Well it turns out not all of Bali is touristy!! We stayed in a quiet hostel called jolie hostel down a cul de sac!! However once we rented a scooter we could get to the beaches etc!! as Mary hasn't driven before, seemed natural that she would sit behind me!! However what I wasn't expecting was crazy traffic and continuously windy hilly roads!! On our first day we visited jimbaren beach, got a nice spot and enjoyed watching the surfers!! The strength and size of the waves was amazing!! The following day we went to balangan beach, a surfers paradise and again incredible waves!! Visited the Irish pub in town and alto we were the only customers for a while the three bar staff were chatty and one guy demonstrated his craft skills by making a rose out of tissue paper and rings out of straws!!!a few more joined later including a japense girl,the only participant of karaoke, an oz guy that looked for counselling on discovering we were social workers..off duty so no thank u!!!

The next day we moved to uluwatu, stayed in this amazing place called Bali bulie homestay (have no idea why it was called a homestay, it was more like a resort!!) We tried out uluwatu beach, well we actually couldn't find any sand ( it was a steep decline to the beach among the cluster of restaurants and shops which appeared to be clinging to the cliff face) but did hang out in one of the clifftop restaurants watching some very talent surfers!!! There was even a whale on the distance!!

The next day we went to Padang Padang beach - this was bit of a disappointment as it was a very small beach so hard to find room to sunbathe and poor quality food - it was also very cloudly so didn't stay there too long!!! Sunday night is the big night at Single Finn's bar so we checked that out - th locaion is quite incredible one part on top of cliff and lower levels on face of cliff!! It seemd like every surfer and backpacker was there but as it was mostly outside it didnt sem too overecrowded!!!

We rented a scooter and visited Finn's beach club the next day - wow - this place was stunning - the waters were tourqise and sand white, absolute bliss and we enjoyed every minute of it, only regretting taht we had not got there earlier!! Leaving the beach as the sun started to come down we drove to Uluwatu temple - now these country roads were enjoyable to spin along!! We watched a Balinese dance and watched the sunset on th grounds of the temple. The dance was quite interesting as it told a fairytale story!! So another great day!! :)

We are sad to leave Uluwatu the next day, especially as the sun was shining brightly, but we had heard great things about Ubud, our next destintation so we at least had that to look forward to!!