Indonesia - part 2

Hello peeps and peepesses. Its your friend and relative Em here.
Its my turn on the old story telling front, but firstly wanted to add my thoughts on Berastagi, because it was my favourite day.

We arrived about 8pm, Then went straight up our first ever Volcano called Sibayak the following day, it was a good 6 hour trek, up and down. It was funny though cause typically as soon as we got to the top, it started tipping it down with rain, but it kind of was enjoyable anyway, more spooky. I love the photo here that Jamie took, and as he said, you really cant tell how far i am away from him. There were a few cracks letting out the lovely eggy m'gregy smell, with loads of yellow and pinkish purple, volcanic rocks everywhere. The walk down was a bit of down climbing and hair raising walking, the rain water was literally poring like a river past our feet and at one point the thunder and lightning was so close we had a very funny moment of me screaming at the top of my lungs diving for the floor, thinking I was gonna be struck by lightning!! We did laugh quite a bit, as I looked ridiculous. It was a very long wet walk down, but when we made it to the bottom, as Jamie told we went to the local hot springs to relax our muscles, and reward ourselves with a beer.

Next day we headed for Lake Toba, for two nights, but oh yes the attack of the stomach bug pounced on me again, after months of being without it, the night we arrived, so the only full day we had there I was stuck in bed with stomach cramps. Luckily, I still had some of those wonderful ciprofloxacins (superflaxins as we like to call them) from India, which killed it off, but I was gutted about not being able to explore the island.

Jamie had a little walk around, and also we saw two nights running, the most amazing thunder and lightning I have ever seen in my life. We had an unobstructed view of the lake and mountains on the other side, and the streaks of lightening filled the whole sky up with light. One after the other, BOOM BOOM BOOM, for hours !!

We then flew to Java and stayed two nights in a city called Yogyakkarta. We felt a little bored and harassed by the Battick art sellers (traditional Javan art......... we must of sounded like this "NO WE DON'T WANT ANY OF YOUR DAMN BATTICK ART LEAVE US IN PEACE AAARRRRHHH!!!!!), so we escaped to the volcanic area called Bromo, in a minibus which took 11 hours.

We stayed one night and in the morning went up to a very active and smelly volcano situated inside a MASSIVE crater which had another two volcano's in it. It was like walking in the wastelands of mid world in the Dark Tower books (Mum and Jenny will know what I'm talking about) . With a short climb to the rim of Bromo, we saw inside the crater and had to hold our tops to our mouth and noses as the stink almost made me throw up, and it burnt the inside of your nose and throat.

That afternoon, we then took another minibus to the local town then jumped on a coach to Bali, (ferry included). Arriving at 4 in the morning, at our hotel, in a town called Denpasar, we discovered one of the best rooms, and softest bed we have ever been in since we have been away.

Denpasar was just a stop over town where people usually only stay to go on to the next place the next day. It is the business Capital for Bali i believe, with only the balinese people going to and fro from work.
We ended up having great chats with the hotel owner and his family. He was extremely accommodating, and lived up to the report of himself in the Lonely Planet Guide, which was "the chatterbox owner will welcome you as a prodical son or daughter". We read him this and had a huge laugh about himself which only made us like him more. We also gave him our website address so if you are reading this hello to the Nakula Familiar Guest House Family. You really made us feel welcome and we would recommend your guest house to anyone who was travelling through.

Going onto the Gilli Islands was a most welcome change to the long haul of continuous travelling that we had recently done. It was a hard job getting there though, with a lot of arguing involved. We had been shammed into buying a ticket with a company that messed us around. I wont go into to detail as its long and repetitive, as everyone who has been travelling in these countries knows that anyone in the tourist business out there are just a load of con artists. They get you to your destination in the end usually, but there's a lot of faffing around in between, and extra hidden costs. You really don't want to go with them, but most of the time there is no other choice because companies like that have just flooded the system out there. And guess what, oh yes the police just don't care !!!!

Anyway, we got there in the end and it was just beautiful. We spent a few days on the Gili Trawangan Island, just enjoying the rest, the food, drinks, and snorkeling. Ive never done it before, and I was worried that I wouldn't be able to see much without my glasses, but it was fine. There was an abundance of really colourful fish everywhere, amazing corals, and even when we just snorkeled off the shore (most people pay to be taken out by a glass bottom boat) we where lucky to spot a huge turtle swimming below us. It was amazing we both got really excited and followed it till we looked up and noticed we had gone quite a way out. So we swam back, which I was gutted about, I could of followed him out for miles just to watch his little fin feet move up and down. So Cute!!

We left the Gilli Islands to go back to Bali were we stayed in a nice hotel that Jamie kept a secret from me. We had a few days there, but unfortunately it ended badly as the hotel had given out secure information (our room number and names) to a time share company who rang us in our rooms one morning. We where immediately disturbed by this as they had our visa card number, and if our names where given out god knows what else could of happened. Jamie card was cancelled but we can still access the account with mine.
Our complaint was ignored by the management as we wanted a free phone call to our bank to cancel our card. They said they would give us 3 MIN'S for the phone call even though it was there mistake.
Oh it just went on and on and on and it just overshadowed our whole experience of a supposed 4 star hotel stay in Bali.
If anyone reads this who is thinking of going to Bali, PLEASE DO NOT STAY AT "INNA PUTRI BALI", excuse my french, but they are shit!!!
Jamie was devastated as he planned this as a surprise for me, but i will always think of the thought he put behind it, not the hotel, and we certainly made the best of what we could.

Singapore was next and that was a nice little city break. We had great fun, staying in China Town, and venturing out into all the sightseeing places. We went to a design museum, (Sam we have some things for you from that, don't know when you will get them though!!!), The big Business district with all the skyscrapers, Quay area, which reminded us of the good ol' London Thames, shopping! sushi! shopping!, then in the evening we got a cable car for some evening skyline views of the whole central city.

We enjoyed Singapore a lot but we were anxious to get to New Zealand as our dreams of our future home on wheels where taking over our thoughts.
The flight was very comfortable and we arrived heading for the cheapest hostel we could find.
We arrived in a fit of happiness as we discovered a fully working kitchen, comfortable room, and really big washing machines and dryers, YAY!!! YIPEE!!!! WAHOOO!!!!!

We were hoping to have a bit of fun here, and we have had a little, but its been one hell of a hard stressful time setting up our lives here.
Firstly we were seeing loads of mobile homes, going to lots of car shows and meeting people, then we had to open up a joint account in NZ as you have to have one to get a job here, then apply for our tax number, get insurance for the van that we have bought, also break down cover, then legal checks for van, sorting out legal checks for van, then mechanical checks, and sorting out mechanical checks (all this before we handed the money over) buying van........... and i think that's it, but include all the phone calling in between and spending hours finding the only one parking space left in the whole of NZ it seems.

Now we have the van and nearly all sorted we are loving it and stayed in it for the first time last night.

Just wanted to give a few little mentions to some people, firstly my Mummy is 56 this year in a couple of days and wanted to say HAPPY BIRTHDAY, and I love you very much and miss you even more.

Also to my friend Amy from my time in wales, congratulations on finding out about your baby being a girl and I reckon Megans the choice you should go for, no pressure though if she is a beautiful as you she could be called bogies and it wouldnt matter!!!

To Daniel and Elle congrats on being mummy and daddy wentzell, I havent had a chance to pass on my love yet, so I just wanted to give you a little hello. And just to let you know that we have named our van Isabella in honour of your new daughter.

Last but not least we both wanted to mention a special thanks to our new friends Zoe and Andy of Auckland, NZ, that we met through our kiwi friend Bec of Brixton fame, for showing us the ropes of our new lives and lightening the load. Also thanks to Zoe's Mum and Jeff for letting us gypsy scum park up in front of their house for the night.

All of the photos from all these experiences I have just written about are above this entry, and there will be a few so sorry about the spacing, as im lazy and cant be bothered to space it all out (to Jamies Anal spacing specs! )