thanks for that Paul McCartney

So I've never been a fan of the Beatles or Paul McCartney despite Band on the Run and Silly Love songs being two of my favourite guilty pleasure songs (pleasures really, the guilty bit is bullshit in that phrase.)

And so this morning I woke up and grabbed my phone to catchup on the overnight scores and the news. Somewhere or other stumbled on a story about Macca being on Carpool Karaoke. James Corden is a likable chap so I thought I'd spend 23 minutes having a watch before rolling out of bed.

It gets to 5 minutes. We get to Let it Be, one of the most over played songs of all time I reckon. Sir Paul tells us it was inspired by a dream in which he was visited by his deceased mother and she  reassured him that it was going to be OK, just let it be.

Which is a kinda saccharine but nice story. Only...

My mum told me it was going to be OK. She was wearing a brown skirt and an orange top, was in our lounge room and her face had no sign of what the cancer had done to it. She looked beautiful. She'd not been dead long when I had that dream. Twenty five years have passed since.

So I had a bit of a weep; thanks Sir Paul-fuckin-McCartney, just what I needed to start the last day of my family holiday in Bali! Nah, I don't mind getting a bit teary, and of course I'm welling up a bit as I type this, but it's a good thing. Better than forgetting. It's good for the soul. But yep, "I didn't see that one coming round the corner."

OK, normal service will resume later, but I felt like sharing that. The Beatles, not so bad after all (maybe.)



...does make me wonder how many people have that dream though...


Oh, and Let it Be now joins R.E.M Everybody Hurts in my tear-jerker draw, that latter because in the video the subtitle "she's gone" pops up.

the bom (uncut funk)

This brief post might read like a bit of an advert. Today was the girls' choice and there was only one thing they REALLY wanted and that was a visit to Waterbom, a water park at the back of Kuta. In fact THE waterpark. By some measures - such as the 2017 tripadvisor travelers choice awards - the best waterpark in Asia.

Now, I'm not a big fan of waterparks. They're fun, but they don't really float my boat. Maybe because my most recent waterparking has been wet 'n' wild in Sydney's west, which is...well...ok. Good I guess...so I was not expecting too much.

Sal had arranged to Wayan (he has a name!) to collect us at 08:30 so we'd be there for opening at 09:00. Sal had drugged herself up in order to make it through the morning and had also, of course, pre-booked tickets.

Waterbom is like a lot of places in Bali. All a bit Tardis. Not a long drive from where we are staying and at the back of super-crazy-Kuta, we pulled into the car park and went through the smart entrance and into the HOLY SHIT WHERE DID ALL THIS SPACE COME FROM park.

Sal loaded up a pre-pay bracelet - the park is cashless - so we could get food and drinks and stuff; all slides and pools are included in the ticket price. We dropped our stuff in a locker and started to wander. Because I am that sort of smart - I left my phone in the locker, so no pictures. But hey, check out their website if you want to see what it looks like.

Where Wet 'n Wild suffers from bing in the middle of a field and a bit open and exposed, Waterbom is set in lush tropical gardens. Neat paths weave between the slides and pools and gazebos and restaurants/bars...I was incredibly impressed at just how well appointed it was. We picked out some sun lounges in a shady spot near the central kids' pool and went out to play.

We had a very gentle start, floating down the lazy river. They were not kidding about the laziness. With our fins wet we started on the slides and did...well, most of them. Mats and tubes and feet/arms/crossed tubes and pipes aplenty and only a couple that H could not go on. I think this was just bad luck though, as there were a couple of others were she was allowed to stand on tip-toe to make the minimum height!

So it was a good morning and I did enjoy it. That said, I don't think I'll ever want to head back to Wet 'n Wild. Sorry Sydney...

A few observations...lots of tattoos (some very good, some not so) on display. Saw a lass walking past the kids pool at 09:45 with a Bintang in one hand and cigarette in the other. Not sure how much vive le in that difference, but who am I to judge? (answers on a postcard to...) A real mix of people there - waterparks, succeeding where religion has failed?

Anyway, if you're in Bali you could easily spend a day there, kids in tow or no.

The rest of the day has settled into a restful mundanity (not sure that is a word and neither is the spell check.) Lunch at a shopping centre that was same-same-but-different to every other shopping centre I've ever been to and now chilaxing.

That was not as brief as I'd expected.

grumpy old man #2 - interrupted briefly by gelato

So while catching up with my blog I also sent Sal a message asking her to pick up some cheap shoes for H so she may one day regain the use of her now, apparently, OK foot. I didn't relent on the swimming thing though. You had blisters so bad you struggled to walk therefore that foot stays clean and dry today so you'll have a good day with mum tomorrow.

Can I ask mum if I can go for a swim when she gets home?

I rolled the dice. Yes you can, but I'll tell mum why I said no swimming.

Now of course it did not go down exactly like this, but my blog = my hyperbole.

Hi H, I bought you some new sneakers! Of course you can go for a swim! Yeah, let's all go for ice cream at Gusto's afterward!

Sigh.

So my flat mood, which had plateaued and was maybe on the up after my earlier blogging took a nose dive, and while I can see what was happening - and how to arrest it - I of course did nothing.

Sal, refreshed from her spa but coming down with a cold, bailed on the pilgrimage  to Gusto's. It is every bit as good as tripadvisor said it would be and every bit as chaotic. The website gallery does not show the huge lineups at the two counters - the first is joined to order and pay, the second to choose your scoops.

Because I'm an idiot, and we're on holiday, and we were all sweaty after the 2km post-rain-humid-wander (amazing recovery from H by the way, but she'll walk over flaming glass shards to get to ice cream...sorry, sorry, sorry, cheer up, I know, I know, I know...) I ordered 3 scoops each.

AJ - Merry Christmas, Strawberry and Milk, Oreo
H - Merry Christmas, Vanilla, Oreo (I think...)
Me - Apple crumble, Vanilla, Bounty

Other than the Merry Christmas (nice chocolate start, weird sweet finish) every one was a winner. I'm quite glad the girls left the Merry Christmas because I was feeling a bit queasy and borderling abusive parent providing them with that much sweet, sweet ice cream (drools like Homer Simpson on a donut.)

So there you go, that was good. And I found some wall art to take pics of on the return, so that was also good.

The girls argued over going through the door to the toilet and left a hat behind. But hey, it was OK there for a while, and I get to go diving tomorrow.

Should be able to sleep my grump off.

monkeying about monday

Right, so back to Monday and day 1 proper of the holiday. Sal had, as Sal does, planned the whole day. In short we were off to Ubud and surrounds to visit the rice fields terraces and the monkey sanctuary and maybe do a spot of shopping.

The same taxi driver that collected us from the airport and whose name I really should commit to memory before we leave, arrived at 07:30 to take drive us to the rice terraces. It was a reasonably long drive and I spent most of it looking out of the window and trying to get a feel for some more-real-than-Seminyak Bali and chatting with the driver. The girls in the back battered mum with questions, H using "how many minutes until we get there?" like a punctuation mark.

We stopped at Canggu...well, we didn't because this was a coffee stop the driver thought would be nice but which deviated from Sal's plan, so rather than stop we did  a lap of the car park and kept going. Our driver (fuck, I feel SO rude not being able to use his name) had worked in the rice fields until 2004, earning $2-3 day. That is doing it tough. As we passed rice he explained that the ducks in the fields are also farmed; they keep bugs down while they roam about and then become my dinner. Yes, there are snakes, and yes, some of them are dangerous. But they help control the rats. And although there are machines that can now harvest rice he (and his wide, who still works the fields) used hand tools.

Sal had made the right decision to leave early so we could avoid most of the traffic. The roads were a little clearer around our part of town as a lot of the shop keepers are Muslim and Monday was a public holiday for the end of Ramadan. We had the obligatory - and seemingly worldwide - conversation about Muslims. In Bali everyone gets on, but on Lombok there is trouble, why can't they live together yadda yadda yadda. I wonder if I'll live long enough to see who gets to share the ire next?

Anyway, we got to the rice terraces and they were kinda cool in a working but rather touristy way. Nothing wrong with that though, just an observation. Hell, if I was on the slim margins that are found here I'd be wanting the tourist dollar. We wandered around after the kids had a go on a massive swing that was strung between a couple of palm trees and swung out over the terraces. An interesting and pretty place.

We got lost. The signage was not great, but rather than retrace our steps we decided to complete a loop of the site and after following a couple of locals up a set of steps that seemed like the path - it was a path - we ended up on a road. The old guy that had been carrying coconuts up the path seemed to indicate that we should walk down the road and we did until we realised we were lost and Sal phoned for help.

TD came to rescue us. (No, calling the taxi driver TD did not make me feel better about not knowing his name...) We were a bit sweaty - what with the terraces and the hills - and by the time we were rescued we were comically close to where we'd started our walk. Rather than head back we decided to move on to a next stop that - arrrgghh! - was a bit unplanned. I say a bit because we wanted a coffee (natch) but stopping at a Kopi Luwak place was not part of the main plan. Before heading off TD placed the large(dead) spider that had dropped on his car into the offering atop his dash. Good luck apparently. I think it may be a banana spider, bit I'm not sure. Ah-ha, actually nephalia pilipes, a type of golden orb weaver.

The coffee stop was good. At a small coffee plantation on the main road, sitting atop a terrace. A good place, the have a couple if civit cats, a guide explains the process and they have some people roasting and grinding the coffee in the traditional manner. Then we had a free tasting of the coffee, several others and a load of herbal teas while looking out over the terraces. I spent some of the time trying to figure out people's obsession with placing themselves in all manner of pouty poses in their pictures. I guess it is a form of self expression, but it seems so so self absorbed and vacuous, people placing more stock in themselves being in a picture than enjoying and sharing the place itself? Dunno, I'm just a grumpy old bastard. But while I am having a whinge, I am also fed up with having to compose my pictures to avoid having your fucking drone in my shot. Ahem, moving on...

I like all the teas and all the coffee apart from the straight Balinese. The luwak was good though. Having had no hard sell we went to the shop and purchased some teas and it is only now, as I type this, that I realise that may come to haunt us when we get to customs in Sydney at sill o clock on Sunday morning. Ah well.

And so to the monkey forest, the main attraction for Monday. Another place that is firmly on the tourist trail and if you want to low down on it then you can just click the link rather than me regurgitate. We did not spend a long time there. It is another peaceful place and the monkeys - well looked after - are all over the place and mostly unconcerned by the tourists other than to cast a watchful eye over us in case we might have some food. We did a fairly casual lap, I took  handful of pictures and we headed back t the car park. Yep, I guess I should spend more time describing it, but hey, I'm getting a bit wordy here already.

It was only lunchtime now and TD took us back into Ubud and suggested the suckling pig at Ibu Oka which I rate more highly than trip advisor. - a good call, solid local fare and cheap. The traffic was a bit chaotic in Ubud so when Sal called TD I had an opportunity to do a quick lap of the palace, click off a few pictures and get frustrated - again - at people plonking themselves front and centre in front of their, and every one else's pictures. I'm sure your friends already know what you look like, how about use more of the frame for, oh, I don't know, the temple gates? Grrr....ahem...

Right, I'm at the end of my blogging patience and the rest of the day was a stop at a silver jewelry making place and a dip in the pool before dinner and bed.

Woo-hoo! I'm up to date!

grumpy old man interlude

Ah the joys or parenting when you're a #grumpyoldman. All's fair day today means Sal gets freedom and I take on parenting duties. Now, I'm not sure if I'm a good or bad parent, really I'm not. I tend to explain - in probably too much detail - all the decisions I make. I also have a pretty good track record of answering all questions the kids ask, refusing only when I know they know the answer or when I can tell them what to do to find the answer for themselves.

The upshot of this is that I have two pretty well rounded, outgoing, confident little ladies who are not afraid to ask questions and offer their opinions. Which is great. Unless you're their dad and you're right about something. They have not yet worked out that correcting people or offering another point of view (their's) does not need to be the default position. Sometimes you just need to understand that dad might be talking sense when he says don't wear those shoes, take a jumper, try to go to the toilet before we leave, make sure you drink enough water...

So the problem I have...I answer, I explain..and if I get nowhere I let them make their own decisions, even when they are wrong. Setting them up for fail? I don't think so. I do (what I believe is) my best to let them make the right decision. Then allow them to make the wrong one. Then have a mini-retrospective when the wheels inevitable fall off.

Like they have this morning.

• Don't wear your crocs if they hurt your feel, we'll be doing some walking. 
• Puts on crocs.
• Wear your Keens, they will be better if you have a blister on your toe.
• Keeps crocs on.
• Taxi to breakfast and then a relatively short bimble around
• My feet hurt (well no shit sherlock...inner monologue)
• Try to walk properly
• I can't walk (quite a drama)
• Let's walk back the shops up here; if I buy you some shoes then do you think you'll be able to walk? (repeat a few times)
• No, oh the agony, you go on without me (limping as if has trod on an IED)
• A bit too much explaining of the situation
• Will you be able to walk today? In different shoes?
• No, we need to get a taxi home
• Get in taxi
• (almost home) if you buy me shoes then I should be able to walk
• too late little lady, too late...inner monologue (words broadly similar though.)
• We need to make sure your blisters get better so you can have a nice day with mum tomorrow
• I'll just go in the pool then
• No you won't, you need to keep your feet clean and dry (repeat)
• Oh but but but, so unfair etc.
• (internet search) What does that say?
• Keep your feet clean and dry
• (sullen)

So here we are back at the villa and I'm letting the kids sort out what they can do. Funny thing...AJ tells me today has been her best day so far because she hasn't got in trouble. Ah, the joys of parenting.

Anyway, before this happened we had breakfast at Revolver. Here are some pictures from this morning and maybe I should take this opportunity to blog about Monday.

dive! dive! dive!

OK, I'm going to skip Monday and come back to that later (note: I probably won't) because yesterday had photos that can jog my memory and today did not. Well, not any meaningful ones.

So why are we in Bali? Well, Sal won the accommodation but was not so keen on coming over, having been here before and not really loving it. I left it at that for a while until I decided to look and see if there was any decent diving in Bali. Turns out there is, so I thought rather than see the prize go to waste I could ring around and find a buddy and use it as a dive trip. I shared this idea with Sal and it very quickly became a family holiday.

Well, that's how I remember it.

But I do get a couple of days diving, I'd done a quick internet search and found Adventure Scuba Diving. They review very well and their website, though a bit dated, says all the right things. It wasn't until we got here that I decided my cold was far enough in the past, my lungs seemed to be functioning and I could clear my ears easily. So on Sunday I sent them an email asking if they had trips going to the manta rays and the wreck of the USS (or USAT?) Liberty. They got back almost immediately with a yes, sent an invoice, I paid and was booked on three dives today and I have another two on Thursday.

So I abandoned Sal and the kids at a bit before 7am and headed out to my pickup point. There I met another couple of divers, a dad and his adult son from Melbourne. Our ride came right on time, we loaded up and made out way to Padang Bai, the small port town from where you can out to Lombok and the Gili islands - or get on your dive boat.

Met the rest of the divers, did the paperwork, loaded up and headed out to see if the conditions were right and if we could dive Manta Point first. They were and we did.

Dive 1 - Manta Point.

Around 45min, max depth about 13m, water temp comfortable in my 3mm, visibility about 5-8m.

I was in a group of four. Benny, our local dive guide and a Japanese couple. I pulled on my own wetsuit, checked my nitrox (34%), got into my hire rig, put my own mask and fins on and rolled off the side of the boat into the water. Time to descend. Which was not a problem for me, but the Japanese lass did seem to be a bit floaty and was half dragged from the surface.

The water was a bit milky and surgey, waves hitting up against the cliff face we were at the foot of. The site a little uninspiring with not much in the way of coral and not many fish, so how about I cut to the chase and get to what fish were there. After a few minutes Benny started pointing upwards and there were manta number 1 and 2. They are a bit like elegant, flying snooker tables.

I lie. I've not seen a snooker table for a while. Manta rays are far larger, I just checked. It is maybe a little pointless trying to explain what it is like being in the water with these incredible creatures. They are massive, they move with an easy grace and seem utterly unconcerned by our presence at their cleaning station. We saw them on and off throughout the middle section of the dive. I saw two at once, so there were at least two of them there, maybe more. The closest once came to me was about 6ft away, as it drifted over top as I hugged the bottom.

We didn't stay in one place but did a sort of loop. I also saw a spotted eagle ray, a turtle, some anemone fish, various other tropicals. It was nice, but had there not been mantas at manta point it would have been a bit ordinary; not bad, but ordinary. As it turned out it was quite awesome.

Dive 2 - Crystal Bay

Around 45min, max depth about 21m, water temp comfortable in my 3mm but a bit chilly under the thermocline, visibility 15m+

A short steam away and we were at Crystal Bay. A sort of sloping wall from a shallow bay affair with far richer coral and fish life. More turtles and another eagle ray here, but no mola mola. Apparently they can be found here at times. Benny did his best to find one and dipped deeper than me into the 20m thermocline and headed off of the wall a bit for a look. I am not sure he was super pleased with the buoyancy of the Japnese couple. I was also a little bemused. Given the up-and-downiness they had in the water I thought having a camera was not a great idea. I didn't take my camera because I thought I was a bit out of practice, but different people have different benchmarks and they seemed to be enjoying their dives so c'est la vie.

The vis here was far better. And that thermocline was really rather distinct. I could see it below me and could not resist dipping in. It was quite refreshing, but I'd not want all thre dives to be in whatever-that-temperature was. It probably wasn't cold, but it was far cooler, and as the dive went on it seemed to be reaching higher in the water column.

Among the things seem were schooling catfish, more turtles, another eagle ray, oriental sweetlips, various small parrotfish, anemone fish - all the usual suspects.

All in all a very pretty little dive.

Dive 3 - Mangrove Channel

Around 45min, max depth about 16m, water temp warmest of the 3 dives, visibility about 10m, current pushing through.

The third dive, after a quite decent lunch for a dive boat (rice, chicken, egg, veg, coffee) was at Mangrove. A no-finning required drift over soft corals and sponges with a healthy dollop of fish life thrown in. I'll not go into detail, other than to say it was another good dive - and I found a mask. Go me! Lucky to grab it as I drifted past (the current was not so strong you could not fin against it for a little while.) Back at the villa I cleaned it up and it looks like a nice mask. Happy days. The splashes in the background are the kids off to pick rocks up from the bottom of the pool.


The weather had turned ordinary by the end of dive three. Rain - warm rain, but still rain. We hung about waiting for our ride back to Seminyak that, in the wet conditions, seemed to take about half the day.

Anyway, this is more a dive log entry than fully-blown blog post, so I'll whip through the rest of the day. I arrived back about 90min earlier than expected. Sal and the girls were still out so I spent about an hour outside the walls of the villa. Remember I told you about the broken glass on the walls? Didn't fancy trying to climb over. But the gate has an awning and was close enough to the house that I could get back on the wi-fi, so all good.

The girls got back - kids with hair braided, mum not. I had a quick hose down, kids jumped in the pool to get out of the rain. And then Sal and I did that rarest of things - go out for a meal together, kids left with a baby sitter. We went to Ginger Moon (go on, have a free shot...) and it was very nice. Ordered too much, ate it all.

OK, that's it, I'm done. It's still raining, Sal gets her free day tomorrow and I'm on lone parent detail, so we'll see where that takes us.

...it is raining quite hard. Maybe this villa would benefit from a couple of extra walls...

settling in and setting up

Day one was all about getting settled in and setting ourselves up for the rest of the week. Which is best done over a decent coffee. And in Seminyak that means Revolver. Or at least that is what the internet was telling us. At a little under 3km away it was a good choice for breakfast as it would take us a long a main shopping drag before the shops were open and before it got too hot. So after a quiet night - weirdly quiet considering the hustle and bustle all around - we got up and got wandering,

After a reasonable wander past a squazillion knock-off shops (I dread to think what Kuta is like!) we found our cafe. Not put off by what appeared to be a security guard on the closed-door-in-an-apparently-windowless-wall we went inside to find a cool - in both ways - bar. All dark and skulls and criminal underworld themed. Should really have clicked off some shots of the inside but didn't. If you find yourselves over here then you can do a lot worse. And yes, the coffee is pretty decent.

After brekkie we continued our wander. It was pretty warm by now, despite only being about 9am. I got into a conversation with a hawker; nice chap, a rep for a local hotel chain. I enjoy a natter, Sal not so much so she drifted off towards some better looking shops. I followed soon after, caught up with them in a clothes shop and then exited to keep on walking, camera in hand.

I found a few interesting things to snap pictures of. Some graffiti (of course!), the...er...petrol stations I guess? Loads of the tat-shops sell petrol to the scootered. The petrol is sold in plastic water bottles, or booze bottles - Absolut seeming to be a favorite. I particularly like how close people stand and smoke to these petrol stands.

Anyway, the rest of the morning and early afternoon was spent wandering a bit further along and then back to our villa. The turn point was on the beach at a hotel called Ku De Ta - bit out of our price range for this trip but looked rather nice. I dragged my heals on the way back - camera made me do it. A few pics of this and that - random diary stuff. My google pics album is here, unedited. I'm still a little taken aback whenever I see the Hindu swastika on a building and I know I should not be. They are relatively common on the temples.

We all had a collo off in the pool and then Sal went for her first massage. I booked into do some diving on Tuesday and Thursday and the kids entertained themselves picking pebbles up from the bottom of the pool before having a go at some Indonesian cartoons. The iPads came out pretty quickly.

Just to make sure my last post did not end as a lie, a few other things.

Holy shit, I forgot the most important thing from the morning (after Revolver.) H lost her tooth overnight. She got AUD$2 for it, bit in Indonesian Rupiah that is IDR205000. Her mind was a little blown.

Sal had spotted a rodent in a tree. I thought it looked like a squirrel. On the way out to dinner I confirmed my suspicions that said rodent was a
Plantain Squirrel. Go me! Other local wildlife news is so far summed up as:

• sparrows, to make me feel homesick
• other little tiny birds that I've yet to ID
• brown frogs, one of which was looking a bit skinny and unwell yesterday afternoon and very dead yesterday evening. It is currently being recycled, and I reckon it will be a small pile of bones by the weekend
• stray dogs, of which there are plenty, but they seem relatively unconcerned by people. And cars. And scooter, and, and, and...

And as is usual for my just before bed on the day after blogs, I'm running out of steam and think it is time to relax for a bit then go to bed. Out for dinner tomorrow night, so don't know if I'll get to blog about today's visit to the rice paddies at Ubud, the Kopi Luwak coffee and local teas, the Monkey Forest....but I'll get to it. And if I don't, at least you have a link to my photo album now.

seeing is Bali ving

So after 19 years down under, several of which I have spent as a card carrying Aussie, I finally get to go to Bali - Benidorm of the south.

It was an earlyish start on Saturday, the sis-in-law packed us into the Delica and took us to the airport where we did the passport and x-ray thing, bimbled about (I bought a hat) and then got onto our Garuda airlines flight from Sydney to Denpasar.

A bit about the flight. We had a 2 rows of two window/aisle seats and it seemed like a reasonable amount of legroom for economy - thumbs up for the Indonesian carrier. The flight is a bit under 7 hours (or 17 trips to the toilet if you're my youngest) and takes you north west from Sydney. Meaning you see the Blue Mountains, then some farmland and then 4 hours of dirt before heading out over the Indian ocean and on to Bali. It really is quite awe inspiring to see just how much bugger all there is in the middle of Australia - I like it. We were lucky enough to fly over the rock, giving me what I think is my first for-real view of the icon. I took a picture with my phone I think came out OK considering I was 10km in the air.

The rock, the west coast and a shit load of awe inspiring dust #straya

A post shared by Kevin Foreman (@auswomble) on Jun 16, 2018 at 4:47am PDT

Not much more of note from the flight. I finally got around to watching Black Panther (thought it was good) and drinking my first Bintang (did not think it was good.) I later had a Heineken and was surprised to find it didn't taste a whole lot different to Bintang. I know I'm a beer snob, but I have nothing against uncomplicated lagers. However these were really ordinary. Ho-hum. I shouldn't be drinking at the moment though, what with the marathon coming up. But hey, I'm on holiday and I've already given up on a serious crack at sub three hours, so why not?


Got to Bali where it was around 30 degrees and muggy - as expected. I did not expect the arrivals hall to be so spacious and full of not much at all. Maybe in peak season it gets rammed?

Customs and baggage collection came and went, and then the organised chaos began. As we exited arrivals we were faced with a wall of taxi drivers awaiting their passengers. Fortunately we spotted our driver good and early and he lead us into the multi-story car park where he abandoned us while he went off to get his car.

I am not sure why the direction arrows are painted on the lanes in the car park. They are suggestions at best. The chaos of the tax driver huddle continues when they get on the road in their cars - most of which seem to be Suziki mini-vans - stopping and starting and heading in every and all directions possible. I could not make head nor tail of it but it did seem to just work.

Out on the main roads the melee has scooters added. Lots and lots of scooters. Which can carry up to - and maybe more than, I don't yet know - four people. Our driver, whose name I cannot recall right now, was a lovely chap, He taught us please and thank you in Indonesian (silahkan/ terima kasih) and explained that Indonesian drivers did not have a lot of emotion in their driving - hence everything just works. If this was Australia then (un)civil (world) war (three) would be breaking out. This calm demeanor is, our driver assured me, the reason why I'd seen so few - in fact maybe no - cars with dings. Quite extraordinary.

And so to our villa, at the southern end of Seminyak, a couple of suburbs north of Kuta. We quickly unpacked, the kids tried the pool (I wimped out) then we locked up and headed out to see if we could catch sunset (we missed it) and a bite to eat. By locked up I mean we put valuables in a safe, locked the bedroom doors and the door into out small courtyard garden. The main living area doesn't have a front wall - you can just wander straight into the living/dining/kitchen. It's nice, and you get a feeling of security courtesy of the 7 foot walls around the lush gardens as they are topped with broken glass.

We are a relatively short walk along a skinny/busy/touristy/scooter rammed road to the beach. The beach was really rather underwhelming; a few noisy tourist traps and some sand of dubious quality. But you know, I can see why people like it and we can't all live in Sydney. This is, after all, the tourist hot spot of the masses. Dinner came and went under a crescent moon, listening to some decent renditions of crowd pleasing songs - can't go wrong with a bit of Maroon 5 - while small bats and ornate kites flew overhead (how the bloody hell does a kite in the shape of a tall ship fly?!) I had an ordinary nasi goreng and completed my day's hatrick of disappointing beers with a Carlsberg. I'm sure they used to taste better...Sal had something forgettable and kids had kid fare. I did take some pictures but they were all rather ordinary so I deleted them, robbing you - dear reader - of the chance to agree/disagree.

And then it was the stroll home to bed, probably well before the beachside places got full on jumping. Given the H bomb's tendency to sleep walk, and aforementioned pool/no wall on the house, the sleeping arrangements are one adult, one kid in each bedroom. I got H as Sal sleeps like a log.

So initial impressions? It's a crowded, noisy, confusing and chaotic place. The mix of tat shops, higher class shopping, crazy-ornate architecture, obvious religious and spiritual trappings, tattoo parlors, massage salons/spas and the obvious signs of low grade hedonism is quite dizzying. But, a bit like Vegas, I think I am going to end up liking this place despite everything lining up perfectly for me to be a grumpy old bastard and hate it.

And that was arrival day. I think I've gone on long enough for one post and want to go to bed, so that'll do for now. Stay tuned for Sunday's run down, in which we find good coffee in a very cool cafe, we all get in the pool, I book five - yes FIVE - dives, I correctly identify a squirrel and H loses a tooth.

Bet you can't wait.