Bali Trip Day 1

Harlo everyone, I miss Bali a lot. I seriously love Bali and definitely will be there again sometime.

12 September 2008, after planning for so long(9 months), finally our long waited vacation came true. We met each other at LCCT at 2pm, had our lunch at Mc Donald (set of Foldover Chicken costs Rm13), checked in our luggage and wandered around LCCT before proceeded to the boarding area. We were the last few to step into the plane and the path to it was freaking hot ok. Anyway, no matter how damn so hot was it, our happiness were not affected because we knew that a great holiday is waiting 5 of us 3 hours ahead. Yes, only 5 of us because TheBusyEngineer-Mr.CC was stuck for his work in Phillipines.

#1 Our Flight AK 904 to Den Pasar

The Air Asia plane was better than what I expected, eventhough it felt more like a bus. Okla, airbus, tiny airbus. The room for my feet was fine, or either i do not have a long feet :p Relieved that the seat needed to be 90 degrees straight only during ascending and descending. Fuh. Else, the three hour flight will be restless.

#2 First time boarding on flight :)

The plane touched down at Denpasar airport at 7.15pm, which was 30 mins ahead the scheduled time. Not bad not bad. I switched on my handphone but no signal is detected because I forgot to activate it before leaving KL. Passport got stamped while our check-in luggage came out in no time and we headed off to exit the arrival hall.

As we passed the airport gate, we saw lots of local's driver waiting for their tourist. At one end, I saw "Esther, Jhony is here!" Yay, that was our driver waiting us there holding my name :) He carried my luggage and leaded us to his van.

His white mitsubitshi van gave me a little dissapointment because it looked old, but the feeling did not last long after Jhony started to talk to us. We passed by some village lookalike place where we had the thought that the local goes to bed at 8pm. Really, I do not tell lie, all the shops were closed and no one was seen walking on the street.

Everything changed after we entered the lively Kuta town. The situation was totally different in Kuta town, where all the shops was still operating and lots of tourists were still walking on the street. Lots of topless white man. DROOLS. Roxy. Billabong. RalphNLauren. Polo. BodyNSoul. Dolcec&Gabbana. and Guardian, yah, they have Guardian pharmacy too. All looked so Malaysia, no culture shock at all. Maybe except that there were lots of Mat Salleh around.

In 20 minutes, we reached our Home for 5 day, Maxi Hotel . The first impression of Maxi Hotel logo gave me was that it looks like some donut outlet. Haha. The narrow entrance to the hotel which only allows one way drive is only suitable for walk-in but our driver was keng enough to send us to the door that leads to lobby of the hotel. Bravo.Keng-ness =D

#3 Maxi Hotel, Jl Legian Kuta, the only entrance to the lobby

#4 Lobby checking in
From left: Alex, Hanni,Hou Gor, Ah yau and Me (mana CC?)

For this 3 stars hotel, we need to pay thousands, in fact is 670 thousand of rupiah for our 4 nights stay. Okla, is equivalent to RM250 for 5d4n. Our plan to share 2 beds among 3 of us failed when we were charged extra bed for each room. Sigh.

After settled the payment, we marched ourself to our room. Room 25 for the XY gene and room 26 for the XX. The room was good, pretty big enough for 3 of us to rest well and the bathroom come with a bath tub. Yeah yeah, you guess it right. I soaked in the bath tub for 30mins before I went to bed every nights without fail.

#5 Twin super single bed for standard room

#6 Bathroom

Placed our passport inside the safe and off we went to Kuta street to hunt for our dinner at Warong Made's which had been recommended online.

#7 Kuta Street at night

#8 Statue along Kuta street

#9 Art gallery at Kuta Street

The infamous Warong Made's was quite free when we reached. It was either we were real late for dinner or it was low season of Bali. Without wasting any time, we went upstair and took our seat at a round table, overlooking the whole restaurant in dim light. It felt warm there.

I ordered Nasi Campur and avocado juice. The must try when in Indo Nasi Campur and also the unforgotten avocado juice from Bumbu Bali Puchong but to my dissapointment the said juice was unavailable :( Other than that, we ordered Satay Babi as side dishes for sharing. Ya, you heard me no wrong, Satay Babi is available in almost all restaurant. And the word Babi was everywhere in Bali. Babi is not a rare word in Bali as 90% of Balinese are Hinduism :)

#10 Made's Cafe

#11 Waiting for dinner

#12 Nasi Campur 20k rph

#13 After Dinner, cosy ambient

The night was still young in Kuta even after we finished our late dinner. Shops were seen operating late to 11pm. Not far from Kuta Beach, we went into Crocs, everyone knew it was my favourite. The price was almost the same after conversion and the designs were almost the same. But the difference was the were a lot a lot of accesories were on sell. I made a mental note to revisit on the last day, mission failed :( In fact now only I recall of that forgotten mental note :((

#14 Crocs outlet near Kuta Beach

Then we took a round inside the ever so high-end in term of price Hard Rock Outlet. I basically just flipped around some T-shirt that will costs me a finger before headed to the nearest exit. I think I can never understand what is the hoo haa about Hard Rock. It is just overrated.Sigh.

#15 Hard Rock Outlet

After visiting the Kuta Beach, we passed through a narrow street mean for only motorcycles on the way back to our hotel. I doubt that if any car can pass by this street which I guess is Poppies Lane 1 or 2. Maybe it is a single direction street, the motorist do not doubt a second to speed their bike along this street. Scary :-s

We passed by our hotel and walked to the other end to visit the bombing site which was originally the most happening bar in Kuta. And opposite of it was the memorial for the victim of the bombing. That was the last spot we went to before calling it a night to rest in our hotel.

#16 Bombing Memorial

Coming up-- Volcano trip :) Happy Weekend everyone. Bye