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Janet's Travel Blog (Part Three - Bali Adventure)
So the last dinner of the second section of my tour joined with the first dinner of the third section of my tour. We lost six Germans and the swiss couple, but gained Alyson from Wales, Richard from London, Hannah from London, Daryl from Canada, Johanna and Celia from Italy and Romena and Sandy from Germany.
The evening was full of highs and lows. At one stage (after a cocktail or two) Gina and I decided that her giving me a piggy back ride would be a great idea! The pavement however had other ideas and when Gina tripped she was left with four big grazes on her face... oops!
Then Ellen, Alyson, Domenic, Andreas and I decided to go to Kuta from Sanur (about 15 minutes by taxi). While we were out I met Mark from Sydney. I was really excited to hear another Australian accent because I hadn't been around Australians for ages! I talked with him a good while then I realised I'd lost my camera. I was shattered! I'd mostly got over it then I had a feeling it might have fallen out of my pocket in the van over to kuta. Luckily the van driver from the hotel was sleeping in the lobby so we woke him up and I got my camera back! I was rather excited! We had a splash around in the pool for a while before crawling into bed around 5:30! Fun night!
It was quite an effort to get up then next morning. I struggled through all morning as we stopped by Tanah Lot, a Hindu temple north of Kuta, and continued the bus journey onto Ubud.
In Ubud we checked out the Monkey Forest Sanctuary where we saw lots of monkeys, some more cheeky than others. At one stage one monkey saw I had something in my pocket so it tried to reach for my pocket. I covered my pocket with my hand and it tried to pull my hand away to get inside! Cheeky monkey. It wast too bad though. One jumped on Alyson's shoulder and another grabbed into Hannah's dress while she was turning!
White water rafting was the next day. It was heaps of fun. (not as good as when I went in New Zealand, but that was pretty amazing!) As we went down the river and through the forest the views of the large river walls on each side of the river were pretty spectacular. In the afternoon a few of us went to have our feet nibbled! We sat down and put our feet in a tank of fish that eat the dead skin from your feet. The sensation was quite strange. It feels like hundreds of tiny electric shocks on your skin. At first it took me a good 5-10 minutes to get used to it but after that it was strangely comfortable! I'm not sure how much benefit you get out of it but it was nice to have my feet soaking in water for 20 minutes. That evening we saw a traditional balinese song and dance show which was good. Quite entertaining.
Ubud was really lovely. There are so many old temples and buildings with moss growing on them which gives the buildings and the whole town a quaint old feel. There were also lots of galleries and artsy places to go and see and its just a really chilled out nice place to be. Ubud is a place that is definitely recommended!
From Ubud we went to Lovina for two nights. I had a quiet afternoon catching up on some sleep from two nights out in Ubud at the reggae bar. That evening we went out for a drink at a bar with some live music. We were basically the only people there and the guy performing had a song list on each of the tables so you could yell out requests. We had all been requesting songs then I requested 'I will survive'. There were calls of "hey Janet you should go down and sing with him!" To which I replied, "No, no... oh alright!" They didn't have to work too hard to twist my arm! I ended up singing eight songs with him! It was the best fun, I loved it!
We had a snorkelling trip to Manjungan Island the next day. The snorkeling there was fantastic. When I first put my head under the water it was like seeing the fish screen wallpaper on Windows, only heaps better! We saw lots of cool fish and coral. I think the needle fish was my favorite. It was overcast the whole day and when I went to put some sun screen on all the Brits were like "gee Janet, that's a bit ambitious don't you think. You won't get burnt today..." (never take British people's advice on sun protection, especially if you are prone to sun burn...) I did put some sunscreen on, but no where near enough! I don't think my back has ever been as sunburn as it was that day! It took a good week to get over it. 3-4 days after it was still painful to change into a t-shirt. Wearing my travel back pack was agony!
I had rather a large night that evening in Lovina. Two long island iced teas and I was dancing the night away!
I had a cruisey morning followed by the bus trip to Kintamani in the afternoon. The scenery around Kintamani was beautiful. Lake Batur is in the middle and it is surrounded by the soaring Gunung (mount) Agung, Abung and mount Batur. We had a quiet afternoon and evening playing cards.
We were up early the next day to watch the sun rise over mount Agung and lake Batur from mount Batur. It was a decent hike up to the top over uneven ground. It took around an hour. Again like at mount bromo there were stacks of people there, but the sun rise was still good to watch. We had some monkeys come to watch the sun rise with us as well (actually, they were probably more interested in our food!) I think I preferred seeing mount bromo better although I really enjoyed mount Batur as well. The hike to the top and back was very satisfying. We went to a hot spring for a swim afterwards. It was very relaxing.
We had lunch at happy heart foundation, which is a place set up for caring for Balinese people with disabilities. They served us up a lovely meal and we were able to have a look at their art work and jewelry. I didn't buy anything but I was able to leave a donation.
On the bus trip from kintamani back to Sanur, Hannah and I decided that it would be funny to pinch Orasa's seat at the front of the bus. We both sat at the front of the bus and took up two seats each. I tried not to give in but in the end I let her sit next to me. She does tend to get motion sickness. We ended up having a long conversation about the differences between Aussie and British lingo. Eg, thongs vs flip flops, pants vs trousers, cooler vs esky. It was quite entertaining.
Back to sanur that evening for the last night of the tour. OMG, what a big night! We started in sanur then we all went across to kuta. Shenanigans of the evening include running into the Swedes Cecilia and Sara from the first part of the tour. Dancing on platforms at the club Bounty, Alyson stealing a New York cap off some guys head, watching the sun rise at some club in kuta. Splashing around in the pool before waving everyone off for their lombok tour. Attempting to go to bed and then realising we weren't actually that tired, so we got back up and had a swim! I eventually went to bed around 12 and slept about 4 hours after having been awake for about 33 hours straight! Crazy.
Alyson was amazing fun on the tour but also a really bad influence on Ellen and I! Too many Bintangs, cocktails, money spent and hangovers! It was worth it though. Catch phrase by the end of the tour... "I blame Alyson..." It was also entertaining helping her with her money. We had to color code it for her. Eg, if she needed to pay 60,000 rupiah, she needed a blue and purple or if she needed 150,000 she needed a red and a blue. Funny. I loved her funky little Welsh accent and she taught us cheers and also happy birthday in Welsh.
It was an amazing tour all round and each section of the tour was quite different from the others. I met lots of great people and will have lots of great memories from my first tour. :)
Stay tuned for more updates!
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