What We Did:
We had a mix of activity and relaxation on this holiday. The first few days we generally found our feet and did a bit of shopping. We went to Carrefour, which we found fascinating both for its size, and variety of things stocked, as well as watching local people shop. We went on a weekday and it was busy. I dread to think what it may be like on a weekend. We found a Bread Talk style shop where we bought a variety of tasty savory things for lunch, before embarking on the giant actual Carrefour shop on the top floor. We did some shopping of things for lunch plus snacks and drinks. We purposely bought things that we were not sure of what they were, one being some brightly dyed noodle discs. After tasting them, the kids decided that they were for offerings as they had no taste or flavour. We also bought fruit not easily available at home, plus the perennial snack fruit, bananas. A case of cans of coke was very reasonable here and was a treat the kids would not get at home. I fully expected it to last ten days, but it was gone with three kids in a week. I looked for the famous MT skincare here, but couldn't locate it.
We also went to Discovery for another look and bought my daughter some underwear in Centro. It brought home to me the shop within a shop concept. We were looking for the type of thing to suit young adolescent girls and she tried on things which were all too big. I kept asking for smaller sizes but they would tell me 'no smaller'. Then as we were about to leave I spotted the section stocking exactly what I wanted, which was obviously run by another company (even though it looks like it is all in the same department store). Over we went and bought just what we wanted, at a fraction of the cost you would pay in Australia. While we were doing 'girls shopping', I gave my 14 year old son some money which he happily frittered away at Amazone ion the top floor. The noise got to me up there and I was glad I didn't have to spend much time there.
We spent a day on the beach at Kuta where the beach chair and umbrella vendors are much harder to bargain with than the ones in Legian. However, it was relaxing to lie on along and read or watch the world go by without too much sand in the possessions. I paid extra than I knew was the going rate, with a deal that the lounge vendor keeps the innumerable hawkers away! Well it worked for about half an hour.
When we went to Ubud we organised to do the Bike Baik tour. Plenty of people have written about this so I won't go into details. Sufficient to say we went on a busy day when they had to split the group into two. They tried to get us to come the next day, but we were leaving so we joined a largish group. It was still very well managed, but the group did get a bit spread out along the way. Make sure your kids know that there is always a support vehicle at the back. Towards the end, after about the fourth or fifth hill, I called it quits and got in to the vehicle. I was the last in our family. As we approached my daughter, I asked her if she wanted to join me but she said no. WE went ahead, and then stopped, but she did not realize that we had stopped. She then though that there was no one behind her and that she had to keep going to the end. At the finish, she was nearly ill with heat and distress, although this was not evident looking at her riding. Some was clearly anxiety as I had not realized that she did not know she could stop at any time and be picked up by the support vehicle. However, she recovered very quickly, and was then quite proud of herself for making it all the way.
Highlights were riding through the villages and the chats we had when we stopped along the way. The view at the breakfast restaurant overlooking the volcano was clear and quite spectacular.
Three of us went to the Monkey Forest in Ubud, but as it was starting to get dark the forest was very dark and we did not stay long. Having seen the monkeys before we were not all that enthralled.
In Lovina, we decided to get up early (5.45 am) to go out to see the dolphins. You travel out in very small narrow fishing boats just as it is starting to get light. On the day we went, we got some good views of the sun coming up, and as I look around I counted well over 30 boats. We looked and waited for ages for some dolphins. The some surfaced and suddenly 30 boats were chasing them. Well it was not a very good day for dolphins and although we did see a few pods, they were not that close and did not hang around. They asked us to come back the next day, but no one was up for another early start! The trip in and out was very calm, and almost soporific! It really was very relaxing on the water even if the dolphins were shy that day.
On the way from Ubud to Lovina and back to Legian, we stopped at the temple on the lake, the Candi Kuning markets and Crackers bar. We had no plans to stop at Cracker's bar as we were supposed to be going there with the group the next week. However, after on look at the toilets in the temple grounds, by daughter walked away and declared she did not need to go! I knew it was a far way further to Lovina, and so back we went to the markets to stop at the 5* toilets and have a drink at the bar. They certainly met my expectations. On returning to Legian we stopped at Pacung Indah for a drink and admire the view.
More about what we did when in Legian in the next JBR