The trick is to get lost.

Not too far from my homestay in Bedulu is Goa Gajah, the elephant cave. It's one of those tourist traps that would pretty firmly fall into the Tour De Crap category (sorry, Dad), and everyone I've talked to about it has told me it's boring. It's where my ibu has her tourist stuff shop, and if she didn't work there I probably wouldn't ever have gone to check it out. Still, there's a vegetarian warung across the street, so yesterday I headed over there for lunch and my Tourist Moment of the week.


That's the mouth of the cave. The European guy whose name I forget who renamed the place Goa Gajah thought it was a carving of an elephant. He was wrong. I'm pretty sure it's one of the major spirits in the Balinese arcana, though I forget the exact details. Inside the cave, there's a statue of Ganesh and a couple of other carvings. Like people had told me, not terribly interesting.

I'd heard there was another cave somewhere in the vicinity, so I went exploring. After heading across a rice field and down some stairs, the concrete pathway branched. To my right, it continued, probably to a temple. To my left, it was a dirt path with a sign that said "Jungle Temple." I decided I was reasonably intrigued, and followed it.

After a couple of minutes of walking, I ran into a guy whose job it was to take donations. I looked at the register -- everyone had donated 15,000-20,000rp ($1.50-$2.00) -- and I decided I was too cheap to go see what the fuss was about. I told the guy I didn't have enough money, but I'd come back another day since I live in Bedulu. Either he was a really nice guy or happy that I spoke bahasa Indonesia with him, because he let me through without paying. I meant to pay him a bit on my way out, but for reasons that will soon become clear, I never got the chance.

I kept walking down the path, a couple of times running into women selling water, fruit, etc. Finally, I ran into a woman who chatted with me for a few minutes, asking me where I was staying and why I spoke Indonesian. She showed me a path down to the river, saying I could go swimming (I opted not to), or cross a bridge, see some meditation caves, and make my way back to the parking lot across the river. As I was following her, I slipped -- Birkenstocks aren't great for hiking -- and landed pretty hard on my knee. It's fine (only a colorful bump), but I should have taken it as a sign to turn around.

After I gave her some money, she left me on the path. I continued down the slope to the river, all the while dodging enormous troupes of ants that wanted to climb up my legs.

Then I saw the bridge. Picture the quintessential rickety southeast Asian bridge: four big bamboo trunks lashed together and stuck above the river, held there by what looked mostly like sheer willpower. I don't know how I convinced myself to cross it. I basically ran-walked across it, scurrying as fast a I could without slipping. It probably wouldn't have been horrible if I'd fallen -- it was only a ten foot drop or so into reasonably calm water -- but I had my camera and didn't much feel like taking it for a swim.

When I got to the other side, I realized there probably wouldn't be a way to get back over the river and scrambled back over the bridge. I tried to climb up to the path by another route, but my way was blocked by wet, slick rocks and a couple of terrifyingly large spiders. I don't know why I didn't try to go up the way I'd originally come down. By this time, it had started to rain -- maybe I thought it would be too slippery.

So, I crossed the bridge again, and miraculously it held my weight once more. I checked out the caves -- which were, admittedly, pretty cool -- and then followed a path upriver, the direction from which I'd come. Then the path dead-ended. It looked like it might continue up the slope, so I followed it, figuring that at the top of the ravine there would probably be people (at this point I was pretty sure I knew vaguely where I was.) After a muddy scramble, I made it to the top. Sure enough, I emerged onto a back road.

I asked two guys siting on a bale (sort of like a big veranda/pagoda/porch thing) where I was. They replied with the banjar (neighborhood) name, which wasn't much help, so I asked how to get to Bedulu. (A few minutes later I realized I'd asked them how to get to "the biggest road" rather than "a bigger road." No wonder they were confused at first.) They pointed me in the right direction. I set off down the back road, avoiding some frighteningly mean dogs, and asking people every once in a while how to get to Bedulu. They were all helpful, if a little weirded out by my muddy attire. Ultimately, I ended up on the slightly-less-back road that I took home from Mas when I was learning to make masks. I was incredibly relieved to know exactly where I was.

I headed back to Goa Gajah, it being on the way home, to tell Ibu that I wasn't lost or dead or anything. It had been less than an hour all told, so she wasn't too worried, but she laughed at my story. She gave me some water and sent me home to shower. Later that night, she made fun of me some more.

So yeah, Goa Gajah the tourist attraction was pretty dull. But if you do it right, it's pretty fun. The trick, of course, is to get lost.