As you may have gathered ...

... we are in Bali at the moment. I've been keeping a holiday journal so I'll post some of the entries from that along with some photos once I can find my camera's USB cable.

So far on Mrs Average's trip to a whole new world .....

Day 1
Tuesday 20/10/09

After finishing packing and going to Clare’s wedding dress fitting, it was time to head for the airport. Not having flown overseas since the age of 13, I was a bit nervous about the whole thing but was trying not to show the kids. Bradley kept talking about a book he had read recently in which a whole lot of planes had been fitted with faulty parts and subsequently crashed, which really wasn’t helping the others to be calm about the whole thing either.

We checked in, went upstairs and then had to wait around for another hour and a bit before boarding. I’m sure the boys thought that there was an endless supply of money instantly available as they immediately started asking for lollies and books and drinks and spare body parts, just in case Bali didn’t sell the ones they liked. I went to check out the duty-free for the one thing Peter asked me to get for him only to find they didn't have any in a size price I could afford but according to the lady who looked she was trying to turn herself into a rainbow lorikeet, they should have some by the time we flew back in. We'll have to wait and see on that one.

We made it on to the plane and found our seats which were in the first row after the premium economy seats which were, surprisingly enough, completely empty. Why pay extra when you’re all going to the same place anyway? After a relatively uneventful flight, which included the 'lovely' rather inebriated lady sitting behind us very loudly trying to chat up two poor unsuspecting Irish backpackers by serenading them with her own 'Irish' song complete with profanity, obscenity and several things that I'm sure are illegal even in Thailand, we landed in Denpasar at dark o’clock, whisked ourselves through the very efficient (insert disbelieving snort here!) Immigrasi and customs sections and were out into the 29-degrees-at-midnight-air.

Bradley, due to being overtired, started in with the whingeing almost immediately, but we were soon whisked off to the partially air conditioned hotel (only sections are air conditioned, like reception, parts of the restaurants and the actual rooms). Elle had packaged up a lovely welcome basket full of drinks, nibblies and chocolate so we wouldn’t have to raid the mini bar and then sell a kidney at the end of our stay to pay for it all.

Soon thereafter, we were ensconced in our 18 degree hotel room where I sent the boys through the shower to cool them down a bit more. Elle rang to make sure we had all made it here in one piece and after arranging to meet her the next day we headed for bed. We were all completely zonked out by 2am but were awake again at 7am. Damn school routine! Oh well .. we can always catch up on sleep tomorrow on the weekend when we get home.