The Haven Hotel Seminyak

... decreased, my excitement inversely picked up. I was actually finally arriving at my home for the next 3 and a half months! The sun shone brightly overhead and the ocean glistened bright blue beneath us, with the waves crashing a quarter mile out from the shore. The island looked overwhelmingly flat. I thought about the tsunami destroying so many homes a few years ago, and I finally realized how possible that could be. The mountains were miles away. After a long hour waiting ...

Selamat pagi, Well I am currently sitting in a small part of Bali called Sidemen... nope not 'sidemen' heathens... it is pronounced 'Cedarmun' honestly buleh! It is quite far up in the mountains of East Bali and I am in a relatively remote house just outside the village, with a backdrop of the monstrously, looming, volcano 'Agung' in centre stage. Spreading out below this domineering spectacle is a rich blanket of tropical forest and rice paddy terraces ...

... but true - apparently. They use the white ones for the rabbit satay sold in the warungs... Aren't other cultures fascinating? Cue the market owner refusing to take them back... ****-a-duck, what am I going to do with ten, live, rabbits? Oh apparently 3 of them died over night so now it's seven! Apparently rabbits die very fast here due to the humidity which doesn't agree with their digestive systems... understanding a little more how the plague of rabbits seen in other ...

... these were the best conditions he had yet experienced. I was worried that I would not be able to paddle hard enough to get up on my own, since I had not been able to during the surfing lesson. This concern proved to be unfounded though as it wasn't as hard to get up once I went deeper to where the waves were first breaking. I found that leaning forward a little more than I previously had meant that I didn't have to paddle quite as vigorously and I was finally ...

... I'm not a total idiot for making this stupid mistake. Incident number two on the bike occured a few minutes after stopping at the ATM and minimart, with my melted leg. Ray is not so 'experienced' at riding these things, and when we came along a steep 'U' shaped hill, he slowed the bike going down the hill since it was gaining alot of speed, but slowed down so much that when we tried to make it back up the hill, the bike slowed to a stop near the top of hill ...

... on my feet (yuk) for any extra $2. It was hot in the sun (even though it was getting low in the sky and I was under a tree) but great. Tim returned as I came back with $ and was having a beer with One?! - the guy who hired out the surfboard. He was lovely and we sat down with some Bintangs (even me! - each tree basically has someone hiring boards with an esky to sell drinks), bought some for One and watched the sunset into the clouds/hazy sky. Everything we needed was provided ...

... it started to rain VERY hard. I guess we were expecting something a bit more sacred but it ended up being quite a tourist trap. The entire path to the temple was surrounded by shops and vendors. There was one moment that was quite hillarious...as we were walking down to the temple, a bunch of tourists were walking back up. Out of the corner of his eye, Ray spotted a huge caucasian man in a black speed with his stomach ...

... sarong to enter sacred temples (you must have legs covered to get in). After this temple, get to Alas Kedaton, the monkeys forest temple. You can guess why it is called monkeys forest. There are hundreds of macaques that come to you to ask for some peanuts. Some of them are quiet, and some of them are a little agressive, like the one that got on Monika's head (what a pity I did not have my camera ready!). She didn't like it very much, so we rushed ...

... you take off your pack first, someone nearby grabs it and runs off with it. (Oh, the agony of choice). By the time we'd made it on to the boat across the narrow channel between Java and Bali I was in serious pain and cracked open the Ibuprofen. The three-hour bus journey from Gilimanuk (on Bali's western edge) to Denpasar was, of course, a four-hour journey. I had a seat to myself but since the seat was designed for a diminutive asian ...

... of ones work c*n been seen *ll *ro*nd. The h*rmony where indoors meets o*tdoors is fl*id. It is the ide*l environment. O*r next *ccommod*tion w*s right next door to the B*li Ag*ng. This w*s * f*r more enjoy*ble experience - not * r*t in sight. The rooms were f*r more s*perior, che*per *nd we h*d the whole pl*ce to o*rselves. The st*ff were gre*t *nd we wo*ld thoro*ghly recommend it www.vill*b*le.com. Before we knew it, the weekend h*d *rrived *nd it w*s time to p*t on o*r ...