Hitchhiking in Indonesia: Beratan Lake
14th of February, 2025.
In less than five minutes a couple stops for me. Will and Alberta are so sweet and kind, very considerate. I’m very happy to meet and talk to them. They leave in Denpassar but are going to another house they have near Lake Beratan.
We stop for lunch and we have Nasi Babi Guling, which is rice with some fried pork and crisps. It’s very good!
On our way to lake Beratan, they decide that they will drive me all the way there. Yay! They also call a priest who they know to leave nearby, and ask if I can camp at his place. When the priest says no, Will gets really upset, and his justification is the same I always give to others when people from the church refuse to help me, that if they are not supposed to help others, as their god helped them, so why are they christians? And he keeps on going saying that the priest was given only excuses, too many excuses, to not help me out. I think it’s awesome!
By the lake there’s the Ulun Danu Beratan Temple, and even though I know you must pay to visit, I come to check. It looks like anything but a temple. It’s so touristic that looks very fake, and I don’t like it a bit.
I keep on walking, trying to find a free public place to camp by the lake but I am not successful. Everywhere there’s something, either a farm, or a homestay, or a camping site. I get to one of these camping places, and as I am starving, I seat by the lake and have some rice crackers, the ones I still have from Situbondo’s family. The people working here must be distracted by a big company group who is spending a few nights here.
The camping itself is very nice, right by the lake, and with some really charming wooden chalets. After sometime, I decide to finally ask if I can camp for free here tonight. I talk with the manager, a very nice man, and at first he says no. But he decides to cal the owner and ask her. Luckily, because she says that I can stay! Yay! He shows me where I can have my tent, and tell me I can use the shower (hot water!) and the toilets. Wonderful! People from the company group are also camping, and the other workers start pitching more tents around. There are also some locals staying in the chalets, quite a lot, but none of them feel like interacting with me.
I have some of my snacks before going to sleep.
10 Years Around the World 