Returned from Bali on Monday 29th January. Had a great 4 week holiday with hubby and the 2 kids, Zoe and Tom. We had no real plans this holiday, just the first 2 nights accommodation booked and the general idea was to follow the correct wind and swell direction to the best surf spots. We mainly visit Bali for the great surfing but have never visited during the wet season and were unsure what too expect. We ended up visiting Ulluwatu, Lombok - Kuta, Nusa Lembongan and back to Ulluwatu. Had good surfing conditions and weather the majority of the time.
Flew Singapore Airlines and while pleased with the service, we have found the service on Garuda and Air Paradise as good. The on demand movies were good though. Unfortunately the trip over was rather long, left Brisbane at 9am and arrived in Singapore at 2.30pm. 3 hours at the airport, which is not that hard as the Airport is huge and then our flight to Bali left at 7.30pm. Arrived in Bali 9.30pm, December 31st. Made Arisio was waiting for us and drove us to Sri Ratu where we were staying for the first 2 nights. Stayed in Mewar bungalow. Dropped our bags and headed to Billy's Bar to have a few drinks and get into the new year mood, not hard as we were all pretty happy to be back in Bali. Good to catch up with the staff, Joey, Jack , Made and Billy all working. Did the new year count down and chatted to a few other travellers. Then a quick visit to Uncle Norms, couple more drinks and back to the room. The frogs were singing in the background but we were all too tired for them to keep us awake. Great nights sleep.
Woke on the first day to torrential rain and it continued for most of the day. Had breakfast at Legian snacks, they do an American or Australian breakfast for 15,000rp, really good. Decided that it would be a good day the go to Discovery Mall, hubby wanted some new reading glasses. Went in and had is eyes tested and bought a pair off the rack for 300,000rp, Melewi Optics. They quoted on transitional glasses for me, 1.2 million rp for the lenses and then frames on top. Decided to shop around a bit and was glad as we met a guy at Bintang supermarket and he ended up getting me a pair for 600,000rp (will give his details further along). Spent the day going around the place, we rarely go into Kuta and this was our first time there, it was just soo big. Lots of other Indonesians in there, enjoying the sales, but not many tourists. The rain kept on coming most of the day. Around 4pm we thought lets get out of here and walked back to Legian. The road outside of Bamboo Corner was quite flooded but no flooding in the laneway too Sri Ratu. The bungalow was quite smelly when we got back and we were all pretty happy that we were only staying another night. It was OK but for the amount we were paying we have stayed in much better places for less money. Dinner at Je Je's, old Rum Jungle Restaurant, and good to catch up with Ketut, who has been there since they opened. He showed us some of there rooms, quite nice and he quoted 150,000 per night for a double or twin, 100,000 per night if staying longer. They are currently building a pool so will definitely be somewhere we look at for future trips, much better value than Sri Ratu. Our dinner was beautiful and we all played a few pool games, back at Sri Ratu we plugged in our portable DVD player to the television and watched a movie.
Packed up the bags and purchases from yesterday and went down to Legian Snacks for another nice breakfast and hubby went to se what deal he could do with a car hire place. Ended up hiring a car from a place in Padma street- Duta Kereta Express- (0361 750971). Reasons for choosing them was that they would write us a letter for the police to let us take the car to Lombok and some of the car hire places had said that we couldn't take the cars to Lombok. We paid 150,000rp a day and had the car for 22 days of our stay, it was anew Avanza and included insurance. Loaded the car up with our gear and headed off to explore north of Candi Dasa. Found our way too Jasri, thanks to a guys directions who we met at discovery mall. There was some very small surf and we checked out the 2 places that were available to stay. The first one was on the beach, a reasonable 2 room bungalow but they wanted 250,000rp per person per night. The next place along was 500,000 per night for 2 rooms, a little over our budget. Stopped at Temple Café and Seaside Cottages at Candi Dasa. Had not eaten since breakfast and it was 4pm so we were all pretty hungry. Had a range of entrees and soups and everyone's food was great. Asked about their rooms but the best they could do was a double at 170,000rp and 2 single rooms at 70,000rp for each. SMS to Sandat Mas at Ulluwatu and they reply with yes we have double and a twin. Arrived at Ulluwatu around 7.30pm. Great to see the family and settled into our rooms, even unpacked this time. Frozen Margaritas on the veranda and a chat to Laura and the kids from the family that run Sandat Mas. Went to Ye Ye's for dinner, the food is great and under 200,000rp for the 4 of us. Today we had only quick showers of rain and these continued during the night. Before we went to dinner a few of the family were hunting frogs and putting them in a bag. This was so that the frogs don't keep the visitors awake with their singing!
The next 2 days were spent travelling between Ulluwatu and Nusa Dua for surfing. Spent a very enjoyable afternoon at the Kendi Kuning restaurant overlooking the beach and the surf break ‘Sri Lanka'. Drank Bintangs, read and watched the people walking by. Not many Aussies, mostly European , American and English. One of the days Zoe and myself had lunch at the restaurant and then when surfing was over went to the 2 surf factory outlets on the bypass road that were advertising big sales. The first one was not that great but at the second one, the surf factory outlet, we all got lots of bargains. Zoe got black rip curl shorts for 120,000 and a black rip curl singlet for 95,000. Even hubby found a shirt and long pants, and I walked away with a dress, shorts and top. Ate at 2 other good Ulluwatu restaurants- Ulluwatu Café and a new Thai restaurant near Pandang, great food at both.
One day Zoe and myself spent the day at the local swimming pool on the main road to the Ulluwatu turnoff. Only tourists there but everyone was friendly. Tom has been letting off fireworks every night for the owners kids and after purchasing some more in the Mini Mart at the pool we all watched a few firework displays. We only spent one day down at the Warungs overlooking the surf because the wind was really strong and surf was not working, when we came back later in the month the wind had swung around and there was good surf at Ullu's. Got a flogging from the sales girls, but nothing has changed, once you have bought something from nearly everyone of them, they leave you alone. Met our friend Danny who sells us DVD's and he is OK, although business a little slow. Of course we helped that and picked over 100 DVD's from him. Told him of our plans to go to Lombok and he said that he was going home to his family in Lombok next week for a wedding and that maybe we could catch up. Great told him we will SMS him. Did a couple of trips into Legian, to sort the car out for Lombok and get our letter to show the police we had the car hire company's permission, change money, do a little shopping and have a few meals. We did stop at a warung for lunch one day at the back of Sanur and had a nice nasi campaur, had a look at the SIM cards because Tom wanted his own. The SIM cards were 10,000rp which is cheaper than what we have had to pay in the past.
After 7 days at Ulluwatu we decided the winds etc were right to go to lombok, the ferry had actually been closed for a few days last week. Drove up to Pandang Bai, pulled in by the police and asked for rego, license and letter. No problems next ferry at 2pm. Not too long to kill it was about 12.30. Bought the ticket- paid 440,000 rp for the car and 58,000 for the 4 of us. The ferry left about 2.30 Settled into a spot on the back deck with some biscuits and drinks, studied the map of Lombok and read a little. Had a look at the toilets and decided I could hang on! The ferry is long but tolerable. Saw pods of Dolphins as we got closer to Lombok. Certainly looks like a beautiful country, lots of mountains and rocky formations. Arrived in Lembar and drove off the ferry and in the direction for Kuta. Amazingly we made it to Kuta in 1.5hours and did not get lost once. Arrived in Kuta at around 9pm, really just a one street stretch along the beach. Had no idea where we going to stay but stopped at a restaurant on the corner of the road as we drove in, Stellas café and had a really nice meal, all the stresses of travelling all day slowly melted away. Asked the waiter if he had any recommendations for accommodation and he drew us a map and suggested Tiatra resort but when we arrived they said they were full, went along the road a little and went into a place called Segara Anak Cottages, showed a nice larger, air conditioned room with double and single for 150,000rp per night, 30,000 for extra mattress, including breakfast, decided it would do us for the night and that we would have a look around in the morning. A couple of Jack Daniels and coke and slept well.
More on Lombok to be continued.