JHR - Sunday 22nd of August
Woke up this morning to my mother yelling at us that we were late.... Late for what i hear you asking? Well she wanted breakfast and couldn't wait any longer and it was 9am! The trouble was, her watch got water in it yesterday and it was in fact only 7am *sigh* just the wake up I wanted to experience....
Breakfast at the Hard Rock has definitely improved from last time we stayed, the staff were friendlier and more attentive, the food fresher and the dining area less cramped. They have put in new tables and chairs as part of the extensive renovations beginning officially in September (Refurbishing all rooms, better facilities, Hard Rock Cafe getting internal refurb etc), the new furniture has made such a difference and it again feels like a quality breakfast area.
Following breakfast we awaited Mr Honeyman for my mother to purchase some lenses from him for some frames she had acquired in Perth. Bang on 10am we had a phone call and he was down stairs. Mr Honeyman was easy to deal with and I look forward to seeing the results on Sunday next week.
Tahlia (my wife) and I needed some "Away time" having spent a solid 24 hours in the grips of our two kids and mother so we made some very clear arrangements that we would go to Seminyak together, she would go shopping with the kids and Tahlia and I would go to Spa Bali for a massage and then meet again at 1pm at Grocer & Grind for lunch.
Tahlia and I had an excellent massage and arrived at Grocer & Grind at 12.45pm, We managed to get an excellent table for 5 and also secure their only high chair.... Some abrupt chinese people had tried several times to take our high chair even though we explained we were using it in anticipation of our 2 year old arriving.... Enjoyed a few cold drinks and before we knew it, it was 1.30pm and my mother had not arrived with the kids. We began to get a little worried and had no way of contacting her. We decided we had no option but to return to the hotel and look for them, maybe they had gotten lost and gone back there. Surely enough, after 30 minutes in traffic on JL Legian, we arrived at the hotel and there they were. Apparently our eldest daughter needed the toilet and my mother decided the toilets in seminyak were far too "Risky" to use. She had tried calling Grocer & Grind to let us know she had cancelled but kept getting told "Maria" and a bunch of gibberish in Indonesia... Turns out, she was dialing the wrong number and that was actually a message saying she was dialling the wrong number, not anybody answering the phone at all.... after I had finished laughing about that, I decided it would be a good idea to go down to the phone shop and buy a second sim card for our other phone so if we split up again, we can contact each other.
We had a peaceful and relatively uneventful afternoon, purchased some bits and bobs at Discovery (Tahlia loves this place!), There was a group of Japanese guys sitting on the stairs inside sogo looking very sorry for themselves with over 40 shopping bags... It was like looking at myself in the mirror and I could see myself going through the same pain very shortly... sure enough, French Connection had some clearance items out so the obligatory browse, rebrowse and rebrowse a third time just to ensure we had not missed anything TODAY (Oh... don't worry, we'll be back tomorrow im sure) occurred and we were good to proceed up to level two to find some nice frames and lenses for our eldest daughter (Mr Honeyman had none that we liked for her), We found a really nice pair of Rip Curl glasses with lenses for only $110AUD, thought that was great and they'll be ready wednesday :)
From Discovery we walked up the beach pathway to Envy at the Holiday Inn for dinner, again, I think Envy has slipped a little bit from our last visit, the service was sloppy and the food was good but not amazing as last time... I'm guessing that maybe as we were not hotel guests they did not give us the same level of service that they otherwise would have....
Coming home from Envy we did a little more shopping along JL Kartika, enjoyed a late night swim and wrapped the day up by 10.30 for some well needed sleep...
that's all for today, tomorrow is changing hotels to the Kuta Town Houses, Legian shopping and more...