The last bit of the Holiday

Elephant fountains at the entrance to our resort

This is the sad part. It is with teary eyes that we face the prospect of going home to dear cold Canberra – to work – to the cleaning up of the camping gear and washing of the car… but at least the ironing was up to date when I left the second time!!

We don’t fly out of Denpasar until 11pm their time which is 1am our time – by which case I will be sleep walking for sure!

Going home from a holiday always sucks in my opinion – unless you are going on another one shortly after or are retired or really rich and don’t have to work anyway. All of these scenarios don’t apply to us.

We will leave the resort about 8pm as the airport is half an hours drive and have booked our trusty driver to get us there. His name is Agung (pronounced Agoong). He has been driving us around to Kuta and yesterday to our quest to find a bit more shopping. Its so posh, he waits for us and then we hop in his car and he drives us somewhere else. Our own personal driver for 3 hours. Anyway it took us about 4 dodgy ones to find him so when you get a good one – you look after them.

However our current problem is to amuse ourselves for the rest of the day. We had to vacate our room by 12pm and are free to make use of the facilities. They do give you a shower room to clean up before you get your travelling clothes on but I have been in these rooms in other resorts before and they are usually grotty. You don’t know whether its been cleaned from the last person - who could have had disgusting feet growing catchable feet warts  or something so we elected to do our swimming and stuff in the morning and shower in our bathroom before we had to leave. The luggage is now in storage and we are free to roam.

There isn’t much to do when you have to hang around all day waiting for a flight.  Its not as relaxing as other days as you know you have to be somewhere and sit on a plane soon.

We could have caught the free bus into the Bali Collection but we have now seen everything there too.

We found the lounge bar and have taken up residence there for the day. I have started a tab so we can at least drink things alcoholic or not – well I do – Greg is still on his ‘don’t drink much’ thing. I wish he would get back to normal all this not drinking and feeling tired all the time is really boring after 8 months – and there is no end in sight. I was hoping that this holiday of sitting around and him doing nothing much would make some headway but no. Now as well as sleeping in for half the day he has an afternoon nap too. Thank goodness I bought the laptop and started a blog or I would be climbing the walls. There is only so much exercise you can do in a day and complete strangers to annoy.

I planned on going for a run this morning but slept in and it was too hot by the time I got up so I went to the gym instead. I needed to do my abs and back exercises anyway. I wiled away an hour there and did a cross trainer workout for something different before returning to the room hoping to find Greg awake and ready to go. He was still snoring soundly so I changed into swimmers and hit the pool.

Yes hit the pool literally because all the children who snaffle the surf boards through the day are having breakfast or something and they are not in the pool so the surfboards (cheap versions of boogie boards) are free so I could play with them at will. So right in front of where sensible people are having breakfast at the 6 foot deep pool, I stacked two boards on top of one another and then pushed them out from the edge, took a run up and tried to go ‘surfing’. I promptly fell straight off with a big splash - but it didn't deter me from trying again - and again. It was actually quite fun to be really silly however after about 8 attempts to keep my balance I got tired and gave up. By which time husband was up and I was hungry so we tidied ourselves up and went for our last breakfast.

Blow Holes and other entertainment

Wednesday’s Bali Blog  8^th August 2012

 We have not been doing anything that noteworthy of putting in a blog. There is only so much of me telling you that I got up, went for a run, came back hot and sweaty, did some stretches, changed into swimmers and went for a quick dip before having a shower and going to breakfast. But for a couple of days when I went to the gym instead or just gave myself a day off, that’s been it.

Not shopping again! Waiting for
our taxi to Kuta

We did go to Kuta one day to remind me why I don’t think much of it unless you need to kit your family and friends out with cheap Bin Tang Beer singlets or want 100 cheap beach dresses. The vendors are like seagulls over a chip except you are the chip and after a very short time, I was over it.

Today however I found something to tell you which I think is very funny.

Kuta - same pretty much as 15 years
ago.

This morning I went for a run. (no, that’s not it) I wasn’t going to today as I ran yesterday but I got up at Bali time 6.50 (8.50 our time which is normally a sleep in) and the gym here doesn’t open until 8am their time which is 10am our time. My choices therefore were to watch Greg sleep for 2 hours or leave the room. Hence I ended up going for another run.

Today because I got a little bored of my normal route, I went further along the path to see where it goes. I normally turn around at the first Island which is about 4 or 5 km up the beach. However today I went to the 2^nd island to see what the go was there. It was not that much further maybe another kilometer.

Discovering a new beach

There is another temple – what a surprise – fancy another temple in Bali but they have a path that leads to a blow hole in the rocks by the sea.

There wasn’t much to see at the blow hole as the waves were pretty flat but I did notice a viewing platform which was very wet – obviously the waves do come up that high. It was also boarded up at the entrance to stop people entering it as parts of the railing were missing. The platform was built over the top of a bunch of seriously jaggered rocks so if one was to be swept off the platform, the consequences were to be shredded to bits by the rocks. Very unpleasant. Nobody else was there this morning so I had a little rest and went on.

The next on my sticky nose tour of Bali was the grounds of the Grand Hyatt. Its absolutely huge and they even have a pond with big white ducks gracefully gliding around. Other than that there are many beach lounges pool side and over on the beach which is the same as we are staying except I would hate to see how much a beer costs off their menu. The pool goes on forever and the grounds are manicured to perfection. I don’t think the grass dares grow out of place.

Anyway the sun was getting higher and it was becoming hot and I had to get back or Greg would be wondering where I got to and probably hanging out for breakfast so I hastened as much as my very grumpy, tired legs would take me. Massage this afternoon for sure!

Starbucks coffee buckets - not for the caffeine sensitive!

Over breakfast I had interesting conversation to have with Greg – which is a change as we have been in each other’s face for weeks now and are starting to run out of interesting chit chat as we are always together. Anyway I mentioned to him about my high morning adventure and offered to take him there. It would not be far from the Bali Collection – the group of shops and restaurants which you can catch the free bus to so we finished our breaky and left to go there via the free bus.

First up on arrival was a coffee at Starbucks.  Now in Australia a large coffee comes in a mug and a normal size coffee comes in a cup and saucer. Yesterday when we were here we asked for a small and got a mug. We assumed the staff made a mistake. However this morning we realized they didn’t make a mistake. When you order a large coffee it comes out in a size resembling a pint you might find in a pub but with a handle and mug like . Small coffees come in normal size coffee mugs. We sat there for ages trying to drink what would keep the population of a 3^rd world country awake for a fortnight before I could show Greg the sights I had discovered earlier that day.

Blow hole blowing - you can see the tourist about
to get a bit wet

By now the sun was burning and bright which made the scenery spectacular and us very hot. Greg had said the forecast for the weather today was 28 degrees and a shower in the afternoon so he had worn a cotton Tshirt instead of a cooler casual shirt. It was much hotter than that but more humid than it had been on other days. He started grumbling about 5 minutes into the walk that what I was about to reveal had better be worth it.

The island had a path all the way around which was paved and the blow hole path off shoot is conveniently marked and paved also. When we got there, a welcome sea breeze was blowing and the sea had turned from its light blue of the morning to a very deep blue and the swell was starting to pick up.

I didn't quite capture it but this is the start of a big
splash and there is actually a guy under this wave
getting a free bath.

Some very game tourists had bravely climbed over the fence of the walkway and were gingerly peering into the blow hole part of the rocks. We went to the safe viewing platform which over looked the wooden platform and also offered a great view of the beaches he resorts about 180 degrees around.

No escape its so funny to watch people getting swamped
by a wave!

Whilst welcoming a sit down and a chance to cool off a bit, a nice sized swell came up. You don’t really notice it except it was larger that the other swells and next thing the sticky nose tourists illegally looking into the blow hole got completely drowned when power of the swell and for force of the waves through the small opening propelled about an Olympic swimming pool full of water upwards and all over them. Actually you could see them see the volume of water coming up through the tunnel but it was too late to run anywhere to avoid the inevitable. You could also see them looking up as the water propelled itself into the sky and then with expressions like a Looney Tunes Cartoon where the Coyote in a road runner cartoon is expecting to have something land on him – they were sitting ducks for a dumping.

Talk about laugh!

When their shrieks of surprise died down and their onlookers stopped laughing, they left the scene looking as if they had been swimming all morning. They had no longer gone when another lot of tourists came along, had a look, climbed over the fence and peered into the blow hole.

Guess what happened!

It wasn’t long before kaboosh and kersplash another large swell delivered a big dump of water, lots of shrieks and squeals. Another pile of wet tourists!

We could have enjoyed this all day! However, we had other things to gawk at so we left after just one more vulnerable bunch of unsuspecting and curious people!

What great free entertainment!

Near the Hyatt - your own private ceremony all set up

More Indian wedding with equine highlights

Remember I told you about the lovely yellow Indian wedding? Well it didn’t stop there. They had their civil ceremony and then went off and had a shindig at another part of the resort which we didn’t see and weren’t interested – in a nice way. The next day however was even more extravagant than the first.

Painting the chapel red? These Indians
don't do things by halves. How many times
can you get married in a weekend - the
answer is at least 3!

Starting with a ceremony on the lawns that included some traditional dress and the wedding party sitting around on cushions lighting incense and throwing petals at each other to the prayers in a language that made not sense to us – which I’m sure was very nice. The best was yet to come.

There were dozens of these
beautiful flower arrangements
around which set the scene

This time the stage was decked out in red and as I went down to take my sticky nose tourist photos, I learned that the groom was to be riding a horse up the walkway to meet his bride. I must tell you that I’ve owned a horse and ridden lots years ago and looking down the path where there were flappity flags and parasols all adored in red scarves billowing in the wind, any horse I’ve ever known would have had all four legs off the ground and have taken off up the beach. So I decided to stick around as it might become interesting.

Everything flapping furiously in the wind and the horse is going to walk calmly down
 this path behind 30 yelling, dancing, cheering people...
Right!

Some time later, sticky nose tourist me and my trusty Nikon Coolpix found the said horse and handler. The horse, a grey fleabitten (colour) mare were standing there nice and quiet but she must have been hot.  She would have been about 14.3hh at best so not the tallest girl to take a man for a pony ride. The adornment she was wearing was heavy velvet all sequinned and tasselly and lovely but it was a hot day, it would have weighed more than a winter rug and she was in the sun. Underneath this rug and neck rug thing was obviously an all purpose saddle and the stirrups poked through a hole in the rug so they could be used by the rider. The front part of the headpiece was so wide that she wouldn’t have been able to see ahead, only sideways which is also interesting.

more fancy decorations

The handler hardly spoke any English so I took my photos and left them alone. On the scheduled time that the said groom would ride his ‘mount’ down to meet his bride I waited as did Greg near the wedding chapel, hoping for a good view of the proceedings. We weren’t the only ones. Many other partially sunburned and also partially clad tourists staying at the resort were eager to see what went on as well. The scene was set and so were several loud speakers along the groom’s path. The wind was brisk and the sun was setting so it was also a bit chilly in the shade waiting and waiting.

All set to deliver the groom to the bride. The horse standing quietly

Eventually someone found the music and all this Bollywood music boomed from the speakers. The groom was on his horse, his supporters and family were before the horse all dancing, cheering and calling out. Small children were holstered on their father’s shoulders and everyone was having a bit of a grove – even us free loading on lookers. It was quite exciting!...

The horse can't see and neither can the groom - she's getting
a bit edgy already

Especially for the horse who had been half asleep and then this guy wants a pony ride which is fine then WHAT THE HECK IS HAPPENING WITH THIS NOISE AND ALL THESE CRAZY PEOPLE!!!! So she did a bit of a dance of her own which unnerved the handler who gripped her bridle tighter and someone else jumped on the other side and gripped the other side of her bridle – so now she couldn’t see whats in front of her and men were holding her head so tight – poor girl. All she could do is chew her bit furiously. She must have been very quiet in spite of all of this – my horse would have been at Kuta Beach by now. The pace the dancers were going was so slow she couldn’t even walk properly so she therefore got a bit uptight. The groom was wearing this veil thing over his face so he couldn’t see properly either.

I watched with ever growing interest.

When the party and the horse got near us, there were 2 tourists sitting in front of us on beach chairs. It was here that the pony had had enough of all this noise  - that had increased 10 fold since they were close to the chapel. Lots more family and friends had joined in the celebration, noisily, jumping up and down,. They also had parasols which they enthusiastically pumped up and down in front of the horse. At this point she started to put her haunches under her. Seeing this I quickly advised the folk in front that the horse was about to go nuts and to get out of their chairs. They did at once. The horse did a quarter rear and went backwards nearly tripping over the chairs at which point the groom got off and then the horse did a big poo right there.

Now when on holidays was there ever such excitement?

A staff member was quickly despatched with a dustpan and broom – (he needed a shovel) to get rid of the mess. It was 5 seconds after he finished furiously sweeping that she did a great big wee which flooded the path in a great big puddle!

We waited and waited for the bride but we were cold and she didn’t seem in a hurry to meet her groom. Greg said he would have given up by now and gone home. Anyway we did give up and go back to our balcony where I could just see what was going on. In any case the horse had gone and the sun was setting.

The wedding scene was so pretty as they had torches and candles everywhere.

We settled in for a happy hour with our own grog and started the discussion of where to go for dinner.

Dunnies, Dining and what do you wear to a Hindu Christening!

Take a seat - waiter will be here soon!

Mind the loos! The perils of the eco friendly tourist.

Its been 15 years since we were in Bali last and other than some more buildings, the security and the staff seem very grateful that you have chosen their country to visit, the toilets have ‘eco friendly’ systems on them. I am sure this is for the people who use a squirt of water rather than toilet paper when they go. Anyway I thought it was like a bidet. This is really wrong as the water is completely cold. Imagine my surprise at that when I tried it out when we got to our room. As is the Caz tradition and always needing to wee on arrival I went to the loo. There was no loo paper so I thought – ‘when in Rome’…. Well Rome can stay there and as quick as you like I summoned the housekeeping people. Not only did we have no towels in the room there was no dunny paper. Both won’t do! (although in an emergency there was a box of tissues) Sorry Bali – I’m not an eco friendly tourist. A cold squirt of water up the backside every time you need to go won’t make my holiday I’m afraid!

You want Massarzz???

I have discovered the joy of the $5 for an hour beach massage. Actually the locals pronounce it ‘massarzzz’. Its not as good as what my mate Trish Blacker in Florey can do but its still an hour of massage on my tired and rubbish muscles and neck and its relaxing and I love it. Every second day I have made time to go get ‘massarzz’ from the same lady. She has a mate that sits with her and the main lady works on my back and the other on my legs. Talk about a good value massarzz! I have been running and in the gym here on alternate days so there is always some muscle group whingeing therefore on tap massarzz is just great.

Getting the washing done

The motel does offer a laundry service but its expensive as you would expect in a resort – so everywhere around this strip you can get a real tattoo, a fake tattoo, washing done, massazze or buy a trashy beach dress. Take your pick. Anyway we found a lady that does massage and washing and hopefully not all at once. She is our $1.50 per kilo person. Since I have been running and exercising every day I have managed to acquire a nice mound of sweaty washing so we have given it to her. We come back for our 5kg of washing amounting to $7.50 tomorrow. I just hope she has not shrunk everything. If she has then my niece Alexandra who is 6 will have a whole new wardrobe!

Eating out in Bali

Eating out has been a re learning experience. The first night after we got here we decided to catch the free bus into Galeria – well its not called that any more its called the Bali Collection. Kind of makes it sound like you have to pay to get in but you don’t.  We had been there in the day and the free bus with the dodgy seats that move about and no windows so that if you have bothered to do your hair by the time you get off  - hair doing was a waste of time… leaves on the hour and returns on the hour.  So we caught the free bus in with everyone else and it was a bit crowded – but you can’t beat a free ride.

I saw this gorgeous little
beaded and sequinned dress
in a shop and thought of
several lovely little girls who
would look fantastic in it -
especially my nieces Alexandra
and Gabriella. Its a girl thing!

Once at Bali Collection, everyone wants you to eat at their place so they try to entice you with offers of discounts, free garlic bread, free spring rolls and a free ride home. We ended up at a place called  ‘Tropicana’ as they had cheap seafood. We were hanging for some seafood after eating my healthy camping crap for  two weeks.

We lucked in as the staff at this little restaurant were just great and we had this wonderful waiter called Agus who spoke English pretty well. They had a live band and a free trip home when we were finished. Greg and I immediately clicked with Agus and Greg gave him shit which he gave back and its so nice seeing your man happy for a change! We had a seafood platter for 2 which included crab and lobster, baby snapper a couple of prawns which weren’t the best and something I  could best describe as a super ball in a  shell. It was a hard and leathery piece of seafood that didn’t have much flavour either  - but the rest was fantastic.

Having converted a beautifully presented seafood dish into a pile of shells and bones, we were having such a nice time. The wine here is hideously priced and doesn’t look the best so we are drinking a ‘Bintang’ beer which is unusual because neither of us are beer drinkers. Mind you we only have one and that’s enough.  However, Greg decided he’d have desert and so I decided to have a cocktail. Enter the $5 Strawberry daquori. Yum – why waste calories on a cake!

The band played Men At Work’s ‘Down under’ for us on Agus’s request which was a very nice touch. Then we scored our free ride home in a nice car. The seafood was only $35 Aussie – bargain.

This cheeky squirrel was taking a packet of peanuts out
of an offering, running up the tree and pigging out.
All God's creatures!

The next night we went back to Galeria for dinner and tried another place. They were playing great Jazz. We had tried to go to another place that had a really good blues band but the people didn’t want to serve us so we left. If they took 10 minutes to realise we wanted to eat there I would hate to wait for the meal! Anyway the ‘Black Stone’ looked sheik and had lovely comfy chairs and were playing nice music so we went there.

Munching out upside down. He was
also very timid

Well that’s where the good bit ended as the menu was rubbish. The lighting was so intimate that I wished I’d taken my petzel light along with me. They lit the tea light candle on the table so at least we had some light to read with. Hang on are we still camping??? Of all the things on it the best I could pick was a club sandwich and Greg had Singapore Crab. Greg’s meal wasn’t the best and it’s a bit hard to stuff up a sandwich but the total experience was underwhelming so we won’t be going back. They didn’t have free transport either. We went to catch the bus and it was so jam packed that you couldn’t fit another soul on edgeways – not even a skinny one. We caught a cab with a driver who would not give us change but wanted us to  use him if we needed to go anywhere – fat chance. That was it. That was the night of the guy who couldn’t sing in the resort. We watched the Olympics to learn that we are not doing well at that either. No matter. On holidays. Who cares!

Greg relaxing whilst waiting for the free bus in the lobby of Grand Mirage resort

We went back to the ‘Tropical’ the night after – which by now was Saturday night and had another fabulous meal and a few more cocktails and Agus got chatting to us. He lives 3 hours by motor cycle away in his village with his wife and 3 month old son. (He works 6 days per week in Nusa Dua so has accommodation here until his day off.) As Bali tradition goes, the sons stay in the family village and bring their wives in when they marry. Therefore, a few generations live together in various ages. His religion is Hindu and his son is to be ‘christened’ or whatever the equivalent in Hindu is on Friday.

He actually invited us along to his village as guests at this celebration which we felt honoured and humbled but since we are flying out on Friday – can’t go. It would be interesting indeed to witness such an event. However I have no idea of etiquette for such an occasion much less an outfit to wear or a gift for the child  - I can’t even bring a plate. I’ve no idea what goes on and for how long -  so its probably best we go home. I wondered about the language barrier too. However – how nice of him to ask us. Wonder what his wife would have said. “Bloody Agus bringing home strange Australians to our family gathering – what was he thinking!?”

Life in the resort - its really tough!

Even comes with free entertainment here!

First day we were here we returned from our meal at the Bali Collection (the old Galeria) and although really tired were greeted by the sound of a lady who could really sing. She tottered on stage on the highest pair of green heels I have ever seen. I thought she was going to fall at any moment. If we hadn’t been walking zombies from being tired we would have stayed to listen. It didn’t really matter as our room is so close to the main venue that we could hear her plain as day from our bedroom. The second night however when we had a little more energy they had a bloke who could not sing for sour apples so we had to turn the telly on in our room to drown him out.

The view from the pool to the sea

Breakfast is thrown in so every morning we go to breakfast. Bali is 2 hours behind us which suits me, I can get up at 8am which is 6am here, have a run, get back, shower and have breakfast at their 8am which is our 10am in which case its brunch to me!

The Breakfast buffet also have heaps of choices including salad and cold meat, pastries and the normal things you’d find in an international hotel as well as a fruit platter. After stuffing ourselves so we don’t have to buy lunch, we waddle back to our room and organise ourselves for the day. Usually a walk somewhere followed by some sitting somewhere else until I get restless and then I leave Greg sitting and go and see what else I can get up to.

Today I went for a swim up to the swim up bar – which has a very ordinary list of cocktails but I met a nice couple from Perth who have never been out of W A much and never overseas. They also recently bought an A Van which they are enjoying except for putting up the annexe which has caused them some grief. Caravanning conversations happen when you least expect it!

By the time Greg found me I had pruney feet from standing waist high in water whilst chatting but he was astounded as I didn’t have a cocktail in my hand. Hows that for will power!  Actually a few nights ago we went out for dinner and I found cocktails for $5 AUD. The resort ones are much more expensive and I’m feeling like it’s a bit too much of an indulgence at this stage. However with my duty free grog running out, I might have to endulge!

The good thing about this part of the holiday is that its hot. I haven’t once had to wear a beanie to bed and I don’t have to put a coat and ugg boots on to go to the toilet at night. The people are not as friendly though, mind you its an international melting pot. There are people from just about everywhere – some don’t speak much English.  However, there are a few people we have managed to chat to. There is a couple a few doors down called Sue and Grant. He works for the mines and she is an artist. Great fun folk. There is also a family next door who come from Ireland but are living in Malaysia and hope to come to Australia. He is in the building game. Also lovely people. Their kids are so quiet you wouldn’t know they had any. The baby is 20 months and their little girl about 5 or 6.

The view down Nusa Dua beach. In the distance you can see the
little peninsula - green mass jutting out. Thats where I run to every second day.
Well run/walk its quite far and also very hot and I'm not that fit!

Still if we were camping we would know everyone by now as its hard to even get to the laundry room from your camp without being stopped for a chat. Its really nice unless you are in a hurry. Two totally different holidays in one. I wonder how many other people have done this?

Time out in Bali

Our nice room in Grand Mirage
Nusa Dua- Bali. 

Here is a photo of our really nice room as we walked in on Wednesday night after the flight. Its hilarious, the bed is so big! We went from the tiny campervan bed which was a little bigger than a king single but smaller than a double. You had to do synchronised sleeping - everyone roll this way etc or someone nearly fell out. Now I have to write Greg a postcard to invite him over for a snuggle!

Actually we have never had an overseas holiday where we have already been before. Its quite different. Normally we are doing tours and seeing things and really busy but this time we have seen the temples, the monkeys, the sunset temple, the rice paddies, cities and all that so don’t have to do it again. Greg needed a sit down holiday and so we don’t feel one bit guilty not busting our butt to see it all. To my surprise I can’t even be bothered shopping. Well having no money is a kind of incentive and my only purchases have been to acquire a big floppy bali beach dress to pop over swimmers as I didn’t own one, drinking water, soda water and tonic water. Oh and sunscreen as I only had a 1 litre pump pack at home (heavy)

Poolside looking toward the dining area and swim up bar

We have happy hour on our little balcony every afternoon. It saves heaps as we bought our duty free spirits before leaving Sydney and now we just buy mixers from the convenience store. A gin and tonic at the motel is $14. A can of mixer about $1. We also buy some really bad for you crisps – this is because biscuits and cheese are in short supply. We also get out the laptop (yuppies yes I know) and put our music on. Music,  warm weather, drinks, people to watch and my lovely Greg – wish I never had to come home.

The deep end of the pool

Whilst doing our people watching which includes a glimpse of the pool, every afternoon a young Chinese boy wheels his Grandpa down from their room in a  very squeaky wheelchair. Parks him poolside and proceeds to have the best time in the pool with a couple of foam boogie boards. The kid would be 10 at best and skinny as a rake and how he manoeuvres pa in the wheelchair is a feat of strength. The wheelchair is one of those old fashioned chrome and blue ones you get from the hospital which weigh a ton, hard to push and hate changing direction. However, every afternoon about 4.30 when most of the other people are hopping out of the pool, squeekety squeek it’s the kid with Pa.

Our secret room- you can
see our door its the one
on the ground floor
 furterest away

Pa sits by the pool – hopefully with the brakes on in his wheelchair and must give advice to the boy who tries different things to stand on his boards. He piles all 3 up and tries to get to stand on them. Sometimes balancing for about 10 before he falls off. The pool is really deep too so he can obviously swim well. Anyway an hour and a half of doing this interjected with hopping out and trying to do a big bomb to jump back in, its time to wheel Pa back home. Makes us tired just watching the energy of this kid but its so heart warming to see this little boy and his Pa having such a nice time on their own.

Our room is tucked away from the beach but we can still see it – so long as you are not long sighted/ short sighted – whatever it is that you can’t see things way over there. We have a birds eye view of the man who is in charge of the beach towels. Many people who collect their towels or drop them off see us having our happy hour and either wave, scow or walk away bemused. Maybe they didn’t cotton on to supply your own grog saves you a fortune.

From Outback Australia to Bali - why not!

In Bali now!

I am sitting in a Balanese resort watching the lovliest Indian wedding on the beach. Its not something I was planning on doing but my hotel balcony allows me to sticky nose all I like at this event. They are playing Sting’s  “Fields of Gold” and there are about 12 bridesmaids all dressed in some shade of lemon – all different. There are so many bridesmaids! I wonder if the bride needed a role call before going out to make sure they were all there! There was also a flower girl – doing what a flower girl should do – throw flowers on the ground before the bride. However, the wind took them and showered them on surrounding tourists sitting on banana lounges, trying to improve on their sunburn from the day before. This is the Western style ceremony of English Indians. The proper Indian ceremony is tomorrow. They do get married good and proper these Indians!

The pretty isle for the
English Indian wedding

Actually I met the bride and her group in the hallway near our room door. We actually had to excuse ourselves to get past as they took up the whole hallway. The bride was having a hard time with a veil that was getting in the way being blown around in the morning breeze. Being an Indian Wedding I didn’t expect the girls to have a cockney English accent – but there you go. I just said to them ‘good luck and have a great day’. How could you not – every bride deserves a lovely wedding day.  I thought of my sister and her wedding coming up in November.

The wind is not as strong as it has been on other days and there is a blue sky and the sun is shining. The bride must love yellow as there is yellow everywhere in the decorations.

The chapel by the sea all decked out in yellow everything
it looked so pretty and romantic!

Its an interesting holiday this one. One minute we are in the outback of Australia and the next thing slothing it out at a 5 star resort in another country! If you had told me our one month off would end there I would have looked at you funny. (mind you I’m funny looking anyway) The outback will have to wait until we have our own caravan more suited to being punished by us. Then if it falls apart its our problem!

Every nice bride deserves a wonderful wedding

Little touches like this bike thingy makes everything
 look perfect. You'd want a skinny bride and to be pretty
fit to pedal it though!!

Saturday - Cobar to Mudge

Saturday - The holiday that ended too fast Cobar to Mudgee

Resigning to the fact that to drag the little van up any more dirt roads seeking national parks was not fair on anyone – we had turned to home.

We left Cobar and travelled to Mudgee. I didn’t want to go home but I didn’t want Greg to be angry and the van to fall to pieces either so we didn’t have much choice. Didn’t mean I had to like it.

We arrived at Mudgee after a decent sized drive. I have always wanted to go to Mudgee. We found the tourist information centre and the helpful lady gave us some information including where the caravan park central to town was. We then booked in and set up. The van behaved, the fridge decided to work and we put on our hats (beanies as it was freezing) and went into town.

Mudgee on a Saturday night

We looked a bit rough for here – Mudgee gets a lot of people up from Sydney – who obviously haven‘t been camping for two weeks and have warm clothes that look nice.  Not a polar fleece to be seen. It didn’t matter as I carry a bit of makup in my handbag so when we selected the first place to have a drink at – I nicked into the loos to try and make myself look a bit more human.  Made up and still in camping clothes we tried a few more pubs around town. One looked like our ‘King O’Malleys’ in Canberra. The next one had more cheerful staff but didn’t look as good but I must say that they had the best Chardonnays as house wines ever.

Mudgee is famous for its Chardonnay. I was in luck. We decided to have dinner at a little café as I hadn’t prepared anything at home and Greg was getting cabin fever from being either in the car or the van. The meal was nice, I had duck for a change and Greg a steak (which he said was ok)Then we went home for a game of scrabble. Only because I took it along and we hadn’t played it yet. I won by a point.

The next day was Sunday. It was sunny but cool. I planned to go on a run so left Greg sleeping and started running about 7.45ish. I found a few points of interest and mapped out the town, even found a couple of pubs we’d missed from the night before’s check out. Then returned to camp to find Greg still asleep.

I didn’t want to disturb him so I got my stuff together for a shower.

The showers at the Riverside Caravan Park are old but well maintained but whoever installed the shower rose must have though that no female ever grew above 4 feet and 6 inches tall. The shower when convinced to be hot – only hit me in the middle of my chest. I am not the tallest woman either.

Obviously the people here realized this problem but rather than replumb the whole row, they have installed a hand rail. This meant that you could stand with your back against the shower while it was on, hang on to the rail and bob down to get your hair wet. Kind of like water ski practice. Now I have decent muscle tone in my legs and had just been for a run but even I found being in a half squat position to rinse my shampoo/conditioner a little work out. I bet there are older women that don’t exercise as much that would have had a whole month’s worth of exercise just in having a shower here.

It was the same in the toilets when I went to use them. I wondered whether I was trying to sit on a child’s toilet it was so low. Again they have installed a hand rail in case you don’t have enough quadriceps strength to haul your arse back off them. Considerate really.

Anyway after my shower exercise I went back to the caravan to find Greg fully functional and awake so energetically encouraged him to have his shower – not mentioning that the roses were so low and then we would purchase a paper and go find some breakfast.

Greg found the showers as interesting as I did.

Wandering down town, we found a great little café with very slow staff but great coffee. You almost had to crash tackle them to the ground to get them to take your food order – then it took for ever – but that didn’t matter as I had my laptop, Greg the paper and we were desperate to find somewhere hot to go to once we got home.

The original bar in a pub transported
the the Gulgong Museum

Sunday was also the day I forgot it wasn’t my husband’s birthday. I was all hugs and kisses wishing him a happy birthday and all the rest of it until we got the paper and realized it wasn’t until Tuesday. Holidays – you just loose track of time.

Breakfast over and none the wiser as to where we could go to after we arrived home, we made the best of the district. We ventured down to Gulgong which is a small old gold mining town not far away. Its the town on the original $10 note! Henry Lawson county and apparently the best museum. We paid our $10 each to the museum which covered a whole block and went exploring. They weren’t kidding – this museum had everything. If you ever expected to see something in a museum – this one had it. Fossils, precious stones, farm machinery, old photos, rooms set up like the old days including shops, banks, a pub, bedrooms. There were displays of old phones, electrical appliances, books, outfits and uniforms, you name it and it was there. The museum also had a lot of reading about the objects on informative displays. We didn’t realize the time but about 2 and a half hours later with our eyeballs a boggling from all the stuff we saw and read about – we were both buggered.

Never complain your
bedroom is too small!
Gulgong Museum

Time to visit a winery.

I drove back into Mudgee and found  winery. I didn’t want to visit the lot, just a few. The first one was High Valley. He had some lovely Chardonnay so I bought some. He also does cheese and feta cheese so we got some of that too. They were such lovely people and offered to store the van if we chose to go on without it, after I told them what happened. How nice and they had not even met us before! We didn’t take up his kind offer.

Next was a winery whose wines were the same as what you could buy in Dan Murphy’s and weren’t much chop compared to the ones we just tried. The only nice wine was around $40 which was way out of our budget. We did start talking to the lady about caravanning and her husband and her have just got back from a two month trip. Picked up some good tips and bought nothing!

The last one was the Mudgee Winery. We arrived when most wineries were starting to pack up. Greg was driving and not interested in tasting. Suited me. There was a young couple on a tour complete with a mini bus driver. The driver and mine started to have a chat. Apparently he has a van too – so they yacked about four wheel drive cars and vans etc. I tasted some of the wine. Eventually the young couple purchased what they wanted and rounded up their driver – still actively engaged in conversation with Greg, and left.

Vinyards at Mudgee

Greg then had nobody to talk to and was giving me the ‘hurry up’ body language. I had been talking to the chap serving and we mentioned that some of the Mudgee reds were not as gutsy as we were used to. He proceeded to disclaim us and produced some lovely reds that even Greg the non drinker today had a try. Then we got talking to this fellow about how he came to be running a winery he doesn’t own and several things including town gossip until the sun went down and it was time to close up. We bought a mixed case of wine at the top end of our budget, he gave us a discount which was very nice. It was a really nice way of ending the day.

Driving through the vineyards - they are considerate here
they put a porta loo on the side of the road
thankfully I didn't need to use it on this occasion !

We went back to camp and decided to go out to the local Thai called My Thai which was supposed to be really good. We walked there which was not far and really nice. The Thai was excellent and since we were the only ones in the restaurant, the owner came out to ask us how we liked our meals. I greeted her in Thai and won a friend.  She told us she does lots of take aways – which there had been a steady stream of phone calls and people coming and going collecting their meals. We talked for ages. She comes from Bangkok and has been living in Australia for so long etc etc. Her staff started to pack up and her daughter who is also the waitress came for a chat. It was time to close – we paid and went home for another round of world championship scrabble. Greg won by 3 points this time.

Tomorrow it was back to Canberra and although we had enjoyed our day – I still didn’t want to go home. I wondered whether I would have felt this way at the end of the holiday anyway – probably.

Thursday - The long drive to Cobar

Thursday The Long Drive to Cobar

We tried to wake up early enough to catch the sun rise but just missed it. I would have set my phone but the battery was flat and therefore useless as an alarm!

All was not lost though as the sun wasn’t up so we caught the sun coming up over the water in a great big orange ball and it was something out of a tacky Broken Hill art gallery picture.

Pelican on the lake

We packed up without a fuss and headed toward Wilcannia. We really wanted to drive the river road that travels along side the Darling River.

However, less than 1km on the rutted dirt road, it was apparent that it would be the end of the van if we went too much further. We were going less than 40km/hr and it was still too rough so we turned around in a 1000 point u turn and headed back toward Broken Hill. We would have to go through BH to get to Wilkannia as the road is paved all the way. It is longer though but probably quicker. On the bright side we decided we would get some breakfast on the way through. We were really disappointed that the river road that was supposed to be a good road was so bad. Well it wasn’t bad for the car, just the van.

We travelled back to Broken Hill and had some breakfast, I popped into the local IGA for some bits and pieces, we got fuel and headed off toward Wilcannia. We wanted to get to Cobar as Wilcannia is supposed to be a little rough and has a bad reputation. However, it was going to be an all day on the road day and pulling up in the dark to set up camp was a concept that wasn’t overwhelming us with enthusiasm.

Its a sign - but where to???
near Menindee National Park

We drove for ages and came across a whole lot of emus on the road(live ones) so Greg slowed the car while I frantically looked for my camera, wound the window down and half hanging out of the window, taking off seatbelt and throwing sunglasses somewhere else in the car – took some of the best emu shots. It was so worth it. It also made the trip more interesting. Then keep it a bit more interesting, I played music on the CD player. I found CD’s I haven’t played in ages.

Emus on the road - a scramble for the camera

Emus running off the road

Handy hint for the day – Ipods and MP3 players are all well and good in theory but someone can come along and delete all your music with the touch of a misplaced finger on a button. CD’s still work!!

Emus running away. Caz's amazing out of the car window photography!

The landscape changed several times from scrubby low lying bushes to treed areas, hills, flat, dry river bed crossings with bright red dirt. All sorts. We pulled up at a truck stop for a quick lunch and a pee in another terrible smelling enviro toilet. Quick lunch was the operative word. I had bought a fresh loaf of bread and some tomatoes but there was no butter as it was in the van fridge. I don’t care too much for butter but Greg likes it so he had to go without. So after the world’s fastest lunch – as it was so cold and windy that one didn’t want to linger outdoors for long at all. It was back on the road.

Miles of nothing much

Same- same but different - the ever changing not much there

At least the clouds were good.

Wilcannia - the most interesting
part was this bridge thing.

Wilcannia isn’t much to look at and we didn’t stop. We arrived at Cobar at near dark and booked into the caravan park. We were both really tired but the best thing was the site was a slab site. We started putting the van up.

When we opened the door this time we discovered that the glass cover that covers the light that doesn’t work had fallen down and smashed on the floor. What a bummer. I cleaned up the mess and checked the fridge that refused to work on gas while we were at our lake camp. It was barely working from the car battery and the food that was in the freezer had all but defrosted. Another bummer. Then the leftovers I had from the previous days had not been kept at a food safe temperature so I had to chuck it all out. Now this was giving us the shits.

After Wilcannia - more flat scenery

The upper door to the camper that has to be removed and replaced with every setting up and putting down wouldn’t go in its spot.

Greg cracked the shits big time. It wasn’t that we were ungrateful to have a lend of a van from a friend we are but our friend bought the van to be used once per year at Burrunjuck Dam for a 3 week camping stint, once a year. And for that its just the perfect thing.

At last some trees. Perfectly trimmed underneath on
account of the goats and sheep that graze on the side of
the road. Something else to look out for.
I'd never seen so many herds of wild goats before.

 It gets towed there once per year which is only an hour from Canberra and put up for 3 weeks, then put down and taken back to Canberra. Not dragged for hours on end on roads, some dirt, some corrugated and put up and down every day or two days. Its also such an old van that the wear and tear that naturally occurs for a van of its age was catching up with it. She was just wearing out and stuff started to go wrong.

Aside from the fact the fridge now hardly worked. The inside light was buggered and when you pumped water with the hand pump inside parts of the water squirted up through the pump soaking the bench. The little light in the fridge didn’t work so you weren’t sure when the gas was on or not. One slider side also didn’t like to be slid in very much either and the rivets on the lid that clamp down on one part had started coming out. We would have to take her back to Canberra and send her to Jaco for a thorough maintenance.

The long and winding road...
(John Lennon song)

More to the point it wasn’t ours. We became very much afraid of breaking it so that its owner wouldn’t be able to use it come summer time.

Trouble is, we recongnised all of this but what to do now?

Do we go back to Canberra or try to press on?

 If we pressed on and something went really wrong what would happen then?

My NRMA road assistance cover will cover transportation of the van back to Canberra on a truck which is good insurance but didn’t solve the problem.

Lunch stop scenery

We really didn’t know what to do – so we poured a drink and had a discussion. Then we decided that we probably needed a walk, so since the local bowls and golf club is just down the road, we decided to go there.

Greg looked all right except for the black cloud hanging over him but I looked like a train wreck. I hadn’t had a shower so my hair was terrible from being stoomped down in a beanie. I had no makeup on and I could not be bothered trying to find my clean jeans. We could have headed to the showers but that would have taken more time and by which the meals would probably be off in the club. We wanted to have dinner out for a change. I looked rough as hessian underpants but nobody knew me here so I didn’t really care.

The club in Cobar has a big open fire place which was an instant hit with me – and a very ordinary wine list which wasn’t a hit.

We bought some drinks and I dragged out the road maps from my handbag and we discussed strategy of what to do next from a comfy lounge chair.

Going on would probably be foolish and may break the van beyond repair. We would have to start heading home. I was crushed. Greg was not happy either. I just felt like bursting into tears – our holiday over 2 weeks prematurely. Greg said we could go somewhere else – but where? I had my heart set on Queensland – the warm. I’d had enough of this camping in cold shit weather. Turning back would just be headed back into the cold southern areas from which we had come. Undesirable.

For 12 months I had looked forward to a month away – right away not coming home in the middle of it.  A road trip of adventure and seeing things I’d not seen before. Not a resort with lazy chairs so you sit like a jellyfish reading rubbish fiction novels, eating too much stuff and becoming fat because there is nothing much else to do. That’s ok for a day or so…but gee.

Right now I wanted more lakeside camps with nobody else but us there. Listening to the quiet and the still and looking up at the stars from our camping chairs and our fireplace. Even caravan parks with their lint dispensing washing machines and manicured lawns weren’t doing it for me any more.

We decided to head toward Mudgee. Which is cold but I’ve never been there and its supposed to be really nice. We expected to hit home in about 5 days.

To try and lift our spirits we had dinner in the bowls club Chinese restaurant. Common sense said to have steak but we were so bored for flavour we had Chinese. Of course it wasn’t the best Chinese ever, I’m sure the sauces came out of a Kan Tong jar - but the staff were very prompt and attentive and it was clean so we cheered ourselves up a bit and after our meal stuck $5 into a poker machine.

We won our money back and the best part about that was I now had change for the washing machines tomorrow. We strolled back to our cramped camp and went to bed.