this huge drive. We left at 9:00. We got back at 6:00. This is Indra day too. Okay, we’re back on the road and we’re going uh on a big excursion today out to the rice terraces, the Holy Temple, ancient temple, waterfall. Charlie might do a swing. What are you looking forward to, Patty? I’m looking forward to going on the big swing. Oh, you’re going to go on a swing, do you think? Yeah. See what you think when you get there, Charlie? I’m looking forward to doing the swing. I really hope it’s really scary and it has a really good view. If it doesn’t, I’m going be a bit annoyed. Stop pinching me. Hey, Jazzy. Well, I’m looking forward to talking in the waterfall. Swimming in the waterfall. I’m not surprised. I’m just looking forward to seeing you and when we get out of all the temples. when we get out of I don’t like looking at I’m just looking forward to a big adventure. Uh and we went to the Sea King rice patties, went on the swings. U zipline. So you’ll see the rice terraces have two names. There’s the Sea King rice terraces and there’s the Talong rice terraces and exactly the same place. just got two different names and you there’s a various kind of different packages you can get when you go there. The package we got because uh one of my older son wanted to do the zip line and that’s quite expensive. That was about 30 to$35 Australian dollars by itself or you can get a swing package where you can do about three or four different swings for around the same price about $25 $30 uh Australian that is uh you can just do one swing if you want to and you get this photo packages little restaurant there as well. Also, what we did is the two of our kids, the younger two got the swing package. My oldest son got the zipline and that’s what they did. And it was like it’s really fun. It’s not a particularly different or spectacular rice terrace to many others that you’ll just come across in the Ubot area, but then the addition of the swings and the zip lines and all the paths and tracks you can follow does make it a really fun. And we ended up staying here probably about an hour longer than I expected us to, I thought, oh, we’ll just go and have a swing and it’ll be done. But we ended up staying there for uh a good good couple of hours and uh it was really really quite enjoyable. [Music] Got [Music] it. Yeah. One, two, three. Uhhuh. [Laughter] Yeah. Charlie. Yeah, mate. You ready? Yep. One, two. Three and let’s go [Music] backward. [Music] What’s up? Yeah. Let’s go. [Music] Oh my gosh. [Music] Oh, hey. What do you think? Oh, it was really good. I I can’t see much rice patties down there, but over there there’s so many. You can see a lot. Is it fast? Yeah, it’s pretty fast. At at the start, you go pretty fast. And then they’ve got like this weird lock thing that when you sit, it slows you down. It’s I think it actually is worth $30. Might be a bit too expensive, but it’s pretty good. All right. Sweet. Let’s go to the next thing. Yeah, Freddy. [Applause] Go. [Music] Y higher. Higher. No. Higher. Yes. Higher. No. Higher. Yes. Higher. No higher. Higher. Yes. Higher. Yes. Higher. Lean back your body. [Music] Yes. Higher. Yeah. She’s probably just All righty. Quick review. We’re at the Sea King rice patties about half an hour north of the center of Ubad in Bali, Indonesia or Indonesia. Uh here it is. They’ve been here for about 2 hours. Look at at first I was a bit not so confident it was going to go well just because the kids are talking a big game about doing these huge swings that going to go over the valley and uh I just want to go on a zip line and it’s 30 bucks a shot and you know for 12 seconds of entertainment or whatever half an hour’s worth half a second’s worth of entertainment each. Uh anyway, uh we did it and uh it was actually awesome and the kids had a really great time. We got some amazing photos and video and uh it’s all set up pretty well. We’re here on a Sunday as well, which we’re told was a busy day. It’s not too bad. You know, the only thing is that the rice patties at the moment are brown cuz they’ve just picked them all, harvested them all. So, they come when they’re green, but you know, don’t really get that choice. You’re either here or you’re not. Um and if you go up the valley, I just flew the drone further over the valley. Super green in the next valley. Yeah. So, uh it’s a bit pricey. I think we spent well over $100 here, but uh we’ve got a couple hours of entertainment for five and uh yeah, I’ve enjoyed it. Definitely worth it. People are actually working these rice ter rice patties by the way. Rice terraces there. They’re not for show. A couple of the big swings. The thousand little Instagram points up there for those who are down with such things. There’s the zip line goes from there all the way across over there. Then you walk up and you come back. So my son really rated it. Loved it. Uh there’s no package deals really. You got a family package or bundle a couple of things together. You just pay out right for each thing which I guess gives you the choice to uh choose what you do and don’t want to do. I’ve seen people walking over here but I’m really not sure how you get there. Anyway, I’ll work that out. But uh do it. You’re an Ubud. Do it. We went out to the holy water temple, the Hindu temple. Hindu holy water temple uh and stuck our head underneath the holy water. So the actual name of the holy springs is the pur ta empul with the ta empul stands for holy spring that bubbles from the earth. Now this is a hindu temple and it’s associated with Vishnu which is the Hindu god of water. It was built way back in 962 AD. And according to local legend, King Maya Denawa was uh who poisoned the waters to defeat his enemies in the area in the area. And Vishnu uh struck the ground to create this holy spring and basically restore health and purity to water in the area. Now tourists are more than welcome. It cost us about $30 to get in there for the five of us. I think it was $750 roughly Australian per adult and $5 roughly for the kids. Then kids under five are free. And they did give you uh like a sarong and and and the clothing that I’d like you to wear while you’re in there. Obviously, you want to have your swims underneath because one of the big things to do here, you don’t have to do it, is to put your head under the 13 fountains and then you say kind of like an intention or a prayer under each of the fountains to kind of bring them true. And that’s kind of the I guess the the the traditional custom of coming here to the holy springs. Now the there is this little change area that they provided for you. So you can go off like I said that they gave us we didn’t have any sarongs and they just gave us some to use while we were there. And there’s a little change room. It’s it’s not particularly nice. It’s a bit smelly. It’s a bit dank with some lockers in it, but you can kind of go use them and get changed and come out. And then the process of actually standing in the line and going through each of the 13 fountains is pretty epic. So we stood in it for a little while and went for this is going to take all day. And we ended up just queue jumping cuz there’s there’s I don’t know there’s maybe eight or nine of them on one side of the of the area and then there’s like the last three or so are on the other side. So we actually just cut across in the end and just went straight to the last one just to do it with the kids and and to have that kind of experience. It was really fun and enjoyable. And there’s a few other things you can explore in the area as well just uh other kind of temple structures and and so forth. There’s also a pond that’s just full to the brim with carp and there’s a restaurant that faces right onto that which you can get some pretty uh cheap classic Balanese food in it like meorings and so forth. Uh so that’s there for you as well and but just be aware that when you exit the temple it’s one of those classic Indonesian tourist attractions where on the exit you just you’re walking through a maze of shops for what seems an age to get back out to the parking spot. Um it like honestly it feels like it goes forever but you will get out of it. Just keep following it and you’ll eventually pop out back in the parking lot. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] went to the ancient ruins, the 11th century ruins, uh called uh I think they’re called Guang Kawi. Uh and they were awesome. Really awesome. But you know, 400 steps or something straight down or 300 steps straight down and straight up. uh which isn’t that many except when it’s 150,000° humidity and 1:00 in the afternoon. The guy was really impressed. It’s a world heritage listed site. I think it’s really easy to forget just how deep Balanese culture goes, especially if you’re just sitting on a beach at Cuda smashing a long neck of Bintang or up in your resort in Nusadua or even doing a yoga class in Ubud. Uh it’s easy not to just think about, you know, how how rich and ancient the Indonesian culture is, Balines culture is. And I really just thoroughly enjoy going and seeing what they had created, you know, a thousand years ago and and walking through it and amongst it. And it’s just it’s it was it was so uncrowded and uh so peaceful. I totally recommend doing it. Heat. [Music] Heat. Heat. Heat. [Music] [Music] [Music] So, I’ve just been at the ancient ruins of I think it’s Gang Gang Kawi. Gang Kawi. Yeah, Gong Kawi. Gung Kawi. I’ve just been at the ancient ruins there. So, they’re from the 11th. What do you want to century? Uh, and we just climbed out the 300 steps up to the top in uh classic uh barley afternoon humidity. It’s a little bit hot, but totally worth it. Cost us 50,000 per adult and 25,000 for the kids. They give you a serong that you can wear down there. Uh, and yeah, like you get down there and there’s just these unbelievable kind of shrines carved into the rock and then there’s this secret spot in the back of this kind of almost like a cave that they’ve kind of carved right down into the rock and then built a shrine within the rock with an entrance way and everything. It was epic uh and amazing for the kids to see, amazing for us to see. So if you’re in Ubada, I highly recommend making sure you include that. And it’s not too far from the uh holy springs dog. Uh and on the way from the rice patties, not too far from the rice patties either. So uh definitely worth doing while you’re in England. [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] [Music] Heat. Heat. [Music] Hey. Hey. Hey. [Music] [Music] Heat. [Music] Heat. [Music] [Music] [Music] Uh, and then we finished off by going at this waterfall. I can’t pronounce it. It was um I’ll put a link in below but bittering butting waterfall something like that. Uh and it was sick. It was really good too. So blank singer waterfall you know it didn’t really come up on any of my searches when you’re doing the best waterfalls around Ubud. There’s there’s so many options to choose from. This one didn’t quite come up. It was actually recommended to us by our driver for the day and he said this is this is actually a really cool one you want to go to. And I I didn’t go see any others so I can’t really compare it directly but I thought it was really really cool. There was there was a nominal fee to get in. It was about two or three dollars Australian, I think, per person to get kind of through the gate. And the long walk down, you’re kind of getting a scare of the scale of it. There’s the kind of beach clubby resort thing that you can go to if you want to go have a swim in the pool. It sunsets kind of it’s really lovely at sunset. Sunsets right down through the canyon and kind of based all in this lovely glow and you get down the bottom and you can have a swim. There is some change rooms down there. They’re pretty basic, but there is somewhere that you can get changed. if you can’t get changed underneath your towel. Uh so obviously, but try and bring a towel if you got a hooded towel or something like that you can get change under that’s even better. Uh it’s all very rocky and kind of a little bit hard on the feet. There’s a lot of people who went down there just to kind of see it and not go for a swim. But the kids and I, we went for a swim and given the heat of the day and the humidity and everything we’d already done in this big huge day in uh Ubud, it was just so much fun going for a swim and the kids were really looking forward to it and it really delivered. So, I I actually recommend this waterfall. And like I said, I haven’t seen any other ones, so I don’t know how it compares, but I can tell you that this particular one was pretty awesome. [Music] Heat. Heat. Heat. Heat. [Music] [Music] [Music] And so we did all of that in one Okay. And having that idea of just kind of like being able to get into the air conditioned car and have a break and get to the next place and then sweat it out and then get back into the car and have, you know, have be able to have a drink and air con and get off our feet for how long it took to get to the next place. Worked really well that all the kids were in much better shape when we got back than they were from doing doing a small like 2 or 3 hours walking around the streets yesterday. Uh so it was a really good plan. worked really well. Uh we spent like I don’t know how much money we spent. I did work it out almost $200 for the day. Uh so that’s not too bad really considering how much we got to see. Um having a private driver and having to stuff around trying to work out how to get rides or black people or anything. Obviously if you’re on your own you just you probably just have a bike. Um but with a family of five it’s just be harder. Yeah. So that is pretty good. When we got home exhausted, the Nefitari villas that we were staying in had prepared a really lovely dinner for us as well. So that was great. [Music] So you’re probably wondering why we didn’t sleep and it was to do just with the stress of trying to work out what’s happening tomorrow. So me and my wife, we weren’t on the same page. Uh, I thought we had a hotel on hold and they were just waiting for us to confirm and I was just waiting to see. There was a there was a chance that I was going to do a review of a of a hotel and I just didn’t want to book one and then have a review come through, but the review didn’t come through in the end. Uh, and mostly because we just too late to the too late to the party with our plans, but uh it wasn’t on hold and she actually said no, we’re not going to take it. So, we worked out that we’re flying out to Hanoi in about 5 or about 5 hours from now. Uh, we have nowhere to stay. Uh, which is easily solved. We just got to jump on a computer, I guess, and work that out. But the problem is is that the next 10 days after that, we have booked in. And I thought we hadn’t booked in the next 10 days. So, I thought kind of the the whole thing was on hold until pending whether we took this took this hotel. Um, and there was a cruise of Halong Bay that we were like ingaring between two options, but that’s not what had happened. My wife had actually booked it all in. Um, you know, and I can see how she I can understand from the way that she was speaking, you know, in hindsight, that’s what she did say, but I just misinterpreted at the time. So, I was just going around thinking, “Okay, sweet. you know, I’ve got room to play here, but I don’t. Uh, so we hadn’t looked at the weather forecast at all, and it’s just so stupid. I don’t know why we didn’t. We just didn’t. We’ve been in Bali now for 12 days, 13 if you count the day we flew in, and we hadn’t um we haven’t had a drop of rain. And so, you just don’t think about it. So the second day we’re in Hanoi, it’s forecast to flash flood like 60 m of rain supposed to drop. Uh and that’s a day we’re supposed to be doing a cycle tour and going to all these things, right? booked them in and then we got in this train overnight to Sappa and then for the two we’re only in Sappa for two days and for both days it’s torrential rain like 30 m each day and then the rain stops the day we leave and then we’re landing back in we’re going to Holland Bay and it’s supposed to rain a whole entire time not not just rain thunderstorm and it’s like we’ve managed to actually book it in to follow the rain as opposed to and I was like okay it’s all right we just flexible You know, we’ll just go straight to Sappa, do that while it’s sunny and then come back to Hanoi once the flash floods are finished and then, you know, I just rearrange it, but we can’t cuz it’s already booked in. Uh so that’s super stressful because it’s cost us a lot of money and it’s not just like oh there’s a 50% chance of a couple of mills of rain like that classic kind of Sydney Sydney forecast you get which is just like oh yeah it might rain it never does. Uh this is 100% chance of a ton of rain. So, we’re just going to have to hope it like all falls during the night or just kind of like I mean it’s Southeast Asia, right? The whole lot could just dump down in a fair bit of time. But we looked at the hour by hours and hour by hour is just like pretty consistent. So, I don’t know. Hopefully just makes for a different kind of adventure. I get to still do everything and the kids don’t lose this their crap too much and we don’t get too soaked. Uh but yeah, so that’s it’s going to make finish in just a couple of hours. got to pack the entire house up, get everyone out, get them fed, get everything sorted to get to a new country, get to the airport, get checked through the airport, get into the airport, get on a plane, and sometime in all that book a hotel like for tonight last minute for three nights. And also try and work out if we can change any of our plans with the uh people that we’ve organized it with. Wish me luck. [Music]
Are you looking for the best Ubud guide? Wondering what the best things to do in Ubud Bali Indonesia are? In particular, the best things to do in Bali with kids? Or perhaps you’re just after a great Southeast Asia family travel vlog?
On Day 12 of the Motivated Travel Show, travel inspiration vlogger Chris Stead attempts the best Ubud itinerary for 1 day of adventure. Or indeed, for Kuta day trips to Ubud.
In this video, you’ll see a review of the Ceking Rice Terraces (also known as the Tegallalang Rice Terraces). The Pura Tirta Empul holy springs and Hindu Temple. One of the best Ubud waterfalls, with the Blangsinga Waterfall. And the ancient ruins of the world heritage listed Gunung Kawi Temple.
Can you imagine a better way to spend one day in Ubud?
The Motivated Travel show is all about travel inspiration, showing what you can do in big family travel through genuine experience. From the best Bali temple to the ultimate in Balinese culture. Plus, ancient wonders and rice terrace swings and ziplines. This episode has it all.
Surely the best things to see in Ubud.
#ubud #travelinspiration #familytravel #indonesia #bali