Heading Home

We spent Saturday at the resort.  Breakfast then sat at the quiet pool.  I would have hated to hear the noisy pool.  So after 30 minutes decided to head up to our private pool.

We packed up and went to the final dinner overlooking the beach. Good meal and we were done about 9.  Bags were picked up at 9:30 p.m. and we got on the shuttle at 10:30 for our 1:35 a.m. six hour flight to Seoul.  We were able to sleep most of the way and a smooth flight.

Arrived on time and have a 9 hour lay over here.  I'm not going to try to get Pam to hop a train into town as that has not worked well in the past.  It is a HUGE airport so there should be plenty to do here.

We are ready to be home and get back into our routines!

Bali Customs

Upon arrival at our hotel we were told that we were lucky enough to be part of Bali's celebration of cremation.  Apparently the Hindu's require cremation and if a family can't afford it the bodies are 'held' until they can or September 1st when the community has a mass cremation.

Then on the 21st and 22nd something goes on for 48 hours with loudspeakers and calling non-stop.  It is similar to the monotonous, loud, annoying, speaker at the Timber Carnival on the Fourth of July!!!

We were up at 3, 4, and @ 5 a.m. Pam told me to turn off the radio.  It just kept going. It's done now thankfully!

We took a cab to Kuta yesterday to look around and do some shopping.  I bought 3 shirts for $375,000!  I guess I'll be working for a few more years!  Found a supermarket and bought a couple bottles of wine for the same cost as a glass at the hotel.

 Shot from the smaller island and our buggy

I decided to force the group to do what we did on Safari.  Set up cocktails on the trail and wait for the sunset.  Did that a couple of nights buggying out to the rocks and it turned out great.

The Jimbaran Beach at evening from our place.

We had our Theme dinner which was a 40 minute bus ride out at a nice place with cultural skits and dances and probably 50 'actors', plus waiting staff.  We sat with Goodmonsons' and Brad Hayes who started one month before me in Portland and is an ex-attorney.

               This was the theme night!  They stole our idea and had a coconut bowling alley!!

Today we lined up a driver who took us around for 5 hours in a van.  It was a manual transmission and he didn't understand that the clutch needs to be disengaged BEFORE letting up on the gas.  Plus he was getting paid by the hour and supplying the fuel, so we rarely got up to 3rd gear.

Saw some countryside and rice paddies. And lots of traffic.

I'll try to put in some pictures, but haven't had much luck so far.

Hope all is well with ALL of our blog followers!!

 Stopped at a petrol station to use the toilet!

Three guys on a moped next to us.

Bali Digs

Here are some shots of our Bali room.  

 Bedroom, walk through closets, bathroom in the air conditioned side.

Out the bedroom side is an outdoor sitting area and pool.  No view, but we were spoiled by our first place.

Fortunately they have golf carts that can take us from our rooms that are as far away from the beach as possible.  The service is great and a large group of about 65 couples.  We know about 10 of them from other trips or in our region.

We had our 'business meeting' this morning and will try to arrange a car and driver for a tour tomorrow. 

Yes, we are finally millionaires!!! And here is proof!

The exchange rate is $14,200 Indonesia dollars to $1 US, so that is only about $70 US!

In Bali

The wifi went down the other day and no one knew how to fix it.

We made it to  Bali about noon, found our driver, stopped at a supermarket that only took cash or American Express, which I had neither. So I owe Paul over $2,000,000 since he had to cover for the golf cart as my ATM card isn't working.  I forgot to call ahead and Skype wasn't working.  I think I have that taken care of as there is high speed internet here.

I'll try loading some pictures before dinner in 45 minutes.

Nope, that ain't going to happen.  They are hiding someplace.  Had some pictures of the roaring ocean and sunset, but they are missing.

The adventure continues

I am in vacation mode, getting up a 4 the past 2 mornings, but stayed in bed until 5:45 today. That is about dawn and sunset around 6.

Two days ago we asked a guy near us if he rents out his golf cart and he made us a deal for three days.  It looks like a Hummer cart with a seat for two facing backwards.  

Paul, Sharon, & I took it for a spin for a couple of hours going by the big beach to the north, Jungutbatu, and then all the way to the north and stopped at a beach side restaurant for a brew.  It had a sand floor and looked out at the main Bali island and it's volcano (inactive at the moment).

The roads are narrow and bumpy.  Most golf cart paths are better.  I come to a complete stop when a truck passes and it's side mirror to side mirror.  Lots of scooters with two or three people and maybe a surfboard.  I only worry when one with a white driver approaches [not that I'm profiling, but it's true, it's true!]

[I was killing time waiting for a video to load that turned out to be a 50 second video of the cats chasing each other.  No cat videos here!

[This is the video I thought I was posting]

This is our view all day and night long. Can't see it at night, but can sure hear it!

Pam and Sharon had long massages Thursday afternoon, so Paul and I took the cart out to lunch and explored.

Had dinner nearby at a great location mediocre food place near by.  The owner was in a t-shirt and shorts.  We were over dressed.

Friday Pam, Paul, and I took the golf cart out.  We came upon a sea weed farm which is very shallow and farmers fill up their boats and people load it in baskets and haul it up hill and lay it on blue tarps to dry.  It is used in cosmetics.

 Harvesting the seaweed.

We followed the tourist buses (pick up trucks) that led to the suspension bridge.  We were going to walk across, but it is two way for scooters and decided against.

Here is a shot of Pam in the back of the cart.

People were unloading huge sacks on concrete from dug out boats with inches of freeboard.  One in the boat would help lift it to the carrier who waded out to the boat.  Men put them on their shoulder, women on their head.  They carried them 30 feet and dropped them in a small truck.

We drove back through the village where all homes were brick or concrete and ornate.  It must have been an upscale neighborhood.  We stopped to listen to band practice and forgot how to hold the camera, but got the 'music'.

We stopped to look at the beach to see if there were any surfers and found more women longshoremen unloading jugs of water.  They weigh 42 pounds.  There is the stack they unloaded, then carried it another 20 yards to storage.  The average wage here according to Wiki is $50,000 Indonesian $ or about $3.50.

We are going on a catamaran today, Saturday, with a snorkel stop at Crystal Bay on Nusa Penida.  About a 4 hour cruise around our two islands, Nusa Lembongan and Nusa Ceningan.

Did I mention that someone other than Pam or I 'bumped' the tempered glass stove top while opening a late night bottle of wine which shattered the top (the wine was okay).  Turns our to be a pretty expensive bottle of wine.

It is an old stove top and we emailed the owner 24 hours ago and are awaiting a response.

Our bedroom and attached open air bathroom is about 10 feet from the main house next to the pool.  Goodmonson's took the bedroom and bath in the main house.

Bali WHOA

Pam meeting the neighbors on the flight to Seoul that left Vancouver one and a half hours late and we only had a two hour layover.

The lady at the counter met us as we got off the 10 hour flight and informed us that we will miss the flight and there is no direct flight to Bali the next day, so you will fly to Singapore in a few hours, hang out there for 5 hours then fly to Bali and arrive at 11:00 a.m. on Wednesday instead of 12:10 a.m. Wednesday

I notified the hotel not to send someone to pick us up at the airport at midnight.  They thanked me and advised that my cancellation was too late and I would forfeit the full payment for the night of $28.  At least I got double miles!

Paul and Sharon met us at the airport with the driver took us through crazy traffic to the 'fast boat' launching area.

They loaded on the luggage, everyone threw their shoes in a tub to mix all kinds of funguses (fungi?)  and we wading in and hung on for dear life.

Upon arrival we were eventually tossed in the back of a small pick up truck and bounced around to our Villa.  This was taken from the other side of the small bay.  Sharon is in the round lounge chair just right of the small hut.  Very nice place with 3 air conditioned bedrooms.  Plenty of room and two cats that own the place and a shy dog that hung with me on a morning walk yesterday.  Right now, Thursday morning 7 a.m., one cat is in the bread basket on the kitchen counter/island.

Pam & I took a 10 minute walk to the other side of the bay and watched the action.  The spray would travel in the wind a hundred yards or so.  Very loud all day and night long!

We are doing well.  A couple comes in and cooks us breakfast.  Scrambled eggs, banana pancakes, fruit, toast and juice.  There is a nice restaurant 5 minutes away. We rented a 4 person golf cart to get around the island.  Very narrow rough roads, but we are pretty isolated by Sunset Beach.

More later as the wifi works, but is SLOW.

Heading Home

It's 5:00 a.m. and we made it to the Cairns airport for our 5:45 flight.

Had a great time on the reef.  There were 90 or so of us on the first vessel where we snorkeled at three sites, all pretty close to each other.  then transferred to the overnight catamaran and found our room.  Decent size for a boat.  There were 26 travelers and 14 crew.  Very attentive and personable staff.

A couple from Zurich, family of 4 from China, a couple of Brits, and a bunch of Danish kids.  We were the oldest by at least 20 years. . .  Pam being the oldest!

Had a nice dinner and then the night 'snorkel'.  The divers went out with their 'torches' and us snorkelers got to lay face down on the rear platform with our heads in the water as they threw out fish food.

Lots of fish and SHARKS were having a feeding frenzy within feet of us.  We were told to keep our fingers on the platform so we wouldn't become a stubby.

Pictures later!

We found our motel and had a short night as we checked in at 5 p.m. and out at 4 a.m.

Looking forward to getting home to some cooler weather.

Hoping all is well with our massive blog followers!!

See you soon!

Rain Forest and Cape Tribulation

We took a road trip north to the Daintree rainforest and Cape Tribulatiion.  We left about 10 a.m. and returned by 4.

First stop was the rainforest where believe it or not it was hot and muggy.  We boarded the shuttle bus for a couple mile trip up the mountain.  The windows were covered with beads of water on the outside so we couldn't see out.

Took a 30 minute hike around the walkways and trails.  Interesting and much like Jurassic Park though we didn't see any dinosaurs, only this turkey and some fish in the river.

Sorry the pictures ain't worth the effort.

On the narrow and windy road with signs to be watchful for Cassowaries, the ostrich like birds with the colorful heads.  We saw one at the 'zoo'.  We were quiet sure it was a tourism ploy, but sure enough we saw two along the way.  Stopped and Paul got some pictures that he hasn't shared with me yet.  Pretty amazing to see such huge birds in the wild.

Came to a wide river and took a ferry across to continue to Cape Tribulation where Captain Cook repaired his ship a few years ago.  Just a deserted beach.

Back on the road for lunch and another stop for ice cream.  

Got to the room to discover the A/C decided to quit, but got it on in a few minutes.  

No exciting night life today.


Today, Thursday, Pam and Sharon went shopping and Pam & I signed up for an outer reef snorkel trip for Friday.  I went in this morning with Paul at 8:00 and was going to go on my own if there was a spot available, but the only one was on a 60 passenger scuba and snorkel trip.  I signed up to tomorrow's all day, three stop, 30 person, snorkel only trip.  I took the ladies into town to shop and signed Pam up as well.  There was an older couple in the shop that went on the trip yesterday and said it was all you could imagine.  She said the skipper was quite attractive as well, but I told her I wasn't that interested.

Now to try to load the pictures.....  never mind

getting ready for breakfast for the reef trip

Snorkel Trip

We signed up for a 2 1/2 hour snorkel trip to the Low Isles on a super fast boat.  It had 3 300 hp motors  with a speed of 80 kpm, which is FAST.  There were 4 other Jones folks waiting in the lobby and only 14 people on board.

Four of those were a filming crew from the channel 9 Today show with fancy cameras and gear.  I couldn't find the clip on their web site as they expected it to show the next day at 6 a.m.

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Tina and Eric who were on our Morocco trip took the front row.

The skipper played the theme from Titanic on the way out of the harbor.  We also heard Jaws and Gilligan's Island.

Sharon and Paul donning their sexy lycra, anti jelly fish suits.  We were exhausted just getting those on.

Pam

The water was a little murky, but warm.  Saw a few medium sized fish and one small stingray.  Back in time to spend a little time at the pool, but it was HOT.

I'll try to upload this before the system crashes.  Real slow upload speeds and this blogger is frustrated.  More later. . .