July 4th - 6th, Bali

My name is Patrick and I am a 36 year old British citizen. I am married to a Kiwi – Marsha – and have been for over 5 years now. As I write this I am in Jakarta – our home. Our home for the last 3 years, but, that has all come to and end. We have resigned our positions at work and are preparing ourselves excitedly for a year of travel. And, I have finally decided to document the travelling we’ll do online.

This is my travel blog.

July 4th.
So, we are awakened by the alarm at the unsociable hour of 3.30am. Work had finished the day before – a very nice send off from the workplace, followed by a few drinks, a meal and some late night, last minute packing whilst watching Andy Murray prolong the agony of the British tennis faithful by succumbing to Any Roddick at Wimbledon. We were flying from Jakarta to Bali.

Our airline of choice has recently introduced an online seat booking service – for a fee. A fee Marsha and I decided in our wisdom (and cheapness) not to pay, and consequently found ourselves sitting apart. Cynically, I had the impression that we were purposefully placed apart in the hope that we may be prompted to pay the fee next time around. As things transpired the separate seating was a blessing. Marsha and I both had window seats and we were afforded fantastic views of the Javan volcanic landscape below us. Mount Bromo was completely free of cloud, plumes of smoke and gas rising from its centre. Easily visible were the steep sided walls of the sunken crater where we had perched ourselves 2 years before, when watching the sunrise over the volcano.

I wonder whether, like me, you may make lists occasionally in your head of your favourites; favourite meal, favourite weekend, favourite drink etc…. I once had a conversation with friends where we discussed our favourite ever views we had had. The winner, we decided was from a plane circling London on a clear day waiting to land. The view of Bromo as we flew over would push Big Ben and the London Eye very close.

Bali was warm, welcoming and smelled slightly of mice – as usual. We checked into the Puri Cendana in Seminyak. The rest of the day was spent relaxing by the pool and sleeping off the recent late nights, interrupted only by lunch and dinner. We were joined by Terri, Dionne, Jo and Malane – friends from work at Gado Gado restaurant overlooking the sea and Ultimos for dinner.

July 5th
A late morning, a fine egg and bacon breakfast, and we all felt a little more awake than the night before. Marsha and I slapped on some sunscreen and walked along the beach from Seminyak, through Legian to Kuta Beach. Huge numbers of people sunning themselves and hoards of would be surfers crashing around in the surf. We passed an organised surf competition. As far as I could make out, this involved a couple of novice surfers splashing about hopelessly in the waves – whilst on the beach, several teenage boys belted out deafeningly loud inappropriate music on a loudspeaker system, periodically adding incoherent nonsensical commentary on the surfers progress on the water. My experience of public events in Indonesia
such as this one seem to suggest that the organisers would only consider it a success if no-one is actually watching or listening due to the appalling noise and babbling boys they render the mikes to.

The walk was warm, and I had a swim in the sea. The rest of the day was spent at the hotel relaxing. The 6 of us headed to Ku De Ta for sunset cocktails at 6pm. The sunset was for once somewhat underwhelming and the bar had deemed it necessary to inflate its prices yet again. However, it was heaving with people and it remains popular for a reason – it’s a beautiful spot on the beach. We ate again at Gado Gado – blowing our budget quite considerably, but knowing that we were off to Timor the next day where superb restaurants were not so easy to find.

July 6th
Goodbyes to Terri and Dionne. Then the 4 of us (me, Marsha, Jo and Malane) flew from Bali to Kupang in West Timor. On arrival we took the 3 hour bus journey straight to a little town called Soe. At about $2 for the 3 hour journey each, you can’t complain, especially as the driver took it upon himself to deliver us to the door of the hotel we had booked in Soe – the Bahagia Dua. What we hadn’t anticipated (stupidly) was the steep climb up the hills to Soe which sits at 1000m above sea level. Despite sitting virtually on top of the equator, the air was freezing. And, of course, seeing as how we hadn’t anticipated the cold, we hadn’t any warm clothes with us for this leg of our year’s travel.

As it happened, I think it was just the shock of not being in 30 degree temperatures, and once we got acclimatised we realised that it was actually about 18 – 20 degrees! Not like the time Marsha and I visited Istanbul for the weekend many years ago. Assuming that Turkey was hot – because it just sounds like it should be – we didn’t check the weather forecasts and we arrived into the midst of a massive snowstorm – Marsha in her high heels and me in shorts!

Anyhow, a plate of Nasi Goreng washed down with some Bintang beer and we were set for the night.