Ubud & Kuta Beach

Thursday 31st August - Monday 4th September

Thursday

So the boat ride from Gili T to Bali was horrific. I have never been so scared in my life, my life actually flashed before my eyes. I had visions of us sinking like the titanic every single time the boat rocked enough to make my heart plummet to my stomach. Thank god for my iPad... if I hadn't been watching greys anatomy I would've had to actively think about that for the whole journey... and fast boat my ass that took 3 hours and it sucked the whole time, I'd rather make a day of it on the slow boat... actually scrap that I'd rather fork out they extra dollar and fly! Never again I swear!! Although we had a better time than the family in front of us, one of their kids puked the whole way and the window started leaking on the dad! Their mum was sitting next to us though and she was pretty smug as the Dad had refused to swap seats with her! Next it was time for our long shuttle bus journey back to Kuta beach. It was so nice to get back to pop hotel and just chill out, all I had to eat for dinner was a pot noodle and Oreos we grabbed on the way to the hotel. We just crashed we were so tired!

Friday

Check out wasn't until 12, so we had a nice leisurely morning (even though I still woke up before 7) and grabbed breakfast at the same place we had breakfast on our first morning in Bali. Afterwards, we got a private car to go to Ubud. It took longer than first thought as the traffic was super bad! We got there at around lunch time, so, after checking in, we grabbed a bite to eat and did a bit of shopping before grabbing a taxi to the Teggalalang rice terraces. They are so cool! So much better in real life than in the photos, although it was super hot and there was a lot of walking so we got mega sweaty! It took us a while to realise there were no bluebird taxis allowed in this area, so we grabbed a drink and then got a private taxi back to ubud town. It was a classic pot noodle for dinner again today and we just had another night in to save money before the Contiki. 

Saturday

It was banana pancakes for breakfast again this morning, but this time we had watermelon on the side and chocolate sauce! Super delish! We then headed down to the monkey forest, Emma still pretty nervous after the monkeys attacked her in China! I reassured her and forced her into going... and it worked! She was a bit nervy at first... but to be fair so was I when they came a bit too close for comfort! We paid 10,000 rupiah extra to have a photo taken with one and afterwards Emma said she was so happy I made her do it as she feels a lot more at ease than before which is awesome! It was a pretty cool forest too, not as big as the one in GuiYang though. We were in and out within an hour so we then had the rest of the day to fill up. We dropped in at a cafe where they gave me a sour coconut and tried to fob me off saying they were supposed to be like that. There was no way they were gonna swap it so I just paid for it (ok it was all of £2 but it's the principal!) despite not really touching it... I feel like I'll stay away from coconuts as I never seem to get the tasty ones! We then shopped around a bit and I finally got some grey elephant pants!! I've been after some for so long and these cost me the equivalent of just under £4 so win win! After lunch we went back to the hostel and chilled out by the pool. The people who work here brought us out some traditional Indonesian snacks, and I pretty much liked all of them but the others weren't too keen on a few! 

Sunday

Had the delicious pancakes again this morning, and then emma and I headed to a cafe (Kafe)-for some chill out time before needing to check out from our hostel... I will miss this hostel it's been so good! It was hen time to part with Emma as her flight was a few hours after mine so I hopped in the taxi, went to the airport and got all checked in ready for my journey to Singapore! 

Gili Trawangan

Tuesday 29th - Thursday 31st August 2017

Tuesday
After the somewhat stressful boat journey over, a lady took us to our hostel, La Boheme Sister. The set up is so cool! It's almost like staying in a treehouse. It was too early to check in, so we headed out to check out the island, and have a browse around the shops for a wee bit. We headed back at around 10, and our room was ready for us. I was very excited to see air conditioning! It makes a huge difference! We then got changed and headed down to the beach to get some sunbathing and swimming time in. We were going to walk around to where the swings are, but decided we would do that later. After a couple of hours of not really doing a whole lot we went and grabbed chicken burgers from the nearest bar then returned to repeat the morning! However, this afternoon we managed to pick a spot next to a devil fish that kept swimming into us and biting us as we were getting out the water! It was very annoying but also quite amusing. We went back to the hostel as he sun was going down to get changed and hen we grabbed dinner at the closest place. The plan was to meet Emma's friend Tyler, but we didn't hear back from him so after a bit we decided to head back to the hostel. I don't really have the money to go out drinking and we were both super tired as well... we seem to have got into a sleep pattern of waking up early and going to bed early! Typically after we had gotten changed into pjs he messaged emma but she didn't fancy going out either so we just watched greys anatomy.



Wednesday
As Emma wanted to catch Tyler after his morning dive, before he left Gili T, we went to the beach closest to our hostel this morning. The beach is much nicer as there's less coral, but the current in the sea is so strong it just drags you away... doesn't really make for a relaxing dip in the sea! Just before lunch we bumped into him and Emma said her goodbyes. Then we headed back down to the beach we were at yesterday before grabbing a beer at the sunset beach and having a little photo shoot haha!

Thursday
We checked out the hostel this morning and chilled on the beach before lunchtime. We had to get our boat at 3, but had to check in at 2 so spent an hour sitting around in the stifling heat before grabbing the boat back to padangbai!

Bali - Kuta Beach

Thursday 24th August -

Thursday
I was on a pretty basic plane with no in flight meal sadly, but this was all a ok as I had a whole aisle to myself which meant I got some great napping time in! Unfortunately, it took frigging ages to get my bags and I was getting more and more hungry, tired and grumpy as the time ticked on. Eventually I got out and went to look for Emma, it proved difficult as I had about a trillion men shouting TAXI TAXI in my face haha! She had already got us a taxi driver so we hopped in and went to our hotel, pop hotel Kuta beach. It's a pretty cool hotel, reminds me of the one we stayed in on the Contiki in Christchurch! (Just no cool lights) it was pretty late by the time we got there so it was straight to bed for us!

                 
                                             

Friday
First I woke up at 2am, then 3:30, then 5, then 6 and finally I got up at 7am. Probably shouldn't have napped on the plane! I was absolutely starving as all I had to eat last night was a couple of tim tams. We went straight on out after getting dressed and, thinking we had an included breakfast, went to go and grab some but we were then told it was not included! (I mean we're paying £11 a night so can't really complain!) somwe decided to head down to the beach and grab something from somewhere. We found a cute little restaurant and got a delicious smashed avo on toast brekkie! After chilling out for a bit, we decided to hitch a cab to a local market to do a spot of shopping. It was a bit strange getting back into the swing of haggling but eventually I managed to pick up some cute shorts and an elephant singlet for about £3 each! Bargain! We spent a couple of hours wandering before heading back to the hotel to chill in the air con/ have a nap. After a while we decided we were too hungry so we went out for dinner. I had some delicious noodles, the best thing about the restaurant however was that they had a soingebob themed kids menu!

After dinner we had a lovely little beach walk before going back to the hotel for an early night. 

Gold Coast

Monday 5th - Thursday 8th June 2017

After getting the long train, then a few buses to get back to the turtle beach resort, I was exhausted! At one point I thought I was going to be locked out of the resort, but I snuck in and waited outside the  rooms, trying desparetky to get ahold of wade or Mary! Eventually I did and the boys gave me a super lovely greeting... telling me all about their adventures over the weekend and saying that they missed me! They are pretty cute!

The following day we made our way to Sea world. I was a bit dubious about going, due to the animal cruelty side to it, and if I had to buy a stand alone ticket I definitely would not have gone, but I went along with the family as I got a ticket for 70 bucks to enter 3 parks which wasn't pretty cheap!and actually, I am pretty glad I did as the kids had such an awesome time it was lovely to see!

We watched the sea lion show, which was pretty cheesy and we kinda regretted sitting in the sun for it as it went on for ages! Then we had a look around Nickelodeon world, I would've loved it here as a kid! When the spongebob characters made an appearance, Spongebob ran pasts all the kids and went straight to hug me... pretty weird! I don't want to think about who was in that costume!!!

They had a deal on where if you bought a drink for $13.99 it had unlimited refills all day, so I took that as a challenge and got in 6 refills!

After lunch we went on the big rollercoaster, and took Darragh with us. He sat next to Wade, and was slightly unsure at first but saw it as a boat and seemed fine. Then we went up, high, and he started panicking a bit less him! He freaked out at the end with the big splash! I had forgotten how much I actually enjoy rollercoasters though!

We stayed and watched the dolphin show, which made me think about my decision once again as there is no way those poor animals have enough room in their enclosures. They're pretty talented though! The worst bit though was seeing the polar bears... like why on earth do they have polar bears in Australia!!!!

We then headed back to the hotel after a long, busy day got changed into slightly warmer clothes, as it gets pretty cold in the evenings, and then went out to grab food. The pub we went to had a kids entertainer and they had a free buffet for the kids on a Tuesday, so we picked a good day to go! The boys even had their faces painted!

Wednesday morning we headed off to movie world, and I have to admit, I was probably just as excited as the kids if not more so! It's pretty similar to Disneyland, but for warner bros, (sadly no Harry Potter though!). We watched Looney tunes 4D as we walked past it just as they were showing it, it was pretty good! I haven't watched the looney tunes for ages, and I'd totally forgotten all about it!

We then went to the kids section, and Darragh bravely tried out the smaller rollercoaster after his borderline traumatic experience the day before. He loved it! He ended up going on it like 6 or 7 times! We spent most of the morning there, before going to the stunt show. The stunt show was mega cheesy, but when they were actually driving the cars it was pretty cool!

After grabbing a bite to eat, we explored the rest of the park. Mary and I took Darragh on the scooby do ride (Cillian was too short much to his dismay!) as he had a new found love for roller coasters. I thought it would be a ghost train, I did not realise it would be as intense a rollercoaster as it actually was! Poor Darragh hated it, but I loved it! 

We then made our way to the Wild West area, and went to go on the big water flume. Darragh, still not quite recovered from Scooby, was not up for going on another ride, but because Cillian was allowed on this one, we persevered and he (very) reluctantly got in the boat! Cillian sat next to me, and he enjoyed it at first, until we went backwards and down a pretty steep drop! Then it was just tears all round from the pair of them! They were totally fine though! 

After this, we headed for the Arkham asylum ride. Wade was super keen and I said I'd go on it with him, but as we got closer I got more and more nervous. It's the first virtual reality rollercoaster in the aouthern hemisphere, and I kinda wanted to try it, but I forgot to bring the five bucks with me and to be fair I think it would've messed with my head a wee bit! I was freaking out. I was sitting in the roller coaster wondering why I was doing this to myself. The only thing that made me do it was thinking about my bungy jump and how the scariest thing turned out to be one of the most amazing experiences! And, yet again, I'm really glad I did it! It was soooo much fun! (Even though I did scream all the way around). 

We popped back to the kids bit for a bit after that, and met Batman on the way out! The kids were super excited about it, it was really cute! 

The last ride we went on was the justice league ride, pretty similar to the buzz light year ride at Disney land! There was only room for four in the cart so I went by myself and had a great time shooting all the starfish things - I doubled up with two guns! At the end Wade and Mary seemed confused, turns out they didn't realise you could lift he guns out and they were for shooting! So I made ya go on it again, and th boys loved it!

Oh and also I topped up my drink twice again (took me a while to find the refill station) so I totally got my money's worth haha!

We went back to the same pub we went he previous day for dinner, and the rest of eh family joined us there. It was such a lovely last day of the holidays!

The following morning we got a late checkout so we just chilled at the pools for a bit. Then we went shopping back at Pacific Fair and I finally bought myself a cheap coat! We then dropped the hire car off and headed backwards to the airport to the land of the Kiwis!

Australia, it was a blast. See you in a few months!

Noosa

Friday 2nd - Monday 5th June 2017

Lily picked me up from the train station and, although we hadn't seen each other in years, it felt like we had never been apart! It was just under an hours drive to get to Noosa and we stopped off at a look out, just catching the sunset. It was phenomenal. It's pretty easy to see why Lily has chosen to live here! Afterwards, we went back to her place and I met her boyfriend, Sam and we grabbed a bite to eat at a Mexican place, then went out for a few drinks.

Lily had work in the morning, and I really meant to make the most of the morning so I got ready sharpish, but then I made the rookie mistake of lying down on my bed and I fell asleep for a few hours... oops! At least my hangover wasn't so bad after that?

We decided to bring Sam's sister's dog, Max, to the dog beach after getting food from a local French bakery (had the most delicious pulled pork pie). The beach was stunning (unsurprisingly) and it was a nice to be able to sunbathe in the winter!

We went out for a few cocktails this evening, with a few of Lily and Sam's friends. However, we didn't stay out too late and headed back to their house. Sam wasn't feeling too great so he went to bed,      but Lily and I stayed up and reminisced on the good old times of brownie pack holidays! This ended up on the memory of being rudely awoken at 7am by 'Crazy horses' blasting out and then us finding 'The very best of the Osmonds' to sing along to. To our surprise, we still remembered a fair few words and had a lovely sing along, and, naturally, we recorded ourselves singing and posted it on Facebook. (One of those things we probably should've waited until we were sober to do but too late now!)

The next day we made our way down to Rainbow Beach, and to get there we had to go on the ferry and drive on the beach a fair bit. We had a BBQ (because if I didn't have a BBQ in Australia I would have considered it a waste) and chilled out for a bit before heading back home, where Sam made a delicious roast dinner! Yum!

Sadly Monday came around too quickly, and it was time to head back down to the Gold Coast. I sorted out all my bits, or so I thought! Lily took me to the national park for a quick walk, where we saw dolphins literally 10 metres away from the shore... the closest I've ever seen them! It was then a rush to get to the train station and grab a maccas before my train left. We said a quick goodbye nad then I made my way back down. An hour into my journey, Lily messaged me. I had left my iPad at hers because I am an idiot! I debated going back up to get it, but I'm the end Lily got it posted down to the Gold Coast for me!

So despite me being a slightly hungover idiot, I had the best time in Noosa and I know for sure that I will be back again!

Queensland

Thursday 1st  - Friday 2nd June 2017

Finally the day was here to get a bit of winter sun over at the sunny Gold Coast in Australia. We had a chilled out morning picking the car and doing a few bits before driving up to Christchurch to the airport.

The flight was just under 4 hours and I ended up reading half the novel I brought with me in that time... it was supposed to last me the whole week! Jetstar isn't the most luxurious of companies, but it does the job! We landed in Coolangatta at around 5ish there time, it took us a while to find the shuttle to the rental car place but Darragh was super excited to see that there was a tv in their playing Mr Bean!

We then drove down to Turtle Bay Resort, it looks pretty cool! There's s splash zone with water slides and things for the kids as well as three other pools. We grabbed dinner at the restaurant there, I had a pizza, it wasn't he nicest in the world but I was so hungry I didn't care! I was pretty paranoid he whole time about spiders though... luckily I didn't see any bigger than we get in England but I still made sure everything was zipped up! We had a little wander around before heading up to the room for the night - it had been a pretty long day!

The next morning I repacked my bag as I was heading up to Noosa to visit Lily and Sam for the weekend. I walked down to 7eleven to grab a go card, kinda like an Oyster card for Queensland. There was a huge shopping centre on the way, so I had a quick look around. The place was so big that I got a wee bit lost a few times! It was so nice to see a load of shops that I actually recognised!

I then walked back up and grabbed a sandwich for lunch. Wade and Mary dropped me off at the train station I needed to go to, as they were going to a shopping centre nearby. It only cost me just under 11 bucks to get a four hour train... I can't believe how cheap it is for trains here!

The Lead Up to Aussie

Monday 22nd - Wednesday 31st May 2017

I had tonnes planned out for this week with the kids, actually going to the effort to have set activities each day! Unfortunately, on Tuesday Cillian came down with a sickness bug which meant the rest of the week we had a sick week. We watched movies and played a few games, but it wasn't until Thursday when he seemed to be getting better, and he was totally fine by Friday but had to stay off kindy because of the 48 hour rule! Luckily that was up before the afternoon so we met the au pairs and went to football practice as usual that afternoon!

Friday evening I slept over at Fabienne's with Sabrina and Julia as we were heading off to Dunedin in the morning. Julia brought some German sweets and they're my new favourite thing! So yummy! We then pretty much snacked and binge watched catfish for the rest of the evening!

We had a pretty chilled out start to the day, we planned to meet Anka in Oamaru to see the penguins, despite repeatedly saying they wouldn't be there as it was the wrong time of the day but never mind! We saw a few seals though, and a wee seal pup too which was pretty cute! Another seal was just chilling out on the seats, which meant we had to be a bit wary as they can be pretty vicious.

It took us a while to find Anka, and when we did we decided to go and play on the steam punk playground - as, naturally, that is what Au Pairs do!

We then made our way down to Dunedin, stopping off at the K Mart on the way. We checked in to our hostel, about a 15 minute walk away from the centre and, the best thing about it, it was called Hogwartz. I was expecting it to have been decorated a bit more in a Harry Potter theme, but there were a few bits and pieces here and there as a reminder! My personal favourite being the Dobby picture!

After putting our bits in our dorm, we headed into town to have a wander and to grab some food  it was nice to be able to see Dunedin in the day light as I didn't spend much time here on the Contiki. We headed to the train station, as a couple of the others wanted to check it out, and there was a wedding going on there, seemed pretty random but was quite cool!

After getting ready at the hostel, Fabienne, Sabrina and I walked down to the stadium to watch the 

Highlanders v Waratahs game. Despite growing up in a family full of rugby fans this was the first time I've actually gone to a live rugby game.. and I loved it! Granted, I was a tad rusty on the rules, but I was pleasantly surprised in how I could actually understand what was happening and the last ten minutes were so intense it was amazing!



We went out for a bit after the game, but we seemed to get to the bars at the wrong time as everywhere was pretty quiet and not much seemed to be going on, until we decided to head home just before midnight... there was then queues to get in the places we had already been! Typical! But to be fair we were all shattered anyway and I had literally no money left in my budget to drink like I would've wanted to anyway!!

After checking out Sunday morning, we headed to the Cadbury factory and yes, I did the tour again! Although I came out with significantly less chocolate this time which sucked! Still loved it though!

We then headed towards Tunnel Beach which reminded me of Durdle Door! The weather was beautiful, albeit slightly on the colder side! It's a truly beautiful beach and I would've liked to stay longer but I didn't have any food so we went back into Dunedin.

There were a few more places we wanted to stop off at, but we went the wrong way for one of the beaches (I had misheard the name of the beach!) and could not find the elephant rocks, but we stopped off for dominos on the way home to get a trusty $5 pizza!

The next few days pretty much consisted of packing and entertaining the kids before holiday! I didn't have much planned as I thought we'd just chill out and go with the flow for he last few days as the boys excitement levels were through the roof!

Timaru Week 3

Monday 10th April - Sunday 16th April 2017

I've been keeping up with my couch to 5k, it makes it a lot easier when you're running around a place that looks like this!

One of the family friends brought her puppy, Daisy, round and the boys and I took her for a walk. She is super cute! Weirdly, dogs are allowed on the beach but not in the area behind the beach so we didn't end up going very far.

As Easter is coming up, I thought I would do some Easter themes activities with the boys this week. We made Easter cards as well as using cotton buds to paint Easter egg shapes! The youngest also brought home a bunny mask so I got into the Easter spirit wearing it around the house!

As well as the Easter activities, we've been keeping up  with construction activities as that's what the boys like to do best! I was particularly proud of my pyramid l, even if the youngest kicked it down milliseconds after I made it! We also combined lego with cars and made all sorts of garages for them. I

On Saturday the weather had turned absolutely gorgeous, so I made the most of it by taking myself for a long walk. There's a few more bags nearby and they're similarly stunning.

This year was the first year in a long time I haven't been to church on Easter Sunday, so it didn't really feel like a proper Easter! I was absolutely shattered so ended up sleeping in. When I got up, the boys had rehid all there Easter eggs so I could have a go at an Easter egg hunt! It was pretty cute! We had a full blown roast dinner for lunch which was amazing... there's something about having a roast on Sundays!!

Akaroa

Friday 7th April - Sunday 9th April 2017

This weekend, the family were going back on holiday to Akaroa and they invited me along, to which I of course said yes as I definitely want to see as much of New Zealand as I can before I go back home!

We drove up on the Friday evening, and we're staying at a family friends place which as a pretty decent view over the bay! The weather was a bit miserable in the morning but luckily it got much, much better by the afternoon. I didn't take many pictures though!

We went for a walk around the town, it's pretty small but really pretty. After lunch we went back to the house and everyone napped apart from me and one of the boys! So we stayed up playing while everyone else slept! We then got a Thai takeaway and it was soooo good. 

The next day we went to Okains bay, a beach about a 10 minute drive away from Akaroa. It was beautiful. I love the contrast between the beach, forest and hills. 

The banks penninsula is breathtakingly stunning. It is exactly what I imagine New Zealand would look like!

We then made our way back to Timaru. It was such a lovely weekend, just chilling out and exploring new places!