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Published: January 7th 2017
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View from bed
Nice way to wake up each morning It's been very exciting to plan and anticipate this trip together But finally the day arrived where we actually got in the taxi and headed to the airport. It's 40 degrees in Adelaide at the moment so the thought of escaping the heat for a short while is very appealing.
Anyway, flight was uneventful. Smooth with barely any turbulence. Flying time is about 5 hours so much better than the 24 hour slog to Europe. I was surprised when we flew over Bali at just how dense the housing is. It was rooftops as far as I could see. Very green but buildings everywhere.
When we landed we headed to the immigration counters and managed to find ourselves at the front of the line which was a nice change. I'm normally at the back of a queue that is longer than Rundle Mall. It seemed that the rest of the people in our plane followed us once the saw that we had chosen so well. We were all processed quickly and headed off to fetch our bags.
Again the travel gods were smiling at us. Our bags appeared virtually at the same time but we have now instigated
Bali traffic
Driving from the airport a new family rule - whoever's bag comes off last has to pay for the taxi. Sorry Emily...
At this point we were done and dusted with the airport. We headed through quarantine, found the official taxi rank and booked a cab to our villa.
Now, we were told, don't let anyone take your bags or try to help you with your luggage. They are not part of the official taxi system and are simply people trying to scam a fee. Funny though, by the time I'd finished putting the receipt in my pocket, two well-dressed chaps were wandering off with our bags to the taxi rank, they looked so official that we assumed they were part of the deal. Anyway, for their grand sum of AUD$2 we had our bags pulled for us and were guided to the taxi rank. Money well spent!
We headed out from the airport and into Bali on the way to the villa at Sanur. Traffic was frenetic. Motorbikes with surfboards. Thousands of cars. No discernible road rules. Welcome to another world.
It was only about a 20 minute drive to the villa but we proceeded to drive down progressively
Back streets
Laneway leading to the hotel smaller and dingier roads and laneways until venturing down a single-lane (but two-way) road. At this stage we had two wide-eyed and worried kids sitting in the back seat wondering where the heck we were heading.
Fortunately we pulled into a tidy looking parking lot and, after a quick checkin we were shown to our villa. That's when things looked up. The villa is beautiful. Gorgeous rooms, private pool and kitchen. Very nice.
After a quick swim to freshen up, we headed out for dinner. We had to walk through the streets and, again, I think the kids were a little alarmed at the state of things. We had spent time before we left talking to them about not touching the local animals or drinking the water etc so when we saw the first stray dog looking mangy they were a little taken aback. Rule for the future - it's ok to tell them about things but don't overdo it until they become paranoid.
We found a very nice restaurant called The Orchid and had some soft shelled crabs, pad Thai, and massaman chicken curry. All excellent. We also passed a massage place advertising $4.50 per hour
Villa
First view of our villa foot massages. I know what's on the agenda tomorrow now.
After the short walk home we went to bed. We're still on Adelaide timezone so quite tired but I'm sure we'll learn to sleep in very quickly.
We've been told that the chef will prepare us breakfast in the morning so I'm looking forward to that.
I'll work out how to attach photos shortly so you can see what we're up to. Until then...
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