Bali Hi!

http://picasaweb.google.com/mhewing/Bali/photo#5233958547857940290

Howdy from Bali - things are going well here - though we haven't found an internet cafe that has picasa enabled - so for now you get ONE photo of us diving... more to come later - MANY more!

The rest of Oz was great - we loved Sydney and ended up seeing Band of Horses play - which was so much fun! Had to sing along to our first dance - we're cheeseballs.

Bali has been interesting so far - Kuta was ridiculous - we hated it - lots of crowds and lots of people pestering us for anything and everything - and no one telling the truth about the price. Getting off the plane - we lacked the necessary visa - thanks to our travel agent for not saying anything about that one - we were able to get one but it was incredibly frustrating and put us at the back of a line of 500 people getting off our plane for customs... oh well. Then - coming out of the airport one guy wanted to charge us 300,000 rupiah (about 30$) for a cab ride - then the next offered 150,000 - it took us till the third time to find the price of around 55,000 that our hotel had told us it would cost... craziness. The first rule of Bali is that there are no rules... and that everyone lies about the rules.

We left Kuta quickly after arriving and went off to Nusa Lembongan - a small island off the coast that has WORLD CLASS diving - it was incredible! We're happy to have our underwater case for the camera and we've taken lot and lots of photos! For now you get one! We saw a Mola mola - which is a sunfish and they're exceedingly rare to see - it was about 3m tall - or about 10 feet tall HUGE - so weird looking. Maybe I'll try to find that photo too... and Mantas and incredibly hard currents for some impressive drift dives where you simply find your buoyancy (not so simple really) and then just float and watch the reef and the world go by - awesome way to dive.

We're in Ubud now - pampering ourselves with a bit of spa time - massages are cheap here - we each had an hour long massage followed by an hour long body scrub - followed by a soak in a flower filled tub with ginger tea to sip on - all costing a whopping $12 or so each. Ahh now that's nice. Our room is $10 a night! Our Motorbike is around $4 a day. Beer is dirt cheap and juice is even cheaper than that - what's cheaper than dirt? Rocks? Mud? Who knows - but it's GREAT! MMMM banana juice. The monkeys are crazy too!!! Again - we'll send pictures when we find a place that doesn't charge per upload...

We're doing well - our health is holding out - despite a bit of a cold on my end. The bugs haven't been bad at all either - knocking on wood...

Ok - thanks again for all the love and support - we told you that your donations would be put to good use!!!

Love Mark and Liz