Ubud

Ubud has been amazing. We were almost about to miss it due to lack of time but I am so happy we did not. We decided to loose one of our flights from Yogya and buy one from Denpasar (Bali) instead. We had a day and a half in Ubud and loved every second of it despite the torrential rain that was hindering us from enjoying it even more.
We walked through the rain to find a hostel and found this place with a magic garden, a forest in itself that was family run. Everyone there directed you to speak to "Mama". Mama is a very nice old lady that takes care of the hostel/B&B and seems to have turned the family into the oppositeof patriarchal. She kindly showed us a room and after a bit of the usual bargaining, we settles for 250000 Rp (25euros) for a triple/night with breakfast, fan and hot water. The bathroom was a bit..say...simplistic but it was quite clean and we enjoyed it there. She did take care of us and bolied Laura rice and served her tea for her upset stomach. Her breakfast was also really good: fruit platter (pinapple, papaya, coconut, melon) and a toastie with egg, peanut butter and chinese cabbage. Strangely enough, the toastie was really good!
Ubud is incredible: it feels stuck in time and at the same time, there are so many things going on. I have never seen as many nice cafes, bars and restaurants as there. I think we could've spent a month just eating and drinking in different places and we would've still found new spots - thought I'd barely eat on the trip, wrong!
I'll later put photos of the food and names of places but till then, a teaser: pomello, chilli and shrimp salad, caramalized mushroom, New Zealad mussles in banana leaf, basil mash, mango mojito....anything you can imagine. For a very good dinner (shared starter, main, drinks and desert) in a gorgeaus place, we payed around 15euros each - just to give you an idea.
There are also a tens (if not hundereds) or art galleries with beautiful Balinese paintings, wood carvings, jewelry... You cannot take your eyes of them! I was dreaming of a house already. You can also visit Monkey Forest which is literally a forest where monkeys freely wonder around. You feel as if civilization has disappeared and monkeys have taken over. I felt as if I was in "Planet of the Apes".
The market was quite disappointing as they were so used to tourists that if you didn't want to buy from them, they'd start yelling at you. However, the shops on Monkey Rd. are very pretty, have a lot of arts and crafts, batik and silk clothing or sarongs, scarfs...You can bargain a lot better there and you know the quality is superior.
The people in Ubud are extremely nice and warm. They are the soul of the place and you can feel it. I would've stayed in Ubud for a lot longer. I would've like to go to the second Jazz concert whilst sipping from a papaya-mango-drink. We were so happy to end our trip in Indonesia with Ubud! It really left us longing for more. We understood the charm of Bali...