No rain this morning, thankfully, but we take the morning to just sort of loll around a bit, then around 8:30 went out for a Grab to take us to the abandoned Taman Festival Theme Park.  You know how we love ghost towns, well this is basically a ghost amusement park!  Built in the late 1990’s at an estimated $100 million cost, it was state of the art with the only inverted roller coaster in the world at that time, volcanoes, a live crocodile pit, 3-D theaters, the biggest swimming pool in the world and a $5 million laser show.  Opened in 1997, it was never really popular with the locals.  The attendance was never very high, and the park never made any money.  Then in March 1998, on Friday the 13^th of all days, the laser was hit and destroyed by lightening.  Insurance wouldn’t pay out, basically dooming the park financially, not to mention that now, in the eyes of the locals, the park was cursed and they really wouldn’t go there.  In addition there were some land ownership issues, and then the Asian financial crisis hit.  That basically did it for the park, investors left, everyone quit, literally walked off – leaving the crocodiles and everything else! – and the whole thing shut down forever.  For the last 25 years the park has remained abandoned and fallen into ruins.  The jungle has taken over and so have graffiti artists!!! 

Our Grab driver dropped us right at the front entrance, where we pay our 20,000 rupiah each entrance fee.  Supposedly the guys out front as well as the fee aren’t “official,” it is just a way for the locals to make some money.  But they give us tickets that say it is a donation for “the cleanliness and resilience of Padang Galak Beach Sand, Keisman Traditional Village.”  Hey, it was only $1.20 each – we can spring for a donation like that to help the village.    In we go!

The place is amazing – full of awesome graffiti, overgrown ruins of all the pavilions, theaters and amphitheaters as well as these cool temples strewn about the property.  We start at the abandoned fountain square then move on, past the bathrooms (yeah, I’m glad I’m a camel, not going in there, no matter how cool the graffiti is!), and onto what we think was the pool building because of the huge falling down atrium (there are no maps of the facility we can find anywhere – so everything is a guess).  Turns out it probably wasn’t the pool, there are lots of knee walls in there, all overgrown with vines and plants – and of course tons of cool graffiti everywhere. 

Wandering out of the atrium building, we pass by the theater building, overgrown with huge roots running down the walls, and again graffiti, graffiti everywhere.

We moved on to the crocodile lagoon, at least we think it is the crocodile lagoon – we’ll never know because fortunately the crocodiles have all either died or escaped into the wilderness (for years, there were still crocs there in the lagoon that you had to watch out for).  They’ve been replaced with ducks – which are much more pleasant to watch as we take in the entire diaspora.  

Behind us are a couple of Naga statues up on the upper terrace, by the entrance and defunct fountain, and off to our left is another huge pavilion that just begs to be explored.  Heading over, we pass more gas mask graffiti – obviously a thing – painted statues, tiled squares, overgrown banyon trees and more and more graffiti in some building of which we no idea its purpose.

Another massive pavilion – again who knows its use??? – more graffiti, more roots and overgrown foliage, plus a falling down roof structure. 

Off to the right of this complex are some gazebo looking things and a walkway that leads up to the artificial mountain as well as out to the river.  Off we go to explore.

The winding path leads to the river as well as an active temple, the Parahyangan or Twin Pole Temple, where we have read some locals still hold ceremonies.  The icons are all dressed in the traditional sarongs, and the lanterns and other tall penjors – those umbrella looking structures on top of tall bamboo poles used in Bali celebrations are strewn around as well. 

Back on the “main” path, we start uphill toward the artificial mountain, looking awfully real these days with all the overgrown trees and shrub.  Around the back of the mountain is a totally overgrown temple – looking like the Lost Ark of Raiders fame – With a viewing area and signs all over telling you not to go down there.  Yeah, we’re not even thinking about it.  There is way too much jungle out there – and we’ve successfully avoided anything that resembles a snake so far – we want to keep that record going!

Circling away from the Lost Ark temple, we end up back at the crocodile lagoon, just on the other side, before heading back to the theater where we began, only this time going inside to see the seating ampitheater and the great graffiti inside.  Wild!  There is a balcony area we aren’t even going to try to explore – unh uh, it is dark up there and we aren’t that adventurous! As well as the ruins of the restroom – complete with a tree growing out of the sink!

Circling back to the mountain, we circumnavigate it from the other side, where there is actually a sign for the Lost Temple!  See, it is the Raiders of the Lost Ark!!! As well as some great long views across the lagoon to the falling down atrium building.  Inside the shell of some pavilion on the edge of the lagoon, we find more park inhabitants – snails! And fortunately, besides the mosquitoes (why we are covered from head to toe), nothing more exciting from an insect/animal perspective.

Wow!  What a great time!  We realize we’ve wandered around for almost 2 hours in here.  Well worth the 20K rupiah admission – real or otherwise!

Finally out of the festival grounds, we can now take off our overshirts and jackets.  Phew.  That was a relief!  Then decide to walk down the beach promenade walk for a bit, which gives us a great perspective on the festival grounds from the ocean side.  When we were inside the grounds, you could hear the waves crashing against the shoreline, but you couldn’t see how close you were to the beach because of the overgrown jungle.  Now you can see just how close the festival grounds come – they’re right there by the beach lane.  Close enough to see the graffiti at the apex of the atrium – something we didn’t clearly see when we were inside.  Fun.

Walking down the beach the other way, we pass a little shrine where a big ceremony was taking place (didn’t feel comfortable taking pictures) then back out onto the street to walk up the hill away from the beach to the Margot Riverside restaurant we had researched for our lunch.

We’re the first customers – of course we are, as it is really still sort of early, just barely after 11am – and have a lovely table right at the end of the deck overlooking the river.  The server is adorable, sweet and nice and so overly respectful – we just loved him and the service.  We end up ordering an appetizer of Smoked beef and ragout risoles.  Haven’t got a clue, but the explanation of smoked beef, mozzarella cheese, potato, carrot, onion wrapped with home made risole sounded interesting.  Oh my! And it was – first of all, it was huge! This deep fried panko crusted sort of ham and cheese and chopped potato wrap.  Crazy good – crazy too much food! 

For our “main” meal, I ordered the Mie Goreng Seafood – excellent!  Little fish balls, which were actually sliced thin like little compressed fish baloney slivers or something, a couple of really nice shrimp, some squid and tons of excellent noodles as well as sauce.  Ed ordered the Mie Godog Jawa, thick egg noodles in a broth with meatballs.  Both so great – and so filling!  Dinner will be hard to come by tonight!

Lunch handled, we order a Grab and head back to the Villa for the pool.  Did I mention it is abhorrently hot and humid?  That pool is a godsend!  We hung out at the Villa the rest of the afternoon in the rain.   Definitely the rainy season here.  Adi, the Villa manager told us it has been even rainier than usual and last week was just awful (thank you climate change)!  We’re still stuffed from lunch, so decide not to bother dodging the raindrops and stay in for dinner of eggs and toast.  Works perfectly!  In combination with a night of TV and we are happy campers on Bali day 3.