Bali Bagus!
Trip Start
Apr 20, 2009
1
63
79
Trip End
Sep 06, 2009
Kuta, Bali, Indonesia
Thursday, July 23, 2009
We hired a car on Wednesday and spent the day getting used to driving around here again - tough work :) we also went down to Seminyak - the 'posh' end of Bali (not much to it really), it was another cloudy and yucky day. For dinner that night we ate a normal indo dinner but we were still a bit hungy so we headed down to flapjacks - a new restaurant opened up here and had a crepe stuffed with chocolate and covered in chocolate sauce, chocolate bits and chocolate ice cream! It was very tasty - and well worth the $7 but lets say we havent had chocolate since :)
Today we ignored the cloud and yucky and headed out to the Bali Safari and Marine Park. It was $35US to get in and John and I were pretty sceptical paying that much around here - we thought it would be worse then the zoos at home, but we had driven a fair way to get there so we figured we would go inside.
It was awesome. You got to hold one animal for free - John had his photo taken with a lion and I chose a baby orangotang - it was great! Just before Johns go with the lion, he got a bit upset and nipped the keeper - John was crapping himself when it was his turn - he was ready to run! We also got to check out a heap of other animals - white tigers, komodos, birds, panthers and all sorts of things - and they were very close (things you wouldnt get away with in Oz). Then we hopped on a safari bus where they took us around a heap of 'countries' - Asia, Africa, India and we got to see the native animals and they were right next to the bus - the hippos were literally 2 feet away from the bus as we drove through the water - the lions were right next to us, it was amazing.
We also got a free ride on one of their amusements (we chose the jungle cruise) and they also had a roller coaster and all sorts of rides. You also got to go into their water park (which we didnt worry about) but is great for kids. In the afternoon we checked out the elephant conservation show where the elephants actually knew their parts in the show - it was so good! Then we got to head out onto the stage and play with the elephants! And for a theme park type thing everything inside was very cheap - we had lunch for less then $10 and I bought the ginger ninja a little stuffed tiger for less then $10!
All in all we stayed there all day and it was worth every cent if not more!
We left there and headed to one of the beaches on that side of the island for a look - John has heard alot about it so we stopped in. You could see how the waves would attract people but the beach is covered in sand as black as tar and Billabong have sponsered the Balinese to clean the beach because it was disgusting - but they are all there cleaning up the garbage.
The traffic on the way back was bumper to bumper. Along the way we saw a man carrying his wooden toy car that he sits down and the kids get on each of the cars and he peddles them around - just like the mechanical ones we have in shopping centres - things are so basic over here for them! and we didnt get pulled over once! There are cops everywhere - like we have never seen. There are truckloads (literally) in the main streets of Kuta and along the beach every day and night - which makes you feel a little bit safer.
We topped the day off with dinner at Poko Loco - mexican restaurant over here that has its own midget! I spent the whole night laughing - we kept getting confused if he was a boy or girl and he kept doing tricks and it was just very very funny!
Tomorrow heading off to some of the other beaches - even if the weather is crappy
