GETTING THERE: Me, my husband & our 3yo daughter flew Garuda from Perth at 3.15pm on 19 Dec and arrived on time shortly before 7.00pm. The queues for VOA and immigration were non-existent so we breezed through, collected our luggage & were out the doors of the airport within 15 mins (very different to our July arrival mid-afternoon when we queued for over 2 hours).
Unfortunately our pre-arranged driver wasn't there to meet us & after locating a phone, trying to call his mobile which had been disconnected, then searching for him some more, we finally found a Blue Bird driver prepared to take us & my hubby's 6' longboard to Legian (at double the usual fare). I was scratching my head trying to work out how the hell he was going to fit the board in the car when, hey presto he pulled the 'Taksi' sign off the top of the car, grabbed a length of rope out of the boot & strapped it to the roof. LOL I think the Taksi sign was velcro'd on.
ACCOMMODATION: Puri Raja on Jl Padma Utara, Superior Room (with an extra bed for our little girl)
We enjoyed our stay at the Puri Raja and would stay again if we were on a budget. The 3 nights we booked here were the initial days of a 3 week holiday so we were looking for something 'cheap & cheerful' and the PR met our expectations. My only gripe would be the cleanliness of the bathroom, it just wasn't quite up to scratch. My little one loved the pool at the restaurant end of the hotel & we found it to be a yobbo-free zone for the days we stayed despite reports to the contrary on the BTF. Maybe we just got lucky, the days leading up to Christmas may have been a bit quieter than usual.
RESTAURANTS:
We arrived late on the Sat night so decided to order room service for dinner. We decided to stick to simple Indo meals (mee goreng all round) and the meals were fine but nothing special.
The following day we met up with a friend for lunch at the Bali Bakery in Kuta for lunch. Sheer, airconditioned bliss! The food was great & they had some gorgeous Christmas displays and festive chocolates etc which kept my 3yo happy. Seemed weird though being in Bali with all those Wintery Christmas scenes!
Dinner saw me & my friend on a girls night out - dinner at Sarong & then drinks at Hu'u Bar in Kerobokan. The meal at Sarong was excellent, as were the cocktails and we enjoyed every child free minute! We had a pre-dinner cocktail, a bottle of WA white wine, an entrée & main & coffee each and a shared dessert for about RP1.5 million. Certainly not cheap but money well spent in my opinion.
We had some trouble finding Hu'u bar despite reassurances from the hostess at Sarong that it was only a short walk away. The sign is quite discreet & we walked past it quite a way before asking a Villa security guard for directions & being sent back the way we'd just come. The 'Lycheetini' at the end of the walk was well worth it though! A small scoop of Lychee sorbet topped with icy cold vodka & a fresh Lychee speared with a toothpick for RP 100,000 - it's now my mission to reproduce these at home, seriously good!
SHOPPING: I didn't do much shopping to speak of in these first few days, I'd decided to wait until we were back in Legian for the last 5 days to do some 'serious' shopping. That said, I headed over on day 1 to stock up on supplies at the Hyper Mart at Mal Bali Galleria and dropped into the Nine West store 'just for a look'. I exited 10 minutes later with a new pair of beige & gold flat sandals and a wallet which I picked up on sale for around AU$60 & AU$25 respectively. Hubby just rolled his eyes when I walked in with the bag - 'more shoes' is what I interpreted the eye roll to mean LOL.
There were some great buys for Winter heels at Nine West. Unfortunately the biggest size they carry is a 9 which is a half size too small for me. Worth having a look at the sale items - the normal stock is the same price as in Aus.