Day 171-172: Padang Bai to Sanur, Bali

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Thursday, July 16th

We had a wonderful nights sleep and woke to the sound of the waves crashing on the first white beach we'd seen since coming to Bali. Ahhh... sweet bliss. With stiff legs we stumbled down the stairs to breakfast. Afterwards we said goodbye to Tani, because she was catching the shuttle to Ubud and we were of to Sanur, a coastal area in eastern Denpasar.

There's something about Padang Bai. We don't know why, but we both really like the town. Maybe it's the nice room, the view, the good restaurants and the tons of dive operators that made us sad to leave. Unfortunately it's way too expensive to stay here so we set of for Sanur.

The road started out as a nice double lane but soon faded into a more typical Balinese road; potholed, very bumpy and narrow, trucks taking up most of both lanes, and cars and bikes coming at us from every direction.

Once in Sanur we drove around looking for the road where all the hotels are located. We stopped at a bank to see if we could deposit money for Ocean-Sun, but were unable to. When we got back in the car Ferdi didn't put on his seat-belt. Before we could say "piggy wiggy wiggy" we were surrounded by five police officers on scooters, signaling for us to pull over. And so started our first confrontation with foreign cops...

We must've seemed like easy prey. Two of them leaned into Talita's window and, speaking loudly in very broken English, they indicated that they pulled us over because Ferdi wasn't wearing his seat belt. Fair enough, but we knew exactly what they were really after. They said we broke the rules. That's a laugh! What about all the people who overload their bikes and ride without helmets (some on the wrong side of the road)? What about all the people parking, driving and overtaking wherever and whenever they please? It's bloody obvious that there are no rules on these roads!
They asked for the car's registration. When we gave it to them they said it was a copy and therefore invalid. We said that that's not our problem and they should take it up with the owner (down in flames went Plan #1).
Then they wanted to see Ferdi's international driver’s license. We let them see it (Plan #2 ejected from the wreckage that was Plan #1).
Then they said they'd give us a ticket and we had to go to court tomorrow. We told them to go ahead and write the ticket (Plan #3 suffered massive parachute failure). One guy half-heartedly started to write on an old, dirty, folded, pink piece of paper.
Then one of the other guys wanted to keep Ferdi's license. Bad move on their part. The whole thing was designed to intimidate us into paying a bribe, but all it did was make us furious! On the best of days neither of us can stand a copper (we are from corrupt South Africa after all) and these extortionist criminal cops were just too loud, stupid and pushy. We flat out refused and in loud voices said that they should take us to the nearest police station where we could sort out the matter (Plan #4 crashed and burned).
After we repeated this statement a few times, growing angrier with each repetition, they finally clicked that they weren't gonna see any of our cash so they stopped wasting their time and gave us "a warning". We drove off exhilarated by the confrontation and super chuffed that we'd manage to stare down five corrupt foreign coppers. Oink oink! See ya later!

We found the big scuba shop we'd heard about and browsed their books and gear, but since we're not gonna dive again soon we just enjoyed the browsing. By this time it was almost lunch and we were starving so we found a nice restaurant, had lunch, then went in search of a place to stay. All the places were really expensive, but after walking down a few small streets we found a place that was at least semi-affordable, so we picked up our car and booked ourselves in.

Later we went to get cash and found a shop where we could get a few supplies like Milo cereal, milk, chocolate, beer and Sprite. We almost forgot to get the water, which was why we went there in the first place.

Back at home we sat outside enjoying real chocolate for the first time in we-can't-even-remember-because-it's-been-so-long. We also tried to run a bath, but the warm water ran in a trickle that soon turned cold. At least we had chocolate! Talita was adamant to have that bath and did so in the luke warm water. Ferdi decided to give that event a skip.

One cool thing about Sanur is that there are a few restaurants with free wi-fi. We had dinner at one of these fine establishments called The Porch Cafe. We had huge and delicious burgers and did some admin. Ahhhh... It's good to have western food and wi-fi!

Today's highlights:
1. Arriving in Sanur.
2. Staring down five cops.
3. Finding a semi-affordable place.
4. Really real chocolate!
5. Huge burgers and free wi-fi.

Thought for the day:
For such a long and difficult day we sure have a lot of highlights!

Friday, July 17th

Our arrival in New Zealand is fast becoming a reality and we've started to shift our focus away from Asia. We'll be a little sad to leave, but we must admit, we've had our fill of Asia. We'll return anytime, but for now we'd like some order, some peace and quiet, and some western input.

We've started to read our NZ guidebook and we're very, very excited. Over the past few months we've kinda viewed our arrival in NZ as the end of our trip, but now we're starting to see that it's a whole new adventure (and if we're lucky, a whole new life)! Ah, we can’t wait!

After breakfast we dropped off our laundry, went to the bank and deposited the outstanding money we owed Ocean-Sun, then drove around Sanur. We found a small road leading to the beach where we took a couple of pictures and Talita got haggled by one friendly lady and one rude lady, both wanting to massage her. Oi, we're back in vulture country. The beach was okay, but it's strange that none of the beaches in all these "tropical paradises" we've visited compares to ours in South Africa, Mozambique and Zanzibar.

Soon we were starving and went back to The Porch Cafe where Talita enjoyed another huge burger and Ferdi had a fantastic pie and real mashed potatoes. We also had a piece of mouth-watering chocolate cake while we sorted out a few things on-line.

Back in our room we had a nap, then went to pick up our laundry. While packing we got rid of a few things, but we might need to get rid of a few more before we fly. Dinner was at The Porch Cafe again. We stand firmly by our philosophy of "Get while the getting is good."

We only have three more nights in Asia. What a thought!

Today's highlights:
1. Easy banking.
2. Delicious lunch with chocolate cake.
3. Emails from friends and family.

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Photos

What a view!
Padang Bai

Oh wow!
Look at them burgers!

Lonely boat
Sanur beach