Bali family reunion

For those readers who have blogs, most will know I’ve been in Bali for a week.  I try to limit ‘advertising’ my holidays prior to going, you know, just in case I have a crazy maniac stalker and all.

Living room, complete with desk?
Living room, complete with desk?

My younger brother of the two has been teaching in England for nine months.  (Oh, if you have any ‘9 month’ jokes none would be as poetic as the fact my BF’s ex is pregnant… alas, his London sojourn means he’s not the father). Anyhow, a year ago my parents suggested a family holiday in Bali in Sept 2015, no matter where they and their kids had scattered to.

Streetscape
Streetscape

Sadly, one brother didn’t make it, but it was great from the littlest to fly 16 hours to join us for a few days in our uncle’s villa in Bali.  The BF and I flew Friday evening, and were offered an upgrade a week out, which we jumped on!  My parents flew the same flight a night later.  The brother came on Tuesday and then we all left on Saturday – my parents for Singapore to London to ‘visit’ the brother, my brother to Doha then London and we had a direct flight to Sydney.

Pointy end of the plane
Pointy end of the plane

It was an incredibly lazy holiday – the villa’s pool was well shaded when needed, and meant lily skinned Sarah didn’t get burnt.  Things were ridiculously cheap.  I did plan a ‘crazy adventure’ but my mother had recently had her students present on a canyoning disaster, which was the activity I’d been keen to do.  In light of that, we didn’t do it, and instead will try it in the Blue Mountains, complete with Australian health care nearby.

The 'back back' route out of the jam
The ‘back back’ route out of the jam

Bali is known as a cheap destination for Australian families, but also backpackers. From Perth, our Western city, it’s only a 3 hours flight, so closer than flying to the East coast of Australia. From Sydney it’s about 6 hours.

Tailored to the Australian market (this is our social security)
Tailored to the Australian market (this is our social security)

I feel somewhat uncomfortable about getting massages, pedicures and the like overseas. I always feel like it’s an exploitation of the cheaper labour rates. And they are hardly ‘nice’ service tasks to do for others. Nonetheless, I had two foot massages whilst away.

Foot massage time
Foot massage time

What else?  Here’s a shot of our in house pool:

Shaded pool
Shaded pool

This was the re-screen right before boarding. For reasons I cannot understand, Aussie flights get a second screen, manually. No x rays. Perfunctory pat downs of women only. Oh and a reinforcement of the LAG rules (no more than 100ml etc) even though you’ve passed passport control, immigration etc. We spent $5 on two waters, to then have to skull them. There wasn’t even a fountain to refill the bottle I BYOed. Tired and cranky – grr!

So much about this photo gets me incensed.
So much about this photo gets me incensed.

Bali was steamy and tropical – much like recent trips to Japan, Vietnam and Thailand. I’m hankering for another wintery or chilly trip next. The US was a lovely cool reprieve from the Aussie summer.