Last night after enjoying some Indonesian food in Seminyak, with Ika, Jevon and Awang, Devin and I jumped on my bike and went for a cruise. We swung around Jl. Oberoi and stopped into Rumours for a dessert. Devin highly recommend the creme brulee (23,000rp), myself enjoying the mango crumble (18,000rp if I remember correctly).
At 9pm the Seminyak area is still in ‘dinner mode’, the party scene not really kicking into gear, but it is cool to cruise around and see all the restaurants, with the candles flickering. Devin has never been to Kuta, so we took a slow cruise down to that part of town, via Jl. Legian. To me, Kuta has always seemed as busy as Seminyak at night, so I was wondering what Devin would make of it. Looking at Kuta through fresh eyes, I became aware of the amount of surf shops, bars and restaurants and gaudy nightspots, along Jl. Legian. Add to that the volumn of light, created by giant lit billboards. “Welcome to Las Vegas,” I said. We jumped off and parked across from Poppies II, deciding to have a cup of tea at ESC, the 24 restaurant / bar. ESC is an excellent place for a quick snack, drink or session online, because it’s 3 storey building affords views of the street below, including the bombing memorial.
Down the street Paddy’s, Bounty, Espresso were gearing up for action, with a number of tourists out. On our way home, which took us around Jl. Pantai Kuta and up towards Jl. Melasti, I saw cops all over the road, outside Kama Sutra. “What’s this?” said Devin. It took me a few seconds to figure out whether it was for parking or a road block. Maybe it was the SUV in front of me, but I didn’t realize until we we almost through, that we’d just blazed through a roadblock.
The new beach access road seemed appealing late at night, rather than dusty Jl. Legian. We made it all the way to Blue Ocean Beach, before running into a traffic barrier. A quick U-turn and explorative trip down a meter-wide dark alley, led up back to the main street, where we were able to head for home. I think Devin enjoyed checking out the ‘city’ at night, even though its not his scene.
