Where We Stayed in Lovina...

The Hotel Adirama.

There were a lot of nice things about this hotel and nothing really bad. It was by no means grand or fancy, but there were some lovely touches. I was a bit worried our first night there. After setting our things down in our room we went to check out the pool. The property's only restaurant is adjacent to the pool and at night they sometimes have live music. This was one of those nights. The band was playing "Welcome to the Hotel California", but they changed the lyrics to "Welcome to the Hotel Adirama". They seemed to get fuzzy with the lyrics after "such a lovely place". I wondered if they didn't KNOW the rest of the words or if they wisely skipped over them. You know, the part that says "You can check out any time you like but you can never leave". Their song choice did worry me a bit. Was this some crazy sinister place? Was my family and I about to disappear? Leave it to me to think such things. Obviously, it was not sinister and we were able to leave when we wanted, but if I was in management there I would instruct the band on their choice of songs!

This quirky but lovely little path led to our patio.
Probably my favorite feature of our room was this beaded entry into the patio.

We had a private little garden between our room and the ocean. It was pretty. (And thankfully I did not SEE the rat which Eric reported to me was scampering about.)
Inside our room, looking out toward the patio and garden. Unfortunately there were no screens on the windows or doors, so we were not able to leave them open at night. I would have loved to listen to the waves crashing just beyond our garden.
To the right was a king size bed, swathed in mosquito netting. Very useful and necessary in Bali. Ahead is a second bedroom.
The 2nd bedroom was HUGE, although lacking in character, charm and air conditioning. Oh well, the place was pretty cheap, what can I say?
The charm which was lacking in the rooms was evident in the gardens.

Yes, Bali knows well how to design gardens and swimming pools.

They could use a little help though, when it comes to decorating for Christmas!

Dolphins Up Close

As I was researching hotels before our trip to Bali, I looked at one called the Melka Excelsior. It's main claim to fame is that they have a dolphin pool and offer you the opportunity to swim with the dolphins. While I thought that would be great fun for the kids, the reviews I read of the hotel were awful so I chose another hotel to stay at while in Lovina. There is not a lot to do in Lovina, mostly you just stay there so that you can go out to the ocean to see the dolphins (which I posted about here.) So when we found ourselves with some time to kill, we decided to mosey on over to the Melka Excelsior and see if we could arrange for the kids to have a dolphin swim.

As we walked into the grand lobby we all thought I had made a mistake by not choosing to stay at this hotel. It was lovely. As it turned out, we missed our chance to swim with the dolphins since that is done only at specific times and we arrived just after one of those times. We were severely dismayed. We tried everything we could think of to get someone to bend the rules, to no avail. As consolation, the hotel also offers pony rides on the beach so we signed the kids up for that.

On the way to the pony corral we were guided through the hotel's small zoo and past the dolphin pools. (Sniff, sniff. We really wanted to swim with the dolphins.) Our guide asked if the kids would like to pet the dolphins. Why, yes! That would be better than nothing. And so it began.There were lots of men in wet suits around, I assume they were all part of the dolphin training crew. Very quickly several of them came to the rescue of the poor children whose parents had messed up by not getting them into the swim program. While one trainer called the dolphins into position, another gently led the kids toward the dolphins. They were quite hesitant at first.
Gradually the kids became more comfortable.





I'm not sure what that face was about, but I think it is funny!
While it had been impossible to bend the rules for a dolphin swim, the staff at the Melka Excelsior did everything they could to give my children a wonderful, memorable experience with the dolphins. And at the end of the day the kids (Anna, especially) realized they would have been too scared to actually swim with the dolphins. Petting them was just exactly right for my kids. And then they got a pony ride to boot! (That was a bit of a let-down, so hurray for the dolphins!)

I have looked back at the reviews to try to remember why I elected not to stay at this hotel. I'm a bit suspicious that perhaps the reviews are written by owners of other hotels in order to steer guests away from the Melka and into their hotels. Because although I didn't see inside any of the rooms, from the outside everything looked very nice. Oh well, we stayed in a nice enough place. I hope to put up pictures of the places we stayed soon.

It has been well over a month since we left Bali, but I still have so many pictures to post! Today, just a few from our elephant ride.

Just to prove I was there:

Elephants are not indigenous to Bali. They have been shipped over, I think from Sumatra, and they seem to be well taken care of. The men that give the rides are also their caretakers. We rode by an area where the elephants are kept at night. They are not chained or fenced in and apparently every so often they wander off at night. We were told this does not make the local farmers very happy. I can imagine!

As we were going along I saw that we were approaching some local housing, and I very much wanted to photograph it. I took this picture before we got there. As we got closer I saw that there were 2 women and a baby in front of the houses, so I didn't take any more pictures. As I think I've said before, I sometimes think it would be disrespectful to take pictures of people going about their private lives. As it turned out, those women were the wives of our "drivers". If I had known that in advance I would have asked if I could photograph them. My guess is they would have been fine with it. But I didn't get that bit of information until we had passed by. Oh well, here is a small glimpse of local housing:

Part of the ride takes you into their watering hole.

The guides wanted to have the elephants spray water on us. I told them NO! I was not afraid of getting wet but I did not want my camera getting ruined. They respected my wishes and just sprayed forward.

At the end of the ride they have the elephants stand on this post, then sit and then JUMP! The standing was okay, but when Anna and I saw the sitting we said NO THANK YOU VERY MUCH! It put the riders at a very severe angle which we didn't care to experience. I didn't even realize they had jumped - Ethan told me about that later. He said it was scary.

In pretty much unrelated news I thought I would tell you that we seem to be celebrating Christmas in February. I didn't bake one single Christmas cookie this past Christmas; however, the kids and I made 2 types of Christmas cookies over the weekend. And for dinner tonight I am going to make Norwegian meatballs - part of our traditional Christmas dinner. Better late than never I guess!

From Tree Top to Ocean Floor

The thing Eric most wanted to do in Bali was go scuba diving. There is a dive site that includes the USS Liberty - a cargo ship that was torpedoed (I think?) by the Japanese during the war. I believe it was beached, then later dragged out to sea.

The plan was for the kids and I to go to the beach with Eric and snorkel from the beach while he dove. I have to admit, when the day came I didn't particularly want to go. Up to that point we had been quite busy and I just wanted to relax at our lovely hotel. Thankfully, I decided I should not be a party pooper and so I went along. It wasn't over-the-top amazing, but it was a good day. Mostly I think I was glad to witness the kids having a cool new experience.

Eric saw the best sights, since he was diving.

He took at least 8 photos of this creature, which cracks me up because while I don't know what it technically is, it looks to be some sort of sea snake and Eric, to put it mildly, does not like snakes.

And now for my highly technical narration: This is the steering wheel of the USS Liberty. (I don't know anything about nautical terminology. My husband was a sailor so I probably ought to have picked up some knowledge from him. But I haven't.)

The family before we started. Thankfully you can't see any of us too well, because mostly it was not a pretty sight. They suited us up in whatever they could find. Ethan actually looked cool, but Anna was in a wet suit that must have been at least 3 sizes too big while Eric and I were squeezed into ours.

The Liberty is actually close enough to shore that you just swim to it. While Eric went under water, the kids and I (with a guide) snorkeled along the surface out toward the ship. Having never done this before, Anna was struggling a bit with her mask and snorkel. Progress was nevertheless being made, until we came to this:

Anna, being totally my daughter, was quite freaked out by the idea of swimming amongst all of these large fish (and they were quite large.) At that point, I headed back to shore with Anna while the guide and Ethan continued on.

After the guide and Ethan returned, we decided to try again. The guide was absolutely wonderful with Anna. He stayed right at her side the entire time, sometimes with his arm around her and sometimes holding her hand to gently lead her. Here they are after successfully swimming to the Liberty and back:

The 2 guides (our snorkel guide and Eric's scuba guide) were impressed with something about Ethan, so that they asked if he was interested in trying to dive. Silly question - he had been quite bent out of shape about the fact that he didn't get to go with his Dad. So they took Ethan just off the beach and taught him a bit about diving. Then our guide used his oxygen tank and some dual-breathing apparatus to go under with Ethan, just a few feet.

A great day. I am glad I didn't miss it. I think this will be one of those memories the kids will carry their whole lives. I hope so!

They Fly Through the Air With the Greatest of Ease...

...the daring young kids on the flying trapeze.

I'm back from my whirlwind trip to the states, and will get right back to the Bali pictures.

One of the highlights of the trip was "Tree Top Adventure". It was zip lining and more. I, having an aversion to heights, appointed myself event photographer. (Smart choice.) Eric and the kids quickly went from training ground...

...to treetop.

I followed them on the ground, taking pictures and occasionally trying not to cry. Seriously. I am such a baby. There were times when the kids didn't think they could go on, so I shouted encouragement from the ground.

After they had conquered the 2nd level Ethan scampered up the tree to begin the 3rd. Anna opted out. Ethan didn't get any further than this:
He was seriously frightened up there, so the guide went up and helped him back down the ladder. Ethan was upset with himself for "chickening out", but I told him I was so proud of him for getting through level 2. I could never have done it. I was also quite glad that he didn't try level 3; Eric did it and here is a bit of what it was like:

A few days later Ethan wanted to go back and conquer that level. We were okay with the idea. He and Eric were going to go together. However, by that time we were staying at a very nice resort which was a 2 hour drive from the Tree Top Adventure park and Ethan (wisely) decided he didn't want to spend 4 hours in a car in order to accomplish his goal. I say wisely because really we had other fun things to do. I realize it would have been good for him to overcome that fear, he would have been very proud of himself. But choices had to be made and there wasn't time for everything.

This was a great adventure for those brave souls. I am sure that, given the opportunity, both kids will try it again.

Note: I feel like I am lacking in narration here. My excuse is I have traveled half way around the world and back in the past week. I am waiting for my brain to catch up with my body. I checked my frequent flyer account today with my preferred airline. On that airline alone I have flown over 63,000 miles in the last 18 months! Ugh. Apparently my brain is still back there at mile 27,000.