Well hello all.

We have arrived in ubud. After spending 6 nights in gili trawangen, we decided to move on and give our selves lots of time to explore and enjoy ubud.

After saying our goodbye's to our friends and family, the quick realization that it was "just the two of us" set in rather quickly. After spending some time together, we quickly decided to depart from the ultra commercialization of kuta, and head straight for paradise. Well we found it!! Gili was exactly what we needed to clear our minds. After settling in a nice cheap guest house, we quickly started to make some rather neat observations.

Firstly, on our trip over, everyone was adressing me and kind of ignoring mo. (must be my dominating male nature) they would adress me like i was the BOSS!(that's me!!) Unless of course if they were selling jewlery, Then they would surely be talking to Mo.

We also observed the extremely hard working people. often men would be up until all hours of the night, even sleeping behind the counter, tending to the guest houses and being available for late night arrivals. Often, they would be up to cook breakfast for the guests before any of us were up. (and i thought scotford was long hours!) Also, with having little luxuries that we enjoy back home, people seem to be so full of joy. The gathering for a soccer match on the beach, or sitting with friends on a picnic table, were sure to draw much laughter and the realization that friends and family were more important than nice truck, or the big TV with Surround sound!

Lastly, the amount of female travellers to the Island was quite overwhelming. Lots of groups of women from Holland, Sweden, Germany, and France. mother daughter combo's. but not many male groups, that's for sure. The result, we came to understand from a local who sat down and explained it to us, was that women were seen as MONEY!!
Men would try to seduce the women so they could get close and perhaps get a free week of beer and expensive food. If monique was walking alone, or even 10ft ahead of me, guys would call out, "your beautiful" or "come have a drink with me"!! We quickly witness a few examples on the beach and witnessed the free drinks flowing to their newly found "sweetheart". I called it "trolling for women" we would laugh at the fellas throwing out lines and waiting for a bite!!!!!

On the island, we did lots of snorkelling. and both saw a sea turtle!!! It was sooo neat. He was eating on a coral reef. I just floated there and watched him. Monique was really excited, cause she caught glimpse of one from our boat, but this one was 5 feet from our face! There pretty cool to watch!

The indonesian selling style has quickly become bothersome. While laying on the beach, every 10 minutes someone would ask us to buy necklaces, or T-shirts, or REAL pearls, or dvd's or blah blah blah. what gets me is how agressive they are when you say no to them!! Even when walking on the streets in lombok or bali, everyone always asks, "taxi" or "Transport" and when you say no thanks they get agressive and walk with you, asking "where u going" "very cheap, i'll drive" or "i'll take you tomorrow". We know they are just trying to make a living, but it got old REAL Fast!!!
We almost got ripped off on the fairy ride back to Bali. The "Lombok mafia" some people call it, try to get ur money any way they can. One guy tried to take our ticket pretending to be the Fairy guard. We almost gave it to him too! We found out it was a scam so he could sell it back! Also, the transport is so tought to know if you getting ripped off.

Now that we've arrived in ubud, we think we finally got our travel legs back! Were staying at Donald homestay. Although it doesn't have a rain shower, it has an amazing indonesia style shower/bathroom that is all stone on one wall and is actually outside!!

Thank-you to everyone for all the updates!! we really enjoy hearing stories and getting oiler updates!! Hope all is well. We just recieved news that my parents have book for thailand and fly out Feb.13th (monique's birthday). Really excited to see them and show them around!!
Happy Birthday Darryl!
Happy Halloween to everyone. Are you having a pumpkin carving contest this year??
My birthday is around the corner and 27 seems OLD!!!!!

Cheers!!

steve-o and mo-fo