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This journal will cover the night of June 17-19.

Ah Bali, Paradise as they say. Well our first experience in Bali was getting off the plane onto the runway, not a large tube directly connected to the airport, but onto the runway. Then we were transported from there in a bus to the airport. This is a very small airport, but I believe it was created just to accomodate the flood of tourists into Bali. I also lost my cell phone in this airport because they did not have plastic bins to place your valuables in as they are x-rayed, so I placed my black cell phone on the black conevor belt and never saw it again. Another interesting note: one of the night clubs in Kuta beach was bombed in 2002, with this in mind this airport did not have metal detectors. This is the first airport I have ever seen without metal detectors, and for such a high risk area this is very suprising. From there we went to a booth that books hotels and we booked the first one offered. When we arrived in our hotel we realized that it was not so nice and only stayed one night there.

Kuta beach is the most popular beach on Bali. It caters to surfers and many of them seem to be from the U.S. and Australia. As expected there are many vendors selling the ever too popular shirts advertising the local beer as well as selling local handy crafts. The vendors here are the most aggressive we have seen on our entire trip. They come up to you as you walk the street almost begging you to buy what they are selling. Vendors are also allowed to sell near the beach but not on it, but many ignore this law and walk up to you as you are relaxing. We encountered one massage lady that went as far as to start to massage Zara's foot as she tried to sell us her services. Many times we were swarmed by multiple vendors all asking us to buy what they are selling, pineapple, massage, bracelet, blow gun set with sharp arrows.

The beach here is very crouded, but the waves are almost perfect every day. I honestly think the waves were about 5 feet. I have never experienced surf this clean yet this rough. Zara and I were once amazing body boarders in Florida, so we decided to pick up the sport again and try our hand at Bali waves. The first day went well, the waves were easy to catch and the ocean was not too choppy. Day two was a different story, the waves were bigger than the day before and the ocean was quite choppy. On Zara's first attempt she was plowed over by a large wave, tumbling her head over heels. She hurt her back and called it a day. I kept at it for another hour or so only catching a few waves, mostly getting hammered by waves that seem like they were trying to kill me.

Next point of interest, in Kuta beach Zara and I are celebrities. We are absolutely famous. We are known around Indonesia as The Lounging White People, and we must have our own T.V. show. See, there was a school group in Kuta beach from another island in Indonesia and every ten minutes or so they would come up to us and ask if they could take a picture. We assumed, at first, that they wanted us to take a picture of them. NO! They wanted a picture with us. This happened no less than six times during our two day stay in Kuta beach. It really made us feel special at first, but after one or two pictures the kids seem to see us as targets and sought us out. But it was fun taking pictures with the kids because they were so excited about being on Kuta Beach.

Now we are onto Ubud to experience some local culture.

Sorry about the lack of pictures lately, we have been taking many, but it takes too much time to upload them and the computers here in Bali have a very slow conection. I promise we will upload some soon.

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