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Thanks to Indonesia only giving a 30 day visa on arrival, and the fact that it's so difficult to renew, we decided the easiest way to deal with it was to fly out of the country for a couple of nights and then fly right back in to receive another 30 day stamp. The alternative would have been to spend three half days at the immigration office, going through the motions to extend it. Not fun, especially with little kids in tow. The cheapest flight we could find was with Air Asia (of course!) to Kuala Lumpur. It was time to go explore our first big city of the trip! Despite the multiple days of travel, we tried to squeeze in as many fun activities for the kids as possible. Here's our last few days...
Day 1: Nusa Lembongan to Sanur by Speed Boat
We got the fast public boat off the island and were back in Sanur a smooth 30 minutes later. After checking back into our home stay where we'd stayed several times before, we lost no time in going back to Peek-a-Boo cafe indoor play center. The kids loved it!
Day 2: Fly Bali to Kuala Lumpur
We had a late afternoon flight so decided to burn Jake and Kyla's morning energy at Peek-a-Boo cafe again. At noon we checked out of Touring Sanur Home Stay and took a taxi to the airport. Driving by all of the statues and temples reminded me of when we first arrived. Kyla and Jake had been so excited to see it all!
Once at the airport, we got our boarding cards and were amused to see that Kyla and Jake had been put together in row 5, and Scott and I were placed together 20 rows behind. That could have made for a relaxing flight, for us at least! I'm not sure about the unfortunate person sat next to an unsupervised three- and four-year old, however! Of course, we rearranged ourselves to each sit with one child, but that made it kind of confusing when our pre-ordered meals arrived. I wasn't going to eat mac 'n' cheese with ribena (but in retrospect it might have been better than the adult meal!)
For the first time ever in all of my flying days, they weighed hand
luggage. It was supposed to be 7kg or less but I'd crammed a ton of the kids' books into hand luggage to make room in the big luggage for some heavy wooden souvenirs we'd bought. I held my breath as they put it on the scale. It was definitely more than 7kg but they let it through. Phew! I'm guessing they are used to people trying to carry super heavy stone souvenirs out of Bali in their hand luggage!
The flight went without anything special to note, apart from an exploding water bottle incident yet again. The kids' water bottles are the non-spill kind with a built-in straw. As the plane ascends, the pressure in the bottle increases, and when you go to open it it sprays everywhere in a crazy fountain. We found this out the hard way on our first flight from the US to London. Now, nine months later, we still keep forgetting and this day was no exception. It was Kyla that reached for her bottle. Luckily Jake and I were in the aisle visiting, and Jake took the brunt, shielding the people across the way. Good job, Jakey! He was pretty upset
though and screamed the plane down until I got him into new clothes.
Speaking of things exploding, I then got Jake to sit down with his iPad. He was playing a game where you pretend to be doing a science experiment at school and add chemical drops to a volcano to make it erupt. He got really into it and repeatedly shouted, "It's exploding, it's exploding!" at the top of his lungs. I'm surprised he didn't get me arrested. Similarly, several flights ago Kyla insisted on carrying her deflated blow-up airplane toy onto a flight, and then announced loudly, "Mommy, can you blow up the plane now?" Yikes!
We somehow landed in KL without being arrested and were met at the airport by a pre-arranged taxi. It really did make it easy and hassle-free. We were soon cruising along the freeway past skyscrapers, the driver using his automatic pass to get through all of the toll gates without even stopping. Malaysia is always so modern-feeling compared to the rest of SE Asia, at least in KL. It took just over an hour to get to our hotel in the center. It was actually a
high-rise apartment, and we were given an electronic pass each to get through the security gates, much like in a subway train situation. We later got in trouble with the guard for all piling through together, oops!
The apartment was on the 18th floor. It was very modern and clean, all done in white and gray, and had a full kitchen and even a little dining/sitting area. The view was pretty cool, of the space needle type tower, but I wasted no time in checking out the balcony safety. A piece of glass was all that separated us from certain death, but it seemed very strong and secure. Still, looking down over the edge gave me a dizzy feeling. I've never been good with heights!
Within sheer minutes the pristine apartment had been turned into a disaster zone with one mattress put on the floor, Jake's wet clothes spread out to dry, and several other essential bits of "stuff" pulled out of our bags. The Tomasis had arrived!
It was really late by now so we snacked the kids on cookies and crackers before all shuffling into bed by 10pm.
Day 3: Kuala Lumpur Sightseeing
Today was a day off from travel, but we made up for it with city activities. We'd read about a huge outdoor playground near the famous Petronas twin towers, so we made that our first stop, before the day got too hot. I had fun trying to get photos of the kids' playground with the towers as a backdrop while Jake and Kyla ran around getting hot. It only lasted about 45 minutes until they were begging for air-conditioning, so it was the perfect time to head to the nearby aquarium. We'd not had any breakfast yet but luckily there was a food court right in the lobby of the aquarium. Unlucky for us, it was mostly catering to local tourists so most places served noodles or rice only. When it comes to breakfast, I can't stomach Asian food first thing in the morning, so I was glad when we spotted a Starbucks in the middle of all the noodle stalls, I'm ashamed to admit!
After a not-so-healthy breakfast we headed into the aquarium. It turned out to be better than I'd anticipated, which is
always nice. The kids had a lot of fun exploring around and seeing everything. It was like a touch of home. The grand finale is a glass tunnel where you are surrounded by sharks and rays and all types of big fish. I think the kids were fished-out by then, though, as they were more interested in crawling on the moving walkway than looking at the sharks overhead!
We lured the kids out of the aquarium with the promise of ice cream and then headed to the food court in the petronas towers for a subway sandwich. At last something healthy! After watching the dancing fountains for a while, we set off in search of a monorail train station. We thought the kids might like to see the city from above. It turns out there's three different rain systems, so it was a bit confusing. We got onto a monorail finally, and Jake liked it but Kyla was a bit disappointed. We'd referred to it as a "sky train" and she'd been expecting it to fly in the sky!
That night, Jake was in meltdown mode after going to bed so late the night
before so we just ate at the cafe on the ground floor of our apartment building. It turned out to be great food and it even had some giant stuffed dogs. Anything to keep the kids entertained! We then headed home for an early night as we had to leave for our flight back to Indonesia early the next morning.
Day 4: Fly Kuala Lumpur to Lombok, Indonesia
Our flight was pushed back an hour, according to an email we received in the middle of the night. This meant that our frantic bid to leave the apartment at 8am turned into a leisurely 9am start. What a difference an hour makes! The kids were again sat together but many rows in front of us, which is crazy! The flight passed quite quickly and we arrived in Lombok three hours later. As you exit the airport, Lombok is immediately much poorer looking than polished Bali, with litter strewn all over the grassy lawn area. We jumped in a taxi up to the town of Senggigi. It was all very rural and pleasant looking along the way, with rice paddies, palm trees, and mosques every few minutes, all
belting out the call to prayer. I'd bought the kids a chocolate milk carton each to hydrate them after the flight, and I took a quick sip as I handed Jake's to him, trying to avoid it spilling. Instantly I realized my mistake. It was coffee, not chocolate milk. Oops! Luckily he'd not had any yet. I'd hate to see Jake wired on coffee at bedtime! Our hotel turned out to be located on a quiet alley full of howling dogs, so after we checked in, we got a taxi down to the minimart to buy a gourmet dinner for our room of white bread, apples, yoghurt, and grapes. We then got into bed, ready for our final travel day in the morning.
Day 5: Sengiggi to Gili Air
Whoever put blackout blinds in our room in Sengiggi, thank you! But I hope it wasn't the same person that decided putting a frosted glass door on the bathroom was a good idea. It wasn't. The morning sun streamed in like a lighthouse, waking us up. Miraculously, Jake slept in. After breakfast, we jumped into a meter cab to Bangsal port. Taxis are not allowed to go
the final one kilometer so we had to transfer to a horse and cart, much to Jake and Kyla's delight. As we arrived at the port, every tout in the world descended on us. Jake was starting to get difficult so we just bought a private charter as we just needed to get on our way. We ended up getting screwed though, as another ten people then jumped onto our "private charter", all paying only a fraction of what we paid would be my guess. Oh well, it set off a few minutes later and within seven minutes we were pulling into the harbor at Gili Air.
We'd decided not to book accommodation as it's so hard to predict how it will actually be compared to the online description, so now we had to start looking. With two kids and a rolling suitcase in tow, it's much harder than in our true backpacking days. We got another pony and carriage to Manta Dive, where I left Scott with the kids and our luggage while I went off in pursuit of the perfect room. It was a bit depressing at first, with rooms both cheap and expensive being
dark wood and not sealed, meaning you'd need to use a mosquito net. We'd discovered in The Philippines that mosquito nets are a pain with little kids. About the fifth place I enquired in, I finally took a room at Mawar Bungalows. It was concrete and sealed, making it so much better from a mosquito perspective, and the owner, Chill, said he'd put an extra mattress on the floor for free. All in all, it cost us 300,000 rupiah (about $22) for an air conditioned room (but with cold water shower) and it included breakfast for all of us. A bargain! It was only two minutes walk back from the beach but the trail was pretty off-putting, full of garbage and burning piles of rubbish. Oh well, it'd do nicely for a day or two until we found the perfect place.
That afternoon we checked out the cute restaurants overlooking the sea and, as it was low tide, went tide-pooling. We saw a lot of cool stuff - hermit crabs with shells decorated with urchins, tiny baby leaf fish swimming vertically, a plaice, urchins, sea slugs with big mouths grabbing at the water... The kids loved it!
On our way back to our room we saw a huge monitor lizard, which looks much like the famous Komodo dragon.
After a cold shower (the kids barely got in enough to get clean ?) we went out to dinner but we had to make it snappy as Jake was tired and in meltdown mode again. Time to get to bed early and hope he wakes up less grumpy. Oh, how we wished we had wifi in the room!
**** Actually, don't scroll down. The photos match the text length for the first time ever! ****
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Andi and Paul
Andrea Kenyon and Paul Matthews
Ribena!
I'm so jealous that you got ribena on your flight? Who did you fly with? Also loving that an airline seats two kids so far away from their parents. Genius - bet you were tempted to just go with it for five minutes!? Hope you are continuing to enjoy Gili Air - keep an eye out for my elephant trousers. I still so regret not buying them! Enjoy chill out!