9am, and were at the border a few hours later. We had to wait outside
for about an hour, to pass through Thai immigrations. Thankfully there
was a tarpauline to wait under, but as the queue grew, people who
arrived another twenty minutes later, found themselves waiting under
the scorching midday sun. It felt like a furnace. As we waited, we saw
lorry loads of live pigs being transported into Cambodia, some of them
were red with sun burn. It wasn't nice seeing so many of them crammed
into open topped lorries, for what was probably a few hours.
Eventually the immgration queue moved, and we were back in Thailand.
We decided to get a taxi to Bangkok airport, as we thought it was
preferable to a five hour bus ride. While it was fun on the way out, I
think we have experienced enough locals on busses and all the drama
that this entails. All was going well until a horrendous thumping
noise came from the rear tyre and we had a blow out. The driver was
able to stop, but we were on lane four of a motorway, and I was
petrified that someone would go into the back of us. People drive
really fast and across any lane on Thai motorways. Luckily the driver
was able to limp the car back, across four lanes, to do a quick tyre
change. While we were waiting, we saw someone do an undertake via the
hard shoulder doing at least 90 mph. We were glad to get moving again.
Our flight to Bali was at 6am, so I booked to stay at the airport
Novotel. We decided to get a quick snack at the hotel's very expensive
restaurant, before going into central Bangkok for dinner. Half way
through Robin's soup, he discovered one of the larger pieces of
chicken was raw in the middle. We made a big fuss, as the restaurant
had only four customers, so it wasn't as if they were stressed out.
Also, discovering your meal is raw, just before an early morning
flight, is not ideal. Thankfully Robin was fine - I'd said before the
trip, to check that every piece of chicken is cooked, so luckily he
did. We were annoyed as we had expected better things, from a fairly
squish restaurant. They didn't deal with the situation well either,
firstly trying to bring out another dish, while I had to ask them to
take away the plate of undercooked chicken from our table. This
followed by a hotel manager telling us not to worry, as the particular
dish was meant to be cooked that way. Not great customer service at
the Novotel.
We're now in Bali. We flew with AirAsia, the Ryanair equivallent. It
was fine apart from the passengers. Robin and I were catching some
sleep and had stretched out as we had three seats to ourself. I came
out of a daze to see Robin sat bolt upright, as a Chinese man had
moved Robin's legs out of the way, woken us up, and sat on the third
seat. After a lot of glarring and trying to ask what he was doing, he
was either playing dumb or genuinely had a slate missing, as he sat
there like it was the most normal thing in the world. We were in the
middle of the plane, so it wasn't as if he was sitting on a spair seat
until a toilet was free. Still annoyed at being woken up for no
reason, and the fact that the annoyance was still sat there, I
stretched my legs out, so that my feet were in his face. He then
started taking reading material out of Robin's seat pocket and tried
to put it back, around my feet. It took him far too many minutes to
get the message that he wasn't welcome, before he got up and wandered
to the front of the plane.
The Indonesian visa on arrival process was smooth enough. We exchanged
some travellers cheques, and met our taxi pickup. The journey to Ubud
was about an hour. We were surprised how narrow the roads were. The
journey was interesting, as the streets were lined with temple
entrances and statues of religious icons. Eventually we left Denpasar
behind, and drove along glistening rice fields and towering palm
trees, until our hotel. The Aniraka had good reviews online with some
enticing photos on their website, but when we got there, we were
dissapointed. I went to find a plug socket beside the bed, only to
discover layers of dirt and various tiny insects. I looked under the
wardrobe, to check for spiders, but it was layers deep in cobwebs, so
I couldn't really tell. The room itself, was dark and claustrophobic,
with a half wall between the bedroom and bathroom. We moved to the
kitchen area, only to jump a meter back, as something dark and hand
sized, scuttled up the curtains. Thankfully it was just a gecho. When
we were outside, Robin told me he saw a spider beside the bed. Not
what we were hoping for.
Back in November, I had emailed the KajaNe Mau spa hotel, for a quote.
It was way out of our budget. However, over a few emails, they had
wanted to know why we did not want to stay with them, and what our
budget was. The end result was an offer to stay in their new villa,
for half of the original price. I gave them a call and asked if they
had any availibility. They did. I forwarded the original emails and
they even honoured the price quoted in November. Within half an hour
of explaining to the situation to the Aniraka Hotel staff, and that we
had expected a higher standard of cleanliness from a hundread dollar a
night room (which is a lot in Indonesia), we were on our way to KajaNe
Mua. The spa hotel looked like something straight out of a coffee
table photobook. It's even more luxurious than the hotel in Cambodia,
but in a ultra chic, outdoor style, with infinity pools and lush
gardens with real peace lillies and other gorgeous plants. We love it
here. The bathroom has a fixed pebble floor, with a path of wooden
stepping stones. We are currently staying in one of their mansion
villas, but will move to their new villas tomorrow. Aparently, these
all have a rice terrace view in a peaceful corner of Ubud. Below, is a
quick photo of our room and the view from one of our windows.
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