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Published: June 21st 2006
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So we left the world of Oz for a week of relaxation and to celebrate Gina's 100th, sorry 27th, birthday in Bali.
Hotel was beautiful and only 5 squid a night - once again we got very excited about the luxury of fresh towels, a bath and a balcony - Heaven!
We spent our time in Sanur - more of a couple resort as opposed to the backpackers' haven in Kuta. It was much nicer though as it was only small and by the end of the week most of the town knew our names! This however did become a bit of a disadvantage as every time we walked down the street it was "Gina you want massage" or "Fiona you promise you come back for Kaftan". My guilty conscience kicked in and I ended up with a kaftan and two sarongs, ooops never mind they were only about a pound each!!
We spent the first few days checking out the beach and reading by the pool - we had bought some books at the airport in Cairns and managed to read our own books and each others over the course of a week!
We went for a
lovely meal at the restaurant down the road, gorgeous food and a hysterical waiter meant this was to be our habitual dinner place for the rest of the week. We went on to one of the few bars in Sanur that was actually very busy with a live band. As usual we were sitting with a cheeky drink and singing along with the band until Gina's eyes focused on something behind us and she started smirking. As I turned around I realised the singer had spotted Jem singing away and was singing to her and eventually made her get up and dance with him. Much to the amusement of us and the rest of the bar Jem got up and danced and he sung "Bed of Roses" to her. I thought Jemma didn't blush but she was a lovely shade of beetroot - actually i think she had just held her breath for the three minutes of the song as the singer had a bit of a perspiration problem and had sweat all over her!!
Then came June 13th, it was time to await the birthday message from the queen, unfortunately she must have sent Gina's card to her
English address as no telegram arrived!
Given Gina's weakness for massages we decided to take her to the spa for her birthday to get a massage, reflexology etc. The spa was a lovely looking place with peacful music creating the perfect ambience - this place we subsequently nicknamed "House of Pain". First of all the girls went to get reflexology done while I went for what I believed to be a relaxing massage, after breaking both my ankles - misery style - the lady started beating me from the toes up. Okay this is tad exaggerated, it was a great massage just a tad on the rough side in comparison to English massage. Once the lady had finished she asked me to turn over, hmmm, that's a bit embarrassing but at the time all i could think of was I can't wait for them to say that to Jemma!!! Half way through my massage i heard the girls start getting beaten up next door and waited for the comedy moment....
"Turn over please....no leave your top off" then Jemma's timid response "oh no, but i have big boobies!!" Right about then myself and Gina wet ourselves laughing!
Anyway
despite the 24 style torture treatment and embarassment it was a nice day and hopefully a nice presant for Gina's b'day!
That night we headed into Kuta after a nice meal and not so nice shots of Arak from our new friends at the bar. The clubs were really busy, and we ended the night in a club that had Brazil vs Croatia on the big screen. Too many araks meant i spent my time winding up Brasilians, telling them I watched a game in Rio and they were crap and making bets they would get knocked out the world cup before England!!! Luckily these guys quite enjoyed the banter so i left the club with my head in tact!!
The next day, well as you expect it, was a bit of a right off after staying out til about 6am. Although we did make it out of bed, only to McDonalds!
We did have a day out sightseeing, we went on a boat ride to Turtle Island, well I say a boat ride to the island but in fact, due to low tide, we had to walk about 1km through the water from the boat to
get to the beach! The island was named so because it is where large numbers of turtles used to go to lay their eggs. However with the invasion of people the eggs are no longer safe so there are a number of turtle conservation centres dotted along the beach. The one we went to housed turtles from 2 days old to 50 years old. I held one about 1/8 of the size of the oldest and i was struggling with that so I can't imagine how much the grandaddy turtle weighed but he was pretty damn big! As well as turtles the centre also had toucans, eagles, snakes and cous cous (a gorgeous baby monkey looking thing). Jem and I held the birds and Gina was about to hold a snake, apparently they are all very friendly and safe, until the "new" snake went for the guide when he put his hand in the box!!
After our boat trip we went on to the Uluwatu Temple which is situated on top of a cliff giving a spectacular view of the ocean. We bought some pineapple to feed to the little monkeys that live in the trees around the temple,
so we trotted up to the cute cuddlies all gooey-eyed. Then before we even saw it coming one of the little buggers ran past Gina and nicked her entire bag!! I found this quite funny until a big one started giving me evils for not handing out the fruit quick enough! Then I got a bit scared and gave him the lot!! Every night they put on a traditional Kecak Dance at the temple so we went to watch this. The Kecak consists of chanting, dancing and a fire dance - I would like to say no one was hurt during the performance however, when a lit straw pile was kicked several af the dancers were momentarily set on fire and spent the rest of the time brushing off their singed chest hair!!
We also went to Kuta one day for a bit of a mooch around the shops after hearing a rumour about a 90% off Billabong sale. New outfits were bought to replace our old Primark rags and we headed down to the beach to recover from a hard days shop.
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Liz Moseley
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Glad you are having such a great time............Your mum had a fit on the sky diving photos............. good for you! see you very soon enjoy the rest of your time out there. Love Liz x