6th and 7th March

Our taxi to get here was quite expensive so we found out when we got here. We could get one for less than half the price to the airport from here, and it's further away! We booked a home stay for the first time on our whole trip. It had good reviews and was centrally located. When we checked in, the owner was really friendly and welcoming. She has young children, they were so cute. The whole house was like a palace, everything was so intricately carved. I think it's a common thing in Bali, that most houses are designed in the style of a palace. We had our own room with a balcony just outside, which was lovely. We had a wander around the local area to get a feel for things, as soon as you go on the main street, everyone is shouting taxi at you. That could be quite annoying. We saw the palace, so took a stroll up to that and had a look at the exterior. We can afford to eat out again as the food is so cheap here, so found a good restaurant and went for dinner. We had a meal with a couple of drinks, main course and desert for around £12.00.

Cheap haircut and manicure

The next day we went to find out about tours and trips and about the boat trips to the Gili Islands as we're heading there after Bali. Our home stay can arrange things too, so we just waste to get some other prices compared to their own. Once that was sorted we wandered down monkey forest road. We're heading there tomorrow anyway, so didn't bother going in. We did see some macquake monkeys on the street. One stole some woman's bottle of water, opened it and drank out of the bottle while it was spilling on the floor, which was amusing. After that, we left and were heading back when some women gave us the massage leaflets. It was so cheap for an hour massage, around 60,000 which is around £3.00. John needed a haircut after I cut it in Auckland, it's grown loads. We went into one of the salons and John had his hair cut for 60,000, and I got my nails for 55,000, so for less than £7.00 we treated ourselves. Perhaps we'll return another day for a massage. We stopped in a coffee shop shop for some refreshments before we came back.

Our plan for tonight was to come back and watch the sunset over the rice paddy fields in a restaurant that overlooks them. We headed towards the fields and had to walk on a busy, dangerous, narrow road. It was already starting to get dark when we were on the way, and we didn't know where it was, so decided to turn back. It would be just goo unsafe walking on a road in the dark with no path. There wasn't anyone shouting taxi when we needed one! So we walked back and found another restaurant to eat instead. We found one doing buy one get one free on cocktails, so ate there. We both tried a Balinese dish, John had mi goreng, a chicken noodle dish, I had nasi goreng, which is a chicken satay rice and prawn crackers dish. The food was good and there was live music playing and it was a really nice atmosphere sipping our mojitos there.

9th March

The day after our Bali outing, we didn't do much, apart from go to the monkey forest nearby. Which we hadn't gone to that one be hire anyway. We were able to get some other pictures with the monkeys. At this sanctuary, there were loads of mother and babies. The babies were so small, they didn't look as cute as the grown ups. Later in the afternoon, we met Emily, who's staying at our home stay. She suggested we walk to see where some herons nest, just outside Ubud. We walked there, it was only suppose to be around 2.5k, but I think it was something like 7. So by the time we got there, we were knackered. The herons all nest in a lots of trees, all along one area and that's it. We saw them flying home to nest for the night, then it got dark. It was a long way to walk, but good to see them. After that, we took a taxi back and had dinner in a restaurant. We came back for our last night in the home stay to pack our stuff for the Gili Islands.