We pass through candidasa, a living testament to idiocy. This story’s been told a hundred times, but I’ll summarize it here. Once there was a small fishing village called Candidasa. Lots of fruit, lots of fish. A beautiful white sand beach, awesome snorkeling right off shore, and maybe some surf too. So there were a few small bamboo hotels on the beach for backpackers. In the late 70’s some enterprising hoteliers decided candidasa was big time, and built a bunch of concrete buildings. Unfortunately, the concrete bids were contracted out to the locals, who obtained material for the concrete from the coral reef right off shore. Quick easy money, they were paid by the ton. So eventually the reef is broken up and made into hotels. Ok, so no reef anymore, no snorkeling, no fish. Bummer. But then the surf came in and washed away the beach too. Government comes in and builds seawalls, but too late. Today, 30 years later, we have a bunch of hotels with no beach, no coral, no nothing. Then Ketut chimes in that in the ‘90s the state oil monopoly put in a gasoline refinery on the shore a few miles away from candidasa. This being Indonesia, there are frequent spills, so now you wouldn’t want to swim in the water either, it reeks of oil product. Sweet. Civilization rocks. What was surprising to me, I thought that the whole place folded, noone in their right mind would go there, the hotels must have long ago crumbled to dust, but not so. As we drove through candidasa we spotted many restaurants half-filled with tourists. Surprising to us since at the current time there are very few tourists in Bali. Why are they in Candidasa? Do they know something we don’t? They looked like hip backpackers…

Outside of town we’re presented with a view of the waterfront. I snapped a few shots from the car. It looks better than I’d expect, but not by much.

Right after Candidasa we pass the entrance to the AmanKila, and exclu$ive Aman resort. Huh? Is there a discount for oil spill? Must have some other redeeming qualities.