Beautiful Bali

This Summer, we decided to go to Bali. We had it all planned out, we'd go straight after school on Friday when we broke up and we'd be sitting on a beach sipping cocktails by sundown. Then the volcano decided to erupt which annoyingly closed the airport. We frantically tried to get through to air asia and the hotels we had booked to re-arrange. We were able to get flights out on Tuesday and delay our return flights by a few days too. Also, one of the hotels we were staying at very kindly allowed us to change the dates, so overall we didn't miss out on much. That didn't stop us from having a few very nervy days when we wondered if we'd get out there at all. We even had a backup of going to South Korea, but in hind sight I'm glad we didn't. I was a bit nervous on the flight over due to the ash which could evidently corrode aeroplanes. My mind was taken off this though, by an adorable Indonesian lady who sat next to Han on the plane. She was a pretty nervous flyer and grabbed hold of Han's hand as we took off. The hand stayed there for most of the flight and there was even a bit of leg grabbing. It was pretty funny to see the awkward look in Han's face as she tried to be polite, but without speaking each others' languages, it was a bit of an awkward flight. As we landed in Bali, they vowed to become facebook friends (which never happened) and then off we went. The first place we were staying in was Ubud. The first thing that struck me was how far away from the town we were. It was a good 10 minute drive out of town, but it was cool. They had a religious ceremony going on over the next few days, so there were these massive arches made of bamboo all around. The people were all dressed up too. We got to our room which seemed nice, but a bit basic. There were a few insects in the room which put me off a bit, but oh well. I saw a line of ants taking away a dead insect in our bathroom, and thought that it had looked a bit more luxurious on the website, but then again they were hardly going promote this. We went into town and met a lovely English/Aussie old couple. They recommended somewhere to eat which was lovely. It's nice how everyone you talk to and mention you are a teacher living overseas seems to think you're awesome for doing so! When we got back to the room, we tucked the mosquito net (complete with massive holes) around us and pretended like the animals wouldn't make it in. On Day 2, we decided to take a trek along the rice paddies to town. It took quite a while, but was very beautiful. We saw some massive spiders along the way which freaked me out a bit, but it was a nice walk. There were loads of people at the side of this small path selling things. It made me think. I can fully understand why the guy selling coconut milk was there, because we were thirsty and there wasn't another shop around. I do have to wonder though how much trade the art sellers got. It was inaccessible by road and you'd have to be committed to carrying around a massive painting all day if you were keen. They weren't even that cheap. I don't get how they made any money. We wandered down to a river and had some nice photos taken beside it. I'm glad we didn't go for a swim because we later found out that further upstream, people pee and poo in the river. Nice. When we got to town, we just pootled around a bit, went to some shops. The roads there were mental. Motorcyclists were just up on the pavements and most roads were 2 way but only really were 1 lane wide, with people parked both ways. It wasn't the best for conversation as when we walked places, the pavements were nonexistent or very narrow so I had to walk behind Han. I didn't mind though. In the evening we went to a place called Mozaic for dinner. It was properly awesome. You sat outside and had a taster menu. They brought a bowl of some of the different ingredients you would be having from the menu for you to smell. The waiter talked about them when they introduced the dishes. I felt properly posh and we had a great evening! Back in the hotel, we found one of the massive spiders in our bathroom. I decided not to shower that night, and made sure to tuck the mosquito net in extra tight around us that night. On Day 3, we went to the Monkey Forest. Far from me to be a judge but some of the statues there were just ridiculous. They seem to have an obsession with massive cocks and there were loads of statues of very excited animals. In addition to this, lots of them looked just plain nasty as if they wanted to do you damage. I can't imagine wanting to worship anything that looked like that, but it seems to work for the people of Bali so that's good. We went to a nice spa. I got a massage and Han got some foot stuff done. Mine was a bit awkward as an old woman in the cubicle next to me was moaning a little bit with her massage - I just tried to ignore it and thought how awkward it must be for the massage therapist! The monkeys were pretty grim. We know how aggressive they can be so kept our distance. We did see them take a woman's sunglasses though. Han and I both thought she was an idiot and smiled smugly to each other as she tried to get a local guide to get them back. We're a nice couple. Highlight of the monkey forest was seeing 2 monkeys up on a fence. One was picking stuff of the other's face - no problem so far. Then one of them just turned around and bent over. The other monkey just started poking his ass and then stuck his face in there. It was pretty explicit so of course I got a load of photos. We sent a picture of it to Hannah's parents but I don't think they liked it as much as us. That evening we went to a nice Japanese restaurant. It was lush again and the cocktails were amazing. We got a taxi home and got completely screwed over with the money. We were very passive aggressive about it though, the guy had been friendly and chatty all the way, then dropped the price on us. We just said we didn't think that it was a fair amount to pay because equivalent taxi rides had been so much cheaper. He asked us how much we thought it would be, then Han sighed and said "Don't worry Joe, I guess we'll just have to pay..." I did a very sad and dejected face to the taxi driver as we left to let him know how sad he had made us. Again, we really are a lovely couple. That night, we got all of 2 hours sleep because at 1am we had to get up to climb an active volcano. So on Day 4, we set off with a group of randoms to climb Mount Batur, an active volcano. I tried not to think about how the volcano just down the road was erupting, and just enjoy it. We were told it was cold so to wear our warmest sports clothes. We hadn't really bargained for this, so Han had on yoga pants, a sports vest and a cardigan. I only had chinos, a t shirt and a collar shirt. I looked very dapper going up the mountain. When we saw everyone else, they looked a bit better prepared than us. One keen bean even had those pole things. I was a bit nervous about how far it would be, but we managed to stay at the front the entire time and didn't get too tired out. At the top we watched the sun rise which was beautiful. But freezing. I had (obviously) got a bit sweaty on the way up and now I was cooling off in the coldest temperature we have been in this year. We huddled up and watched more monkeys steal food from unsuspecting tourists. Then we were shown around the crater and saw some smoke, and then it was time to come back down. After the mountain, we got our bags and went straight to our next hotel, near the beach in Seminyak. The room was lush and had a jacuzzi (which I made good use of), so we freshened up and went down to the beach. With all of the travelling in the day (it took around 3 hours to transfer hotels and 2 hours to get back to our hotel from the mountain), it was nearly the end of the day. We watched the sun set from bean bag chairs on the beach. There was some awesome live music and it was a really nice end to a great day. On Day 5, we just a quiet day Hannah wasn't feeling too well and it would have been a bit harsh to have left her on her own, so we just had a quiet day and watched some bootleg DVDs. We did manage to make it out in the evening and got some good sunset photos. On Day 6, we had a chilled out on the beach and then had a surfing lesson. When we turned up for the ultra beginners class, I looked around and saw a couple of larger ladies, an old couple and a family with kids. I felt pretty confident that even if I wasn't very good, then I probably wouldn't be the worst there. I was wrong. All the theory was good, and I managed to catch a few waves, but I just could not stand up on the board. As I fell off, I looked over and saw one of the family's children with a big grin on his face stood up on a wave. One of the large ladies passed me whilst standing on their board. Turns out I'm just not very good at balancing, so need more practice. It was really fun though and we decided we definitely wanted to go again! I think I pissed Han off because I was so grumpy because I wasn't immediately good at it. She was patient though and in the end I stopped being miserable. We got very burned from the beach, we stayed under a parasol all day, but as I later read, this does not stop you from getting burned (news to me). So we were all lobstered up for the next few days. Even as I write this over a week later, I still have some absolutely ridiculous tan lines. We went for dinner in an awesome place called Mama San. The food was delicious and the atmosphere was great too. I had pork ribs for about the 3rd of 4th time this trip! It's not easy to get in KL so I was making the most of it! On Day 7, I made the mistake of renting a scooter. We didn't need to show passports or driving license to get one, just have a small amount of money. I did however pack plenty of 50,000IDR packets for police bribes if we were stopped (as is the custom). We went on a little adventure to Uluwatu temple which is a cliffside temple which overlooks the sea. Getting there was a nightmare. The roads are even more mental than in KL or Ubud. I literally had to go on the pavement at times and had to do an emergency stop when someone decided to turn right in front of us. We managed to make it though (somehow) and went round the temple. It was very beautiful and a bit scary. The path was just casually next to some bushes which concealed the cliff. Then you got to a part where you were on the cliff edge. I tried to be all brave and go near it, but the photo showed that I was still a good 3m back from the edge. We went back home after and had a delicious dinner in a place called Watercress. Day 8 wasn't the most cultural, but was possibly the most fun. We borrowed bicycles from our hotel and set off early to Waterbom water park. Even cycling was a nightmare on the roads, but we got there in 1 piece. We managed to get there before the park was too busy, so got virtually no queues for the first couple of hours. We went on a few which were pretty standard for water parks, sharing a rubber ring, going down a fast ish slide. Then there was the race on a mat one. I've done these before. You each get a mat, go on your front and go down a bumpy but generally quite gentle slope and see who wins. This one was different. As both Han and I are competitive, we were going for it. All the tricks, like lifting the front of the mat up for more speed, leaning into corners. Anyway it was going pretty well, we were going fast in a completely covered tube, then from nowhere appears this drop. It was the steepest drop I've ever been down and I'm not exaggerating when I say that I came away from the slide for the entire drop. It was terrifying. I beat Han though and managed to bag some man points for being brave so it's all good. The other scary on was a trap door one. You stand in a case and it counts down, then a trap door below you opens and you drop into a slide. We did the less scary one. The scary one was mental. The tube was pretty much vertical and open the whole way down. I always worry that these things are build for people with slighter body sizes than me, and that I would overload the system by being too tall or heavy and fly out the side. After Waterbom we went back and relaxed for a bit. I can't remember where we went, but according to the photos we got some nice cocktails and looked happy. - UPDATE - I believe the cocktails were at a beach club called Potato Head which was really cool. The waiter was so friendly. It overlooked the sea, played awesome music and had cool cocktails. On Day 9, we were idiots. We were walking into town when a man stopped us, saying he wasn't selling things. He gave us each a ticket and I "Won" a promotional T shirt for a Hotel he was working for. Hannah won the star prize!!! It was either: a 7 night stay in a hotel in Bali (decent prize as we want to come next year), or $500 US which is awesome or an Ipad. All of them looked good. All we had to do was be shown around a new hotel which was around the corner for 1 hour and then we'd claim our prize. I knew it was a sales meeting but all 3 of the prizes looked good, and it was only 1 hour.... When we got there it turned out we weren't being shown round a new hotel, but a dickhead named Gavin was going to hard sell a holiday membership to us. We were there for over 2 hours. It started off very genial, he was obviously trying to make small talk and connections, but as the meeting wore on we grew more and more pissed off. The trouble was, he was showing us how we could stay at 5 star hotels for a cheap price, but the problem is we really enjoy the cheap boutique hotels we pick out ourselves. All the resorts he showed us looked soulless. We politely declined, but he carried on his talk, then eventually we told him we really liked what we currently did on our holidays and didn't want to go to any of the resorts he showed us irrespective of price. Then he turned a bit nasty and basically slagged off our choice of holiday and said that the prize we are going to get will not be great as they don't waste their time sending people to their nice hotels. What a bloke. Anyway, we won the holiday, but think we will give it to mum as if we went on it, we would be reminded of what we did to get there! After that we had a lovely lunch and another bit of spa. This one was less moany and awkward, so we had a great time. On the way home we went to the famous Hog Wild restaurant and had some delicious ribs. As I'm writing this I'm asking Hannah if we can go to their KL branch for dinner tonight - they are that good. - UPDATE - she said YES!!! Boom get in! On our final day, we just chilled out by the beach and went surfing again. we did it for a couple of hours, and I kind of managed to stand up twice. It was a lot more fun without trying to compare myself to everyone else and I had a great time. Han was a lot better than me, but I am hoping that won't last long. We went back to Watercress for dinner because it's lush. I felt really lucky, because although I was feeling a little bit of the blues to be leaving the next day, I love it so much in KL that it didn't really feel that sad. It's only a 3 hr flight so it's not a massive whole day of travelling either which is nice! To top is off, here are a few photos of us on the last day. We both agreed it was the best holiday we've ever been on and can't wait to back next year!!!!