Arrived in Bali after 2 weeks of relaxation. We were a bit out of the "traval mode" we are in before the operation so we well victim to loads of scams around the airport etc.

We arrived in Kuta late at night and found a scummy hotel down a dark alleyway for the night. Next morrning we moved into our nicest hotel so far - swimming pool, hot shower, tv with bbc news so we could watch the election (though that only upset us...). Kuta isnt as bad as everyone makes out, it has golden beaches as far as the eye can see, loads of little shops filled with t-shirts, sarongs and souvineirs etc. bit more pricey than we were used to. Not very much culture, only bars, restaurants and lots of foreigners with horrific sun tans.

We next moved on to Ubud, the "cultural heart" of Bali. To be honest we didnt find this any more cultural than Kuta, there were lots of small temples but the town was very much based on tourism with its rows of designer shops. Here we went to the monkey sanctuary, where we found the monkeys not as threatening as those before (even if they did steal our water, which was right next to our passports in Manons bag!). Second day I got ill again, we think it was food poisoning so I had to spend another two days in bed. We have eaten well though in Bali, the local restaurants (Warungs) are very cheap and full of Indonesian food which seems to specialise in Satay Sauce, so I hate it with a passion..

We then went onto Lovina to relax on the beaches of black sand, and rest in another bungalow hotel, which apart from the armies of bugs was amazing. We went dolphin watching in the early morning and saw schools of dolphins leaping out of the water, and then risked a trek up a volcano to watch the sun rise over the biggest volcanos on the island, both active!

Back to Ubud we went, right in to the middle of a festival which the locals dressed up in cow costumes (i think they were anyway) and marched around banging drums and gongs. Also Manon got the first massage of our holiday whilst I got a haircut from the least skilled and most scary hairdresser in South East Asia (Manon had to fix my hair, which she did very wellk)! Other than this most of the day was spent indoors escaping the monsoons.

For a change of scenary we went to Sanur (known as snore by locals as well as us) which was another beach town but aimed towards the middle class with more money than they need. This was very dull, to expensive and we left extra early to go to Kuta.

Today is our last day in Bali and we went white water rafting through the jungle in the middle of the island, which was amazing, we paddled 16km, went down huge rapids and slides and got extremely wet and burnt. Huge buffet at the end for us so we were very happy!!!

Now we are going into THailand to Krabi tomorrow morning, wish us luck!