I had booked the Bali Baik Bike tour from Ubud via email with Wayan before we left Australia, so we were ready for pick-up from Legian at 7.00am on the Saturday morning. Our driver was wearing the yellow shirt that Wayan had emailed me to look out for, to make sure that we went with the right tour company.
I thoroughly enjoyed the day - it was a highlight of the Bali trip.
We picked up one other starter in Ubud, so there were 5 of us on the tour.
First stop was a coffee plantation, where we learnt about kopi lawak and tasted a few different flavours of tea, cocoa and coffee. The coffee lawak could be purchased for 30,000 Rp / cup. I found the lemon grass and ginger tea was delicious. They had a couple of civets in cages and I felt sorry for them, but it was good to see the 'pooh' that is used for making this famous coffee.
Next stop was Kintamani for breakfast - buffet style. It was fairly average food, but we needed some energy for the ride so I ate some of the food on offer. The view from the terrace was the clearest I have ever seen up there, the mountain was not shrouded in cloud and made for some great pics.
We drove to our starting point and collected a mountain bike each. No helmets were offered.....(but then again, we never asked for them either). Checked the brakes were in working order and then we headed off in Indian file. Our guide asked us what pace we wanted to go at and we all said 'nice and slowly.' We travelled on back roads, with very few vehicles. A van and ute with spare bikes followed us and they would go ahead and stop any traffic if we had any cross roads, so we didn't have to worry about anything - it felt like we were on the Tour de France!
So many children along the way, wanting to say hello and do 'high 5's'...but I kept my hands firmly on the handle bars to avoid any mishaps! Felt like we were movie stars.
The ride is 95% downhill and I failed at the first uphill section, as the chain jumped off as I wasn't used to changing gears! But it was all fun and everyone waited for me.
We had plenty of rest stops along the way, learning about temples and rice growing/processing. It was the best part of 2-3 hours spent on the bike and is so much more fun than driving past in a car.
Cold towels and water were offered at the end and we jumped back into the van and onto lunch at Wayan's home. As has been said before on this forum, the lunch is absolutely superb. They have a great set-up, with a buffet table laid out with at least 8 different dishes.....mie goreng, vegies, sate etc etc. Cold drinks and we sat down at a low table on the floor and enjoyed our meal. The owner, Wayan joined us and we had a good chat. He told us that we had travelled 26 km on the bikes - thank goodness it was downhill, I don't think I have ever gone that far on a bike in my life......it certainly didn't feel that far, which goes to show how well they picked the route to take us without too much peddling effort.
He also mentioned that if anyone returned, to please bring along supplies for the local school, like exercise books or pens. I didn't even think of that this trip, but will remember for next time, as I'm sure we will do this tour again one day.
It is well organised and such fun.
Details are:
B i k e B a i k Tours
Website is b a l i b i k e dot com
It cost us 400,000 Rp each with the pick up from Legian (is 350,000 if leaving from Ubud) and worth every penny.