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We are Ian and Cassie from California. Welcome to our little slice of the world wide web. We are checking off our bucket list of places around the world and sharing all our tips with you! 

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Sacred Monkey Forest

Thanks to Eat, Love, Pray, most people now know where Ubud is. If you don't though, it is a small very quiet, peaceful village in the middle in Bali, Indonesia. Since the movie release the village has obviously become more touristy. Once you are there, you will see why. That's for another blog though. We are here to talk about monkeys. We had heard about this place and knew we had to go. Anytime we see animals, we usually have to stop. It's just what we do.

 

History/Mission

Before we dive into the monkeys themselves, I want to point something out. When we travel or know someone who is traveling, we ALWAYS encourage to completely dive into their culture so you can understand the passion of the locals and the mission behind it all. The Monkey Forest is considered a sanctuary but also a sacred place. The mission and meaning behind the forest is far more moving and inspiring then we expected. This place was created to practice the concept of what Hinduism calls, Tri Hita Karana. To sum up what this means, it is “Three ways to reach spiritual and physical well-being”. Tri Hita Karana's concept is to maintain three harmonizing relationships (Humans & The Supreme God, Humans and Humans, Humans and the environment). I won't take up too much of your time about the history because I truly believe Monkey Forest Ubud has already summed it up in the best possible way.

 

Information/Things to Know

  • They are open from 8:30am 5:30pm. Just like all tourist places, your best bet is to show up early to avoid lines. We went mid day and had no lines to deal with but there were a lot of people.

  • It cost 40,000 IDR for children (~ $2.50 USD) and 50,000 IDR for adults(~ $3.50 USD).

  • Make sure EVERYTHING flashy or grabbable is put away. All jewelry, phones, food, or bottles. THEY WILL REACH! We did exactly this, and it still wasn't good enough! The pockets on the side of your backpack should be empty. We had hand sanitizer dangling on the backpack and they tried to take it. We moved it to the side pocket, and yes you guessed it, he came back and took it. We felt so bad.

  • You can purchase bananas once you are inside and interact with them. Just remember they are wild animals, do not tease them or fight with them over the food. If you try to hide any food, we can guarantee they can smell it and do anything they need to do to get it from you.

  • DO NOT SMILE TOO BIG!!! Showing too much teeth is a sign of dominance so don't let them see it. You will be in their territory, so they obviously will not appreciate that.

  • Just be respectful and remember you are a guest in their area. They are a pleasure to be around if you treat them correctly.

  • If you have kids, talk to them about the dangers of scarring and teasing. We saw some out of control children in there and we were so worried the monkeys were going to lash out.

 

Exploring Around

The forest is about 27 acres and has more then 115 different species of trees. There are more then just monkeys though. There are different areas of the forest that contains temples, amazing views of nature and they hold a cultural dance every couple hours. Make sure you go into the back forest. It was so beautiful and picture perfect. In my opinion, if you take your time and enjoy everything it took about 3 hours. We got overwhelmed with feeding the monkeys and that took up most of our time!


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