no camera

Our camera seems to be beyond repair. I mentioned it was dropped in a drainage ditch and we thought it might eventually dry out, doesn't seem like it is going to happen. When it fell in, due to a series of clumsy events, I had no intention of plunging my arm into the water, no way!! But, Regan laid down on the road and sunk his arm straight in to retrieve the camera. ( Regan explained that it is mostly for water overflow from rain so the roads don't flood...but I have an imagination...I used baby wipes to wash his hands and arms.....) Anyway, it was a good thing he managed to get it back because our memory card was fine, whew.. Clumsy events were: standing by our car in the pouring rain and trying to find the keys in my purse, the camera rolling out, Regan trying to hand Marije to me and I was too flustered to react.... and....camera into ditch....aahh.

Gili Meno and Gili T, small Islands off of Lombok, Indonesia

From a North American perspective, the amount of scooters in Bali is really astounding. You feel like you have an escort wherever you go (because of all the scooter surrounding your vehicle). When we went to Gili Meno and Gili T it was a 4 day break from the busy traffic; there are no motorbikes or cars on these islands, just pony carts (Cidomono).

The beginning of our trip started with a 6 am pickup from this van, the one Marije is trying to climb out of. We originally were told we would be picked up at 7 am and then told, because of our location, that we would be picked up earlier. The last we heard, the pick up time was 8 am. Due to the confusion we got out of bed at 5 am, ate breakfast, and made sure we would be ready for our ride anytime it would arrive.....and the transport arrived at six am, 2hrs before they specified. After loading into the car the driver drove for 15 minutes and then parked and left the van, we were not too sure what was happening. We sat for about a half hour while Marije tried to climb out the window and waved at a little girl across the street. Once the driver returned we continued on the journey....the next stop was at a villa and we picked up three Russians, and 2 Balinese surfers. The Russians, 1 male and 2 females, climbed into the van and the male, with a boombox on his shoulder ( I am not kidding!!), sat down in the middle seating area and played electronic music, no idea of specific genre, the whole hr ride to the fast ferry terminal. I really wanted to take a picture but I was not brave enough. You will just have to imagine a tall Russian with skull necklace, skull bandana, and skull baseball cap with a large ghettoblaster/boombox on his lap.

Once on the fast ferry to Gili T, with the Russian still playing his music, we looked out the windows in the hope we would see dolphins. Apparently, you can sometimes see dolphins on this route but we were not so lucky. Next time I hope. But, the bright blue ocean was lovely- wow! ( Note, trying to use a small bathroom on a boat is very challenging)

The fast ferry delivered us to Gili T. It is known as a party island and that is what it did seem like, with first impression. There were a lot a lot of hippie tourists, pony carts, small hotels and restaurants, and many signs for magic mushrooms..... and a lot of garbage lining the one main road. When initially planning this trip we did not plan on staying on this island and after taking a tour around Gili T we decided that heading to Gili Meno was a good idea, we wanted somewhere quieter.

......in the next post I will talk about Gili Meno...kind of tired and I have already said way too much.

Bali bird park...

Two weeks ago we visited the Bali bird park. It really is a nice place to walk around; but, I did feel like I had to be cautiously on guard as there were many large birds just hanging out. To be honest, I was not sure how confident I felt about wandering around with all the birds: parrots, cranes, pidgeons... just ready to peck me. I was especially afraid of a particular one winged crane, who I believe, was following us. Regan laughed at me because I was acting so jumpy. I imagine it was amusing to see me flinch or duck everytime a bird walked or flew by, especially since the baby seemed a lot more brave. However, she did not like the parrots, the sound of them made her cry, and the picture I have included shows her ducking. In this park, it is possible to stand very near all the wildlife, as you can see by the close proximity to the Bird's of paradise, one of them flew over me and I swear it brushed the top of my head, exciting (or scarey)!

........ There are baby finches building nests in my back yard. I love it! I would take a picture but I recently dropped our camera in a drainage ditch and it has not recovered.

Aventures with Air Asia..

I have learnt a couple things about flying with Air Asia. Firstly, it is really essential to pay for your lugguge online and not at the airport- whew, what a mistake!!! My family took two seperate Air Asia flights in one day and each time we had to pay lugggage fees. For the first flight, we checked in at Hong Kong airport to fly to Kuala Lumpur and then in the afternoon we were catching a flight to Bali from Kuala Lumpur. Catching our first flight was no problem. We checked in and paid our extra fees and we were shortly on the first leg of our journey. Of course, earlier that day we had tried to check in our baggage at the train station, a nice service that Hong Kong airport has; but, the Air Asia counter was closed. So, we had to take all our lugguge to the airport and check in the old fashioned way....at the airport... the first irritating moment of our day. Once arriving in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia we had a flight to be on in 1 hour. This is when the confusion began...... We had to go through customs, collect our baggage, and then go through the whole process of checking in. I felt a bit afraid when I saw the huge lineup for customs but we managed to get through quickly. Earlier, when exiting the airplane there had been some confusion of where our stroller would be; so, we had left the plane and then had to go back to the airplane to find the stroller as, for some reason, it was not with our normal baggage... confusing...... Once we finally had all our lugguge we had to find the appropriate international Air Asia counter, it was not easy. Then, we had to get out money to pay for our luggage, again. Regan went to go get money while I waited for our airline boarding passes. Once I had the airline boarding passes in hand we ran to our gate. By this point, we were already late for our flight. At the gate, we realized we were missing a boarding pass. I had no idea if they had either neglected to print one or if we had dropped one in the rush to the gate. So, Regan ran back to get a new boarding pass and, of course, they did not want to print one for him. After some arguement we had a new boarding pass and we were finally ready to catch the flight to Bali. The next thing that was quite funny, we were escorted onto the wrong airplane.....we almost went to Saigon, haha! We suspected we were on the wrong airplane as our seats were taken. I cannot believe we eventually made our flight. I think in the end we were about half an hour or more late for our flight. None of the other customers yelled at me.....a good thing. The airline staff were annoyed because they had to unload our baby stroller from the airplane to Saigon and reload it onto the flight to Bali. To say the least, it was a very long day and I was very relieved to arrive safely in Bali. When I fly with them again I will definately not take two flights in one day or take more than one very small bag......but, the flights are a great value!

..finding a hotel

We tried to book a hotel in Hong Kong before leaving but, it did not happen. So, once arriving and carting way too much stuff : baby car seat, stroller, suitcases... we hailed a cab and asked to be taken to the hotel we wanted. The hotel was chosen due to its close proximity to a friend's house. Unfortunately, the taxi driver did not know where the hotel was and actually was furious that we had no address. This is one of the first times I have had a taxi driver mad at me......and as we wanted to get out of the cab as quick as possible we asked to be taken to the closest hotel. We were dropped at this hotel: http://www.asiatravel.com/hongkong/sohotel/index.html and it turned out to be quite nice. The room was small but very tasteful and the shower was great and it included breakfast!!! Luckily, the Sohotel was very pleasant and the angry driver directed us to a good place.

prices in Bali

Today I bought 1030 grams of fresh tomatoes for 60 cents. There are better deals to be had as these were bought at a market that mostly tourists shop at.

flight to Hong Kong

I know this is not the best picture, it is kind of fuzzy; but, I think it definately captures how I felt about the flight. My baby, Marije, surprisingly was very good on such a long airplane ride, 13 hours. She did a lot of walking up and down the aisles, made a lot of friends, and napped for a good portion- which was great for me! There were a couple moments when she was very upset at having to sit still..... as this photo illustrates! But, Air canada gave us an extra seat to deal with the baby, as there were empty seats on the flight, and this meant Regan, my husband, got to fully extend his legs.....yay!

Travel

So, I have been travelling for a few weeks now.... and I have to say... it is very odd to try and be adventureous and experience new things when I am the kind of person that is always anxious and always afraid of doing simple things, like using a public bathroom. In fact, I think travel books should revolve around bathrooms and where the best one's are. For example, "...this restaurant has great food but the bathroom only gets a three star rating...etc" I think a lot of people would really appreciate a reference guide that directs you to all the clean bathrooms in a city, or I would appreciate it.