Hi again everyone. Day 2, we had a booking at the Murano Spa, in Seminyak. We had the full 4 hours of treatments booked. A driver from the spa picked us up from out hotel, and drove us out there. Now this spa is only 5mths old, and is in the middle of a new development area, so it looks like a construction site. The spa itself, is beautiful! Double storey, Japanese/ Balinese style. This spa was great, my only critism was that for me, with my dickie leg, it was very hard to get to some of the treatment rooms. Some are up a very small spiralled staircase, which was very hard for me. At the end of the day, I had to get down the stirs again, very scarey! First we walked in to our double room, and one of the staff handed us what looked like a black suppository, and asked us to change. "Into what?" we asked! They were 'one size fits all' black paper undies! Cham and I looked at each other, and laughed! Now while this was all going on, the two staff members (one male and one female) were still standing in the room. We shooed them out, and did the whole 'You face that way, and I'll face this way' thing. Another complaint. They didn't have a towel, or a robe or even a sarong for us to wear, we had to just sit there in all our glory! Now for two 30 something rather voluptuous women that had never seen each other in less than t-shirts and shorts, this was rather awkward! Much to Chams distress, she got the male masseur, who got a little too close and personal during her massage. By the time we got into our body scrub, we had got over the prudish thing, and were just laying there in all our glory! We also had a flower bath, deluxe facial, pedicure, manicure and a creme hair bath. All for about $45 ! We ended up being there for over 5 hours!Day 3, we headed off for a full day of touring with our driver 'Budi' that we got his details from the forum. This guy is great, and a lot of fun. His english is fantastic, and he has lived in Aust. for awhile, so he likes our sense of humour, and understands what we're talking about most of the time. Anyhoo, Cham and I headed off with Budi for a drive up to Lake Beratan in the north. What I like about this guy, is he takes you to places that the organised tours don't. You experience things and places you may not see otherwise. We took the back streets, we saw many beautiful rice terraces, super kites, and the Balinese going about thier daily lives. Cham's face was hillarious when she saw and old lady with no top on, walking down the street with a huge bowl of washing on her head! Makes you appreciate our automatic washing machines! This was Cham's first trip overseas, so Bali was a real eye-opener for her. Much to my happiness, she has fallen in love with Bali aswell. We stopped at some markets near Lake Beratan, and she got her first taste of bartering. We paid way too much for some cheap earrings, placemats etc, but didn't care that much, these people looked like they needed our cash more than us. I was surprised that at this market, the only live animals were baby rabbits, and I was hoping that they were there to be sold as pets, but I kinda think they had another use!
We spent about an hour at the peaceful lake, and was pleased to see that they have banned the tacky 'animal attractions' from the grounds.
A short trip further up the mountains, and Budi pulled over on a very steep part of the road, in the middle of no where. Within seconds, about 30 monkeys came out of the jungle, and from the tree-tops to greet us! It was so cool. A little old lady came out of a little hut, and sold us some tiny bananas to feed the monkeys. We hand fed the monkeys, which were more gentle than the ones at the monkey forest. It was great to actually see these little guys in a natural setting as well. Further up the mountain, singing along to 'Kai San' (sorry, probably spelt that wrong, but you know what I mean right?) we felt like we where at the top of the world. Budi stopped at one of his favourite local indo resturants up there for some lunch. We ordered the chicken satay and rice, and had some Bali coffee (on recommendation from Budi). The meal tasted yummy, but was cold by the time we got it. Thank goodness for the 'Travelan'. While we were sitting there, the clouds rolled in, and you could not see anything around you, past 1m! It was so freaky, it was like the world around us had been completely deleted! It was very cool up here, and I even shivered!
That night, we ate at Gosha's on Melasti. Never agin! The service was so slow. We sat down, and gave them our order straight away, and sat there for over an hour waiting for our grilled prawns. I grumbled to the waiter that the chef muct be out catching them himself, but he told me he was most likely w*nking himself! Charming! When we did get the prawns, they were over-cooked, and dry.
Till next time....