Bali Bali Bali

Just when we thought it couldn't get any hotter we arrived in Bali Indonesia! This place is nothing like what we expected. It is the Asian Cancun! It's night life is pretty hectic and never ending! Almost too much to handle! We figured we wouldnt spend too much time here. That all changed when we saw the beach! Beautiful white sand beaches and crystal blue water! It is breath taking. Now for the catch... You don't get one minutes rest here. You are constantly bombarded with people trying to sell you things. Normally I can accept this, but these people are so aggressive! They grab you, yell at you, whine at you, even cry when you say no thank you. It's just a bit too much to handle and really takes away from the experience. It's quite unfortunate because Bali is really gorgeous but I wouldn't come back. 

We could evade the hawkers by going in the water and decided to try surfing. We found a nice lady who rented us some boards and warned us not to go out for an hour or so. Instead of listening to her warning like most people, we took to the water. Just a note to you beginners if you look around the water and no one else is surfing there is probably a good reason for that. After our near death experience in the powerful waves we gave up (temporarily of course). Hoping to try again in some much calmer waters. 

After a few nights in Bali we decided it was enough and are heading to the Gili islands.  We are looking forward to seeing another side of Indonesia! (hopefully a much more friendly side) 

City Living

I have a new appreciation for the little things! Like HOT showers!!! We are staying with Cathy and Alan, family friends of Kalenes.  It is soooo nice to have home cooked meals and comfortable beds and of course a real western toilet complete with toilet paper.  Their apartment is right in the heart of KL and the view from their balcony is breathtaking.  Right across the street is the KLCC, a huge complex with everything you could ever want.  We have spent a considerable time in the giant mall there.
Aside from shopping, we have spent our days exploring the city.  We are now experts at navigating the monorail system here which is super convenient and one of the cleanest public transportation systems I have ever seen.  We are very impressed with the city, it's sort of like an Asian New York.  On Sunday we went to Chinatown where you can get fake perfume, purses, sunglasses, and random squares of mystery meat.  It was very crowded with tourists and people selling things everywhere.  The next day we walked around to where the museums and gardens are but didn't have much luck getting in.  Everything was either closed because it was Monday or closed to us as non Muslim tourists.  Definitely got our exercise walking around there and lost 100 liters of water sweating in the heavy city heat.  Today we went around Little India and found lots of cheap shopping which was a nice change from seeing Gucci and Chanel in the mall.  Much more in our price range.  We had another delicious banana leaf meal eating with our hands like pros now.  Everyone there was so friendly and there was tons of head wagging which is what Indians do when they are agreeing with you, I think anyways, they do it a lot and I'm not always sure what it means.  We are going to have to practice it before we go to India.
We are getting spoiled with our meals here.  Cathy is a fantastic cook and it has been so nice to have FRESH vegetables and things that aren't fried noodles or fried rice.  The other night we took over the kitchen and made a delicious meal of bruschetta, pesto pasta, and greek salad.  YUM.   Tonight is round two and involves lemon and herb chicken, scalloped potatoes, dijon asparagus, and salad.  Pretty excited.
Tomorrow we take off to Bali!!!!!!!!  We are looking forward to getting out of the city and back to the beach.

Our host family, Cathy and Alan, with the delicious meal we made

biggest chair in KL. . so much fun to jump on!

the infamous twin towers of KL, right outside our apartment

Cathys cooking- YUM

the view from our apartment at night

our favourite place in the whole city- the KLCC mall

flip flops!

our experience eating durian- the smelliest fruit in the whole world

The Real Life Jungle Book

We have found the site of the Jungle Book.  A place that has snakes, tigers, bears, and jaguars.  Unfortunately we didn't run into any of these animals but we did see some monkeys, deer, and crazy lizards.  Did I mention the bugs? There are HUGE cicadas that make terrible screaming noises and fly at your face and body without seeming to notice where they are going.  At one point we thought there was an animal outside our room but it was just a HUGE bug the size of your hand.  I am not even exaggerating! We came to the jungle in hopes to do the Canopy walk. We really didn't think it would be very difficult a task but man were we wrong! The first attempt we walked all the way there (only about 2 km into the jungle, with no path) only to get there right when it closed! Our second attempt we thought we had it. We woke up early, had a nice big breakfast and were just about to go when we found out it closed in 20 minutes! So we RAN as fast as we could through the jungle to try and get there before it closed. According to our watch we were there 10 minutes before it closed...but our watch was not set to proper Malay time (aka they close when they feel like it). So now on our last and final attempt there is nothing stopping us! We marched through that jungle for the third time (now experts on the very muddy and unpaved path) passing every group of tourists we could! AND WE MADE IT! Just in time too. Once we completed the most amazing Canopy Walk the line up was over an hour! PHEW! Emily has yet to overcome her immense fear of heights but she pulled through with the canopy walk with ease! (well...sort of) haha Now we are off to Kuala Lumpur! Looking forward to doing some much needed laundry and hopefully some NON-fried, home cooked food! 

On the boat ride into the oldest rainforest in the world!

We thought these were funny

Beautiful flower for beautiful hair

Canopy walk!!

Perhentian Islands

Covered in body paint before the Full Moon Party! 

WE MADE IT TO MALAYSIA! 

Our new Island Paradise!

Onward bound!

Words cannot describe how unreal the full moon party in Thailand was! You just have to see it for yourself. Quite a nice send off as we leave Thailand that following morning!
It was a long uncomfortable journey which took us all day and into the night. We arrived in Penang Malaysia starving sore and exhausted. I should add we are still covered in body paint from the party the night before and getting very strange looks. With a goodnights sleep an a very long shower we were off to explore the city. One day was all we needed before we yearned for our beach bungalow again! So we decided to head for the oasis of the Perhentian islands. (even after being warned they were closed due to monsoon season) Another long uncomfortable bus ride followed by the scarest boat ride of our life and we arrived once again in paradise. The islands are magnificent and due to te fact it's "monsoon" season there are few people and very cheap prices. It hasn't rained once since we arrived 2 nights ago. We had fresh fish BBQ on the beach for dinner with the waves literally at our feet.
Today we went snorkeling around the islands and it was amazing. Tons of fish and huge turtles completely surrounding us. Unfortunately no luck sighting any sharks at shark point, but maybe that was for the best:) We also didn't see any sting rays which are prominent around these islands. Still an incredible day. Now a wee bit sunburnt, we look forward to having a couple drinks on the beach and watching the sunset! Can't wait to see what tomorrow holds!

The Island

Leaving Koh Samui, waiting for the boat to take us to the next island! 

 

We rented some motor bikes and drove around the island. We found some of the most beautiful beaches!

 

Our friend Alex and us at one of the beaches

 

We also found some elephants, so we fed them. Alex was also hungry so we fed him some bananas too haha

 

Koh Phangan

We are now on Koh Phangan where I think we will spend the majority of the time left here in Thailand. We have a little bungalow in a little bit of paradise! Why would we leave!?! Our bungalow is over water, and it took a little getting used to the fact that you can see below through the cracks in the floor. Especially annoying when you drop things! (because they disappear) But I cannot say one bad thing about this place! It is heavenly! The bungalow even comes fully equipped with a hammock! Right now I am laying outside and listening to the frogs under the stars. Tonight is an easy one, since we had our first HALF moon party last night. Let me just say this... its a million times BETTER then what I expected! Everyone is covered in neon glowing body paint and its just an insane party in the middle of the jungle! I am sooo looking forward to the FULL moon party now :) But thankfully we have a week to recover before that one!