Bali Hai

Bali is a small Indonesian island lying between Java and Lombok and is one of the countries 33 provinces. It has a population of about 3.5 million people which are mostly Hindu so Kung Foo would probably help here too; whereas the rest of Indonesia is mainly Muslim. I believe that they really try hard to keep the Hindu traditions over here which I suppose is the same the world over when a small religious population separates from their majority. Keeping traditions becomes important so as their identity doesn’t get lost in the new land. The rest of India moves on with the times but not the small island populations. One aspect of Hinduism Caste is observed here but less strictly than in India.

Bali is known as, “The Island of the God’s”. They believe that every element of nature possesses its own power, which reflects the power of the Gods. A rock, tree, dagger, or woven cloth is a potential home for spirits whose energy can be directed for good or evil. There are quite a lot of Chinese immigrants here on Bali, and once again, they are all connected with the food industry. People have been living here for a very long time; they have found stone tools believed to date back to the late 19^th century. No seriously, the next island is Java where they found the “Java Man” (Pithecanthropus erectus which means upright ape-man in Greek, very upright by the sound of it in English) which is one of the first known specimens of Homo sapiens around 250,000 years old.

Bali is one of the biggest tourist destinations in the world and is only 8 degrees south of the equator. The highest point is Mount Agung, an active volcano just over 3000m high which last

erupted in 1963. They say it erupts roughly every 40 years so it’s now overdue. Good job Claire and I don’t like climbing. One of the other mountains called Mount Batur, in the same range, is also

active and when it erupted 30,000 years ago was one of the largest known volcanic events in the history of the Earth.

The place to be if your young and don’t have kids is Kutu as this is where all the action is. If you are young and do have kids then Legian is the town to be; not quite the action of Kutu but getting there. These towns are situated on the South West coast. If you are old and don’t have kids with you then you stay where we are staying in Sanur on the south East coast, just out of range of the party noise, next to the quiet beaches and hopefully, far enough away from all those volcanoes. The ferries to Lombok leave from Sanur and I’m hoping that we get time to visit it. There are no train lines on Bali and consequently no trains so you have to travel around by road which are very

busy. On the up side, there are no train spotters on Bali; or if there are, they are much unfulfilled train spotters. I am also hoping that we can hire a motor bike during our stay so we are able to get around the island and see most of it while we are here. If you want to hire a bike or car on Bali, you will need an international driving license which I bought back in England. They are only about £7.50 and you can get the forms in some post offices. Strangely, the massive Milton Keynes Post Office doesn’t have them but the tiny Northampton one does. You can find a list of PO that has them at the AA website http://www.theaa.com/motoring_advice/overseas/apply-for-an-idp-at-a-post-office.html .

The currency in Bali is the Rupiah and there are about 15700 to the £. Or to work it out quickly 100,000IDR is worth about £6.35 and you can’t work it out quickly so take a calculator with you. If you ignore or forget the last 1000 then 100 is worth about two thirds divided by 10. Mak

e sure you have deep pockets when you are travelling around this area or preferably a saddle bag. Why don’t they get rid of a few zero’s like they did in Turkey a few years ago? Once you get a note that has more than four zero’s its hard to tell the difference between 5 or 6 zeros and easy to make mistakes which I very nearly did when paying for our taxi at the airport.

We got to our hotel about 5pm but it was still very hot and humid without a trace of a breeze but they had switched our aircon on so the room was ice cold. Ours is a garden room where there are 4 in a block and we have a pool behind us and one in front. The main pool is by the beach and looks lovely; its one of those where you can sit in the pool by the bar. We dropped our stuff off in the room and headed for the bar to unwind. Mind you we had already been unwinding on the plane with the free drinks; wonderful seats with plenty of leg room and films on demand that you could pause and rewind at will. It was probably the best flight I had ever had and for me was a little too short as I didn’t get chance to watch the end of my second film “Moon”.

We then had a short walk outside to suss out Sanur but the hawkers got the better of us after we had found a chemist and bought sun cream and mosquito spray and stocked up with water for the fridge. We found a little bar called “JJ’s” across the road a way and had another drink. The local brew is called Bintang and comes in a 1 litre bottle; this seems like my sort of place. The other one is Bali Hai which is a more appropriate name but doesn’t taste so good. We talked to the bar staff who were friendly and decided to stay for dinner as the entertainment started at 7.30pm and got a table in front of the stage. It was those weird funny men in masks and the long fingernails like we saw when travelling through Kerrala in south India. I like the “ping pong, ding dong” music that accompanies the dance. Claire had a steak and chips while I tried the recommended fish and king prawns steamed inside a coconut leaf with rice. It looked great but wish I had gone for the steak now.

We headed back to our hotel but decided to have one last one by the pool and guess what? They had entertainment on there too; it was three guys that go around the tables taking requests and sing for you. They reminded me of the group they always have at the Fusion in Majorda, Goa; exactly the same so we new what songs they would know and like. We chose “Yesterday” and “Hey Jude”; the old ones are the best and everyone knows the Beatles. We gave them a real good tip and they went off happy and so did we, but not before Claire had a little dance before bedtime. What a great start to Bali, feels like three days in one; can’t wait for tomorrow!

Claire's Hong Kong

I don’t do long haul flights very well and the flight from Hong Kong was no exception. In fact I’d go as far to say that I’ve suffered with the worst jet lag I’ve ever yet to experience. Not sure why? Maybe too many late night suppers and a weakened immune system didn’t help, I dunno but I’ve been seriously knackered.

My poor husband, I have felt so sorry for him over the last few days. Sleep deprivement can do many thanks to the personality and on a measure of grumpiness from 0-10 mine is 100! On Monday night I managed 7 hours straight and when I woke Phil up for our flight at 5.45am I thought he’d managed the same. Unfortunately not though; apparently I’d woken him with a full sentence of effing and blinding in my sleep at 12.05am. I was oblivious, fast asleep to the world and sleep talking is something I often do. Poor Phil, I sleep walk as well so he always has to make sure he double locks the hotel door as I’m more prone in unfamiliar places. I am a walking talking nightmare!

Phil blogged that maybe 3 days was a day too long for a stop-over in Hong Kong but I’m not so sure. I think I needed 3 days to sort out my body clock. My impressions of Hong Kong? My first reaction to the city – a fusion of New York, Bangkok, Dubai with a twist of London and maybe Venice because of the water. Unlike Venice though, Hong Kong is not sinking. No way, she is bold and brave and so very westernised. What surprised me was the amount of old sky rise buildings right amongst the brand spanking glass ultra modern sky rises which could have easily belonged to an east European country. Why I wondered, did they not knock these down and build new ones?


I draft this in my travel journal, which was a goodbye gift from Christine, whilst mid air aboard our Cathay Pacific flight to Bali. We’re 2 hours in and another 2 hours to go. Phil is wearing one of his ‘Indian’ shirts together with his shorts and sandals which always makes him feel like he’s on holiday. Complimentary drinks and a good choice of flight movies and he’s one happy bunny despite the lack of sleep. So used are we, to budget airlines, Easyjet, Ryanair and Air India that flights like this one are almost luxury to us. Phil says it’s like being in business class!

I have high expectations for Bali and don’t worry about me Vanessa; soon I will be chilling on my sun bed overlooking the ocean and blogging about happy times. Fingers crossed anyway. Sometimes, the lower your expectations, the lesser the disappointment.

Summing up Hong Kong

Claire is too tired to do the summing up today I’m afraid you will have to settle for me again. Claire still hasn’t got used to the time difference yet and has severe jet lag. She goes to sleep real early then wakes up starving and we have to go for a midnight trip to Mc Donald’s. I even caught here reading by torch light under the covers last night. It hasn’t helped that she still has UK time on her watch so is constantly asking me whet time it is. It also hasn’t helped that I have dragged her all around Hong Kong for two days running in the hope that she will be knackered and sleep better. I’ve been watching too much of the “dog whisperer”. We set off quite late and bought fruit and juice at the super market in the market area next to our sister hotel and were just in time to catch the shuttle bus into town. As we didn’t have tickets they wouldn’t let us on the bus; how does that work then? The other times we have to sign and get a ticket on the bus giving our room number. Luckily there was a taxi waiting just in case so we jumped in that and set off to Star Ferries.

The main drag on this side (Tsim Sha Tsui) of town runs right through Hong Kong and is called Nathan Street but my God, the touts, or hawkers are out. You will be constantly plagued by them trying to sell you a suit that will be made the same day amongst other things. It’s a very busy road and takes ages to get across with all the traffic as does the side streets that cross it every block. Near the bottom off Nathan Street is Chungking Mansions which the guide book describes as, “..a place like no other in the world. This huge, ramshackle high-rise dump in the heart of Tsim Sha Tsui caters virtually all needs-from finding a bed and curry lunch to changing your Burmese kyat and getting your hair cut- but you maybe put off by the undercurrent of sleaze and the peculiar odour of cooking fat, incense and sewage………and unclaimed bodies; everyone should come here once.” They certainly got that one right, but strangely, it reminded me of the “Agora Centre” in Wolverton.

We walked up to the metro station and bought a tourist day pass for about £4 each which enables you to travel on metro, overland train, bus and ferry for the day. ; Perfect to get further a field cheaply. The stations are very modern and clean and each station we saw had platform doors which synchronise with the train doors to stop jumpers. As it was lunch time by now and Claire was starving we used our first trip back over to Hong Kong Island Central station. Only a short walk through Lan Kwai Fong to Soho where all the little restaurants are and this time we chose “Café Siam”. The Businessman’s lunch for two with a pitcher of beer fitted the bill perfectly and we stuffed ourselves silly.

Back on the Metro up to Mong Kok where all the locals come to shop. This is still on the Nathan road but there are no touts this high up. I was looking for the Mong Kok computer centre but never did find it. I thought I might buy some cheap CAD software while here but no time now. I did ask in a shop on the street but they only had AutoCAD which was about 1000HK$ for the package or 330HK$ to install onto your computer. 1000HK$ was about £77.50 when I bought mine so a bit cheaper than the £2500 odd in England. We tried to walk from there through Kowloon Park but missed that as well. We were both exhausted and headed straight for the China Hong Kong City shopping centre where we normally catch the bus from. By the time we managed to cross the road we just missed the bus and didn’t have the energy to wait an hour for the next one so grabbed another taxi which costs about 150 to 160HK$ apposed to the 30HK$ on the bus.

We have been her plenty long enough for us, as we neither like cities much. Maybe a day less would have been perfect but never mind we don’t have to come back again now. One strange thing here that reminded me of Germany is that all old people seem to smell of moth balls. Bizarre; I guess the two nations have the same moths and only get out their best clothes when going on holiday. We have seen it, know the vibe now but still I would prefer Bangkok out the two. Everyone is very friendly, helpful, and polite as they seem to be in most other Asian cities we have seen. It’s very clean, modern but for me just too many people and haste, give me the beach life anyday. See you in Bali tomorrow!

Extreme tram and Park

We weren’t sure how many islands we would have chance to see in only a couple of days but the main international airport is on its own island to start with. Our hotel shuttle bus took us onto Lantau Island via a bridge, then onto Ma Wan Island, Tsing Yi Island, then onto Kowloon via other bridges to our hotel called The Gold Coast Hotel. It’s a bit far out and takes about 30 minutes on our hotel shuttle bus to get to down town Kowloon. We took the Star ferry over to Hong Kong Island today to explore it. You catch it from the end of Canton Road where it joins Salisbury Road and costs less than 20p (2HK$) each way.

First stop The Peak Tram terminal just up from the Bank of China on Garden Road. The trams run every 15 minutes up and down Victoria Peak which gives spectacular views over Hong Kong Island and Kowloon. It is drawn up by a very heavy gauge cable and sometimes is at 45degrees to level; well worth the 43HK$ for the return trip. At the top there are lots of shops and restaurants but we were too early for lunch. You can get out onto the streets where there seemed to be lots of people around and a load of Chinese people dressed in tartan playing the bagpipes. If you walk down a bit further you get to the second most expensive housing area in the world with spectacular views but it was a bit cold and we didn’t bother.

Back down the extreme tram and cross the road to Hong Kong extreme Park. Everywhere over here seems to be on really steep slopes and you are forever walking up and down hills. The park is very unusual being right amongst all the tall buildings but hardly Central Park as it is quite small. As we left the Park we could see the Mandarin Oriental Hotel in the distance so decided to go for a drink there. The East Asian Games 2009 are being held in Hong Kong in a couple of weeks and there are signs for it everywhere. In the Mandarin Oriental’s Captains bar they serve the beer in silver ice cold mugs; pricey but nice.

From there we headed off to the Lang Kwai Fong area off D’Aguila Street which is an old area of steep windy streets with lots of shops and street markets where you can buy live seafood amongst other things. We walked all the way through there and started to look for somewhere to eat lunch in as we started to get hungry. If you carry on through this area it leads you towards Soho where there are lots of different food restaurants and shops which are also on small steep streets.

If you walk down Old Bailey Street at the bottom of Soho you can catch the Central Escalator on Staunton Street which is the world’s longest, covered outdoor people mover. It’s like a series of escalators that stop at all the parallel streets that you cross so you can walk up and down these streets until you find one that you fancy before catching the next escalator up. All together it’s about 0.8km long and saves a lot of hill climbing but you have to walk down as it only goes one way. We ended up eating at Harty’s where we had the daily 2 course special that cost about 70HK$ each; however they do bring a complimentary sweet out which was a coconut milk pana cotta. That was the first meal that we enjoyed since we got here. Strangely over here they seem to serve warm water with your meal. Not just, “not cold” water but warm, almost hot we couldn’t understand it. We asked for cold water and they fetched us ice cubes in a glass and then poured warm water over them.

We took our time over lunch before heading off on the very long trek back to our hotel down the steep streets by foot, ferry, foot again then a 30 minute bus ride stopping off for supplies at the 7-11 next to our hotel. There are lots of restaurants, stalls and shops in the next hotel to ours which is a sister hotel called the Golden Sands yacht club. There is even a Mc Donald’s there where we got breakfast while waiting for the early morning bus. Only tomorrow left as we must catch the early morning bus to the airport on Tuesday. I do feel that we have seen most of what we wanted to see today so not sure what we will do tomorrow yet. Maybe we will get a day pass for the Metro and travel a bit further a field or try and find where we can buy some cheap software. Claire will sum up Hong Kong tomorrow before we head off to sunny Bali.

Hong Kong

Hong Kong consists of a peninsula and 236 islands on China’s south coast and is enclosed by the Pearl River delta and South China Sea. Before I got here I wondered how they managed to fit over 7 million people into such a small space and now I know. That’s why they all do Kung Foo to clear a space for themselves to walk anywhere. They are so small; I haven’t stopped tripping over people and treading on them since we got here. Do you remember Hong Kong Phooey?

When Chinese people come to England over 99% of them work with something to do with the food industry. It’s the same over here, there are over 10,000 restaurants here in HK and we only have three days to try them all. I’m not sure if that includes all the street vendors as well. Mind you we haven’t seen many bars around yet. See these funny little dogs. Are they dogs? They might have been crossed with a kangaroo or maybe they have just made a dish consisting of front legs and are keeping the rest preserved without having to buy a fridge. What’s going on? If it was one, you would think that it had an accident; but two!?

The Hong Kong Dollar is worth about 7.75 pence so that 100HK$ is worth about £7.75 or roughly three quarters divided by 10 to do it quickly. Some of the islands use different money again but I think they still accept the HK$ as well. That’s a little bizarre if you think about it, it’s like London having its own currency that is different from the rest of England and Peckham having a different currency again. I wonder if they accept the HK$ in the rest of China?

Check in was great but we had about 90 minutes delay in the airport and that was sitting on the plane so it increased our time on the plane to 13.5 hours. We shared a taxi with Steve and Jan which was convenient and the drive went across country and it only took us about 90 minutes so we ended up having 4 hours to kill before even getting on the plane, no wonder we are so knackered now. The flight and service was fabulous with the hostesses bringing free small bottles whenever we wanted. I did manage to get about 2.5 hours sleep plus a few minutes here and there while Claire managed about 5.5 hours somehow; maybe she had more wine than me.

The hotel is lovely we have great views of the beach, harbour and sea from our room with floor to ceiling windows on the 10th floor. It’s very posh at our hotel even the dogs have to wait until they get to the toilet. We tried the restaurant for lunch but wont bother again as it wasn’t up to much but I have never seen so many weddings! We have witnessed at least 7 at our hotel and noticed others when walking around. We got the shuttle bus downtown but it’s not for us; I would rather shop around Milton Keynes. Let’s hope we like it a bit better tomorrow after some real sleep.