I have just watched my night owl Auntie hobble painfully to bed. My mother shuffled her weary self off about 10 minutes ago, and the rest of our rag tag group has already collapsed with exhaustion. Its 10:15pm. What a day!
Firstly, my weather report this morning proved to be slightly immature. By 10am the rain had cleared, and Kuta/Legian enjoyed blue skies with fluffy white clouds all day. Still a lot of humidity, but thats to be expected.
Day one has been pretty full on. After finally getting to bed at around 3am, we miraculously woke up before 8. To be honest, we were all exhausted, but noone wanted to be left out of the group exploring the Villa!
Our initial plan to "pack lightly" failed... big time! So its no surprise that we had milk and cereal on hand. We had a quick breakfast got ourselves ready for the day, and then wandered outside to wait for our driver who arrived as scheduled at 10am.
With half our party new to Bali it had been decided that our first activity would be a driving tour around Kuta/Legian. So the traffic was seen, many eeks, oohs and aaahs exclaimed over the number of passengers on a single scooter. Somber comments were uttered as we passed the memorial, and eager squeeks from certain nameless members of our party were heard as we passed hundreds of shops and then Kuta Square.
Then as the excitement of seeing but the reality of not touching waned, we headed to Carrefours. I have to tell you, we were ready to shop!!!
It was disasterous!
Not a pool noodle in sight.
This was a MUCH planned, very high priority shopping experience.
We had carefully decided to NOT pack pool noodles, because we were going to be "packing lightly", and what do we find... not a noodle (of the pool variety) to be seen!
We consoled ourselves with Mee Goreng from the food court. It wasn't the same... you just can't laze around watching the world go by as you hug a Mee Goreng. People look at you strangely. :(
Eventually we gave in and ate... it was good, but not as good as a pool noodle.
We left Carrefours a couple of hours later, dropped off the excess baggage (shopping, kids and the menfolk!) and went to Bali Deli. Cheese, Meat, Bread, Pastry... YUMMY! Enough said.
We then went "home", told our driver that he could escape from us crazy people until the next day same time (hehe) and dived headlong into the pool. Nice. :)
I was finally roused by the promise of a pedicure. Mum and I dragged ourselves the 50 metres up the narrow Gang our Villa is situated on, crossed the road, and walked in the front door of Eden Green.
An hour later, at a cost of 65,000 my feet were in heaven. I had been mildly concerned when the team with the giant emery board came in and started having an aerobics workout on my feet.. but it was obviously worth it. The staff are looking buff :) As is Eden Green. Its clean, professional, well presented, has good working aircon, comfy seats, and pleasant staff. You could probably find something more sumptuous, more upmarket, etc. etc. But its 30 seconds from our door, and meets all our everyday requirements. Yay us!
Mum (who snoozed her way through a foot/leg/shoulder/neck massage 80k) and I were met by a search party on our return. Hubby had obviously had enough of chasing our 2yr old around the villa, and had decided it was time mummy took over.
I however decided it was a much better idea if we all go out for dinner, and keep the toddler amused by making daddy take him for walks while I let my freshly painted toenails glisten as they peeked out from under the table at Zanzibar.
The walks worked well (Little Master managed to talk daddy into purchasing a handful of bright shiny light things), my toes looked great, and the meal was lovely.
For 6 adults and 1 pint sized manipulator (who got full sized meals to himself!!) dinner came to 1,100,000. This included entrees, mains 3 cocktails, bintang, 2 waters, and 2 cokes. My overall impression. It was nice. Not great, not wow, not "OMG we must go back there of I'll just die!!" It was nice. :)
The walk between Villa Baliana and the beach gets a bit of a mixed review. There is a well paved clean and tidy laneway that runs from Jl Werkudara down to the beach.. its only a 4-5 minute walk for the average person and quite pleasant (take a torch if out at night!). However, with Auntie and mum unable to walk far we tried it as a challenge and have learnt not to do so again. It took us 15 minutes to get to the beach, but unfortunately they barely made it back again. From now on we'll have to get them driven.
So that concludes the day one fun... except for the one confession I have to make.
The toilet facilities include a bidet feature in both ensuites. A separate, handheld hose with a shower type nozzle on the end. My curiousity was piked. Now in my defence I was sleep deprived, and feeling giddy, and it was just sitting there calling to me!!
So, being the daring woman that I am, I grabbed the hose thingie, shoved it into the appropriate spot aiming carefully, and pushed the lever. Nothing.... Not to worry, I'm tech savy!! I turned the wall tap on!
Shower head nozzle thingie appropriately positioned, press lever.. HOLY MOTHER OF $&%!! It was like having a fire fighters hose blasting water at a thousand pounds per square inch... I lifted right off the seat, water spraying everywhere, and immediately let go of the nozzle!
It didn't turn off!! Insert big expletive here! I have water GUSHING into places that should never EVER have to endure such pummeling!! I juggle the hand held shower nozzle thingie, screeching like a cat in heat, up on my tiptoes, jumping from foot to foot, and with water flying everywhere, and turn off the tap!
I then very calmly reseat myself, replace the hand held shower nozzle thingie, blink very slowly, and proceed to pee myself with laughter.
So day one went well.... Lets hope Day two doesn't rhyme with ......
:)
BaliDaze