This is our last full day in Amed, Bali, which we are quite sad about. Since it is low season, we have had these villas all to ourselves for the whole week, and the two brothers who have been serving us have been way too good to us. Everyday, they surprise us with something new. Our second morning here, we tried a local fruit called mangosteen - inside a dark, purple-ish shell, there are soft white pieces of fruit, some with pits. Tasted a bit like a mix between a lychee and an orange. We receive a fresh plate of fruit like this every morning, in addition to the complimentary breakfast (coffee/tea, fresh fruit juice, eggs, pancakes or a jaffle, i.e. a toasted egg tomato sandwich). Yesterday, it was a traditional Balinese cake, and a mixture of coconut, brown sugar served in a leaf of corn. We ate a late breakfast that day, and a very late lunch, so we had decided to skip dinner, since we didn't think we were hungry. But at 7pm, Pari arrived on our balcony with fresh red snapper caught that morning, green bean salad with rice and fresh corn on the cob. We were totally floored, and found out that we were indeed hungry. After dinner last night, we also hung out on the beach with Pari and his family, drinking the local alcohol - Arak. Arak tastes vaguely like vodka, but is made from fermenting coconut. A popular mixed drink in Amed is "Arak Obama" - it's as good as it is witty!

Last night's surprise dinner.

Since this is our last tropical paradise of the trip, we have mostly been snorkeling. Jeff recovered from his food poisoning very quickly, so we've snorkeled everyday except yesterday. It is almost overwhelming how many interesting fish there are just off the coast. A couple of times, we brought a ziploc with bread in it to feed the fish while we snorkeled. I have been working on getting used to how comfortable they are around snorkelers - a few times, some of the fish have started to come right up to us, chasing and even nibbling on us. I responded with excessive thrashing, which didn't seem to phase them.

Those white specks are bread crumbs.

Jeff diving deeper.

The fish furthest to the right with blue lips is one of the types of fish that wouldn't leave me alone.

One of many stalkers.

Hated these guys.

More stalking...

Underwater beehive!

Bright yellow needle fish.

These small blue fish were VERY bright in person.

Some kind of dolphin fish?

Fish with a horn.

A small baracuda.

2 days ago, we went on a 17-18km bike ride over to a Japanese ship wreck just off the coast. Very cool. Very tiring. It was surprisingly difficult to find bicycles around here. Motorbikes, however, are plentiful, and driven as recklessly as possible. There are a couple of rules for motorcycles here: You can never slow down under any circumstance, and you can never get out of someone's way, even if you are risking your and their life. Oh, and if your bike isn't loud enough, you don't belong here. We have also had many tasty meals out, ranging from comfy sea-side seats to live Balinese dancing and music.

Snorkeling in our pool

No-arms

Balinese dancing

Lunch spot

We actually ate one of these tonight.

Sunset. That is Mount Agung in the background.

The Japanese shipwreck.

Tonight, Pari made us another stellar dinner for free, even though (as we found out after) he isn't feeling well. Tomorrow at noon, we head back to Denpasar to catch our flight to Malaysia, followed by our flight to South Korea. We're going to have to pick up some warmer clothes while we're there! I would also like to point out that the woman who did our laundry here is a miracle worker. Our clothes look brand new.

More soon,
Jen & Jeff

Believe it or not, I have not completely abandoned this blog! We have been busy exploring and any spare time has been eaten up by work for the past month or so. But all work is now out of the way, and we have only good stories to tell. Since my last post long, long ago, neither of us have fallen ill to food poisoning or injury, we have not lost our bags once much to our surprise, and we have jumped continents. I plan to fill you in on what we've been up to through a mini-series of posts over the next few weeks. :)

Jeff playing with the kids in Ho Chi Minh

Saturday:
Jeff and I woke up pretty early again, and set out to downtown Ho Chi Minh. We were looking for the botanical gardens, but stumbled upon the zoo instead, which we're thinking was also the botanical gardens. It was a pretty typical zoo, some animals had satisfactory habitats, others didn't, the white tigers were gorgeous, and the baby monkeys could slip out of their cages as they wished. There were many gorgeous orchids and bonsais, which Jeff was really into. At one point a small Vietnamese boy attacked Jeff, much to his mothers embarrassment but our amusement. It was about 36 degrees (as usual), so we were sweating buckets the entire time. After the zoo we found some lunch, which was delicious as always, and headed over to the war museum.

Birds at the zoo

The war museum was very interesting, and very harsh, at times hard to handle. The section about Agent Orange was especially stomach turning, I will spare you the details. Very cool exhibit.
The war museum was just a couple of blocks from Anne and Des' school, so we met them afterwards and went for Bun Cha dinner, which consisted of vermicelli, which you added beef, sauce and a variety of greens to - so good, so cheap. Anne, Jeff and I visited a tourist center quickly after dinner to organize our trip to Phu Quoc, then we headed home and spent the evening entertaining a variety of very high-energy Vietnamese children (including, Ba, of course). We skyped Diane while at home, which the kids made more difficult than usual!

Market in Ho Chi Minh

On Sunday Jeff and I finally slept in a little and spent most of the day getting some work done. Once Anne and Des were done work, we all went over to a get together and one of their co-workers' place. It was an interesting mix of people, Anne and I were the only losers of Jenga.

Tuesday:
Anne and I went out for lunch downtown (we had meant to go to yoga, but were too late), followed by a coffee (50 cents) and a hair wash/face massage/hair braiding (all for about 3$). That night we brought Ba to the movie theater to see Oz. Although he can be a little difficult to bring out in public, and had trouble focusing on the movie at times, he had a great time (as did we!). We all went to bed early that night except for Jeff who stayed up until 1:45am to watch a soccer game.

Night view in Ho Chi Minh

Wednesday: last day there. Caught an 11pm sleeper bus to Rach Gia. If only we had sleeper buses in Canada! You get your own completely horizontal bed.

Sleeper bunk

Jeff and I each had top bunks in the front of the bus. Very comfy, although I wished there could have been an additional side wall to keep me from feeling like I would fall out, since the bus driver drove like a mad man (I suppose you just have to in Vietnam - although he shaved almost 2 hours off of our trip time, so I still feel justified saying that). A lot of hard lefts and rights and ups and downs, to accompany the very loudly-played vietnamese music and the driver turning his light on or honking his horn every few minutes. Given all of this, I didn't sleep the whole time as I had intended to, but when we arrived in Rach Gia at 5:30am I definitely had been sleeping.  We were very disoriented from sleep when we got off the bus, so a couple of motorbike drivers managed to scam us a little, but the whole trip cost relatively little anyway. While waiting for the ferry to Phu Quoc, we met Toni, who spoke very good english and warned us what to do and what not to do in Phu Quoc - incredibly helpful. He explained that he became famous in the past and made his money, and now he just spends his days helping people for free. The Vietnamese government tries to encourage people to travel to and from Phu Quoc by making every ferry ticket into a lottery ticket. But, if you're not around when they draw the ticket (28 days for us), then the government gets the money! So, Toni takes the ferry everyday to collect all of the short-term tourists' tickets, and if he wins, gives that money to the poor.

The ferry was 2 and a half hours long, so Jeff and I both passed out for the whole thing, other than Jeff translating Toni's lottery ticket explanation to a group of french tourists from France. When we got to Phu Quoc, we grabbed a cheap bus into town (someone had a live chicken in a grocery bag in the bottom baggage compartment, the poor thing.) Using our guide book, we knew where to get off and headed to the most recommended hotel. Unfortunately it was full, so we tried the one next door and had better luck! We had a pretty nice room for about $17 a night for the two of us. The room had a mini fridge full of drinks (not free but when the drinks are 50 cents each it's practically free), a balcony and a great view! The bathroom was hilarious - it was very small, and instead of a separate shower, the shower head is in the wall across from the toilet and hits the toilet the entire time it's on. I had a cold shower (much too hot for a hot shower) and made a mini lake in our room.

Since the A/C didn't work in the room, we decided to check elsewhere for rooms for the following nights (mid-30s = too hot for just a fan). We were also trying to find a way onto Long Beach, since the entire thing seems to be claimed by resorts, and managed to find both things in one place. One resort had  a very clear sign pointing to the beach, so we asked if we could go through, and they agreed but also offered us a very discounted price to stay there - small increase in price, HUGE upgrade in quality. It was nice to be able to run into the ocean, even if it was full of garbage.

From Phu Quoc we headed to Cambodia to Siem Reap. From there we went to visit the lost city of Angkor, the 7th wonder of the world that was built in the 12th century.

Our trip to the Angkor ruins (Angkor Wat in the background behind my head)

There were many examples of this, where these white-barked magnificent trees grew into the ruins.

Jen was showing too much skin to go up there (to be fair, it was at least 35C), so we took a picture of everyone else watching the sunset.

Climbing some ruins to the top in flip flops in the pouring rain.

Close enough...

Tuk Tuk breakdown! (Again.) Jeff found some amazing banana snacks at the vendor across the street, though.

We are currently in Bali, Indonesia! After traveling for a couple of days from Siem Reap, Cambodia, we finally arrived in Denpasar last night, a little tired (okay, a lot tired), but excited to be here. We decided on the flight over (our planning has become essentially non-existent) that we would catch a ride over to Bali's north-east coast once we arrived in Denpasar, to a stretch of coast called Amed which consists of 7 or so fishing villages. Unlike Denpasar, Amed is known mostly for its nature and snorkeling, rather than for its nightlife. We didn't have any accommodations arranged, but we read online that you could cab over for $40. Since it's a 3-hour drive to Amed, I suppose we weren't terribly surprised when the cabs tried to charge us $70. Jeff managed to bargain it down to $60, and we found a driver whose family lives in Amed, so he took the opportunity to visit home.

Nyoman (children here are named based on the order in which they are born - Nyoman means third born) was very friendly and gave us a good idea of how things work in Bali. It is apparently the 6th most corrupt place in the world, and school is not payed for by the government, so kids coming from poor families never have a chance to change their situation. Since this was the case for Nyoman, he definitely guilt-tripped us a little. Most people in Bali are Hindu, unlike the rest of Indonesia which is mostly Muslim. Although it was dark, we could already tell that Bali was stunning. Just before Amed, we payed Nyoman's parents a visit, and he explained Hinduism to us. Since his parents were asleep when we arrived, could only offer us coffee since they have no food, and didn't speak a word of english, this was a little awkward, but interesting for sure. We arrived on the main stretch of Amed a little later than we had anticipated, and absolutely everything was closed. After about 30 minutes of searching, we managed to wake up a hotel owner, who had a room for us. In retrospect, we should have grabbed dinner before the cab ride, as Jeff and I ended up going a little hungry that night. Over a span of 36 hours, all I ate was a raisin bun, 6 chicken nuggets, and some dried fruit. Oops!

Although the hotel we ended up at (De Potrek) was at the upper end of our budget, it is paradise on Earth, and served us a free delicious breakfast in the morning, therefore fixing our hunger needs. Pari (one of the staff) also served us a whole mackerel each, since we had mentioned that we'd never had it before. Delicious. The weather here is fantastic, and we essentially have this set of bungalows to ourselves. There is a very nice swimming pool just before the beach, some amazing views, and the hotel owners are very nice. First thing this morning we did some amazing snorkeling from the black sand beach right behind the hotel. There is a huge variety of fish right off the coast, including a few jellyfish whose stings don't hurt much, thankfully. We swam and got some sun, grabbed some Indonesian food for lunch, and haven't done much since. I don't have many pictures to post yet, but more will come soon.

View from balcony to the North.

View from balcony to the East.

Our balcony.

Nasi Campur

These prawns were infused with fried garlic.

Not exactly free range.

Jemeluk lookout, just a few minutes walking from our hotel.

I will do my best to remember what we've been doing leading up until now - starting with where I left off.

We were staying at Bella's Backpackers in Caye Caulker, Belize - a very relaxed hostel that turned into a party every night. There were lots of hammocks to lounge in (or sleep in for the night, as some people did), and occasionally you could spot a small alligator hanging around out back. Our first night there, we went out to eat at Fran's Grill with 2 Finnish girls and 1 German girl. Fran is a hilarious local who cooks great seafood. Our next couple of days were spent canoeing and not doing a whole lot, frequently eating a delicious breakfast at Amor y Cafe and trying out the local restaurants. Wish Willy's, for example, is run by the local Wish Willy, and he doesn't give you a choice in what you order.

During the day, it was too sunny to open your eyes without sunglasses, so Jeff and I bought some really stylish ones (they are both gone now, didn't last very long). After a day or two of stomach settling, we did a full day snorkel trip with the company Black Hawk that had been recommended to us before Belize. Definitely lived up to expectations - our best snorkeling experience of the trip. We did 3 stops: The first stop we got to swim with nurse sharks (not aggressive - see picture) and sting rays (was only scared because of how Steve Erwin died), among a variety of other fish. The water was very clear. The second stop, we got to swim with sea turtles (too cool), and after a sandwich lunch, the third stop was the best - the reef drops off, and it is absolutely stunning. Hard to describe. On the way back, we had unlimited ceviche and rum punch. Unfortunately Jeff learned the hard way that expired sunscreen does not do a thing, so he had to cover up for the rest of the week (check out his biking style)!

We canoed at least 3 more times during our stay in Caye Caulker - got at least one stellar sunset, and it was surreal canoeing among the massive tarpin. Jeff went canoeing and fishing with some other guys (using a stick with fishing line tied around it), and they managed to catch a nurse shark! It was about 25 lbs, and to my and Jeff's relief, they let it go. We went biking to the other end of the island one day (not that that's very far) with the hostel bikes, which was a lot of fun. Our last day there, Jeff, an American and I went to the island's beer distributor to buy beer as cheaply as possible for the whole hostel. Before evening set in, Jeff got to play some soccer with the locals, while I hung out with some Danish girls at the Split (apparently a hurricane came through at one point and split the island in two, and most people go there to hang out and have some drinks). That night, we "sold" all the beer we'd bought to everyone at the hostel at cost (although we definitely lost money) and taught everyone what a Power Hour is (a shot of beer every minute for an hour). All in all, it was a great night.

Bella's Backpackers

The hostel's front yard.

Fran and her grill.

Amor y Cafe

The main street in Caye Caulker.

That is our bed in the left corner.

It was a 45 minute ride by sailboat out to the snorkel spots.

Ankle swell by bug bites.

A nurse shark.

Needle fish.

A school of fish.

Cool spotted fish.

The drop off, with sting rays in the distance.

Another type of sting ray.

Ceviche + rum punch

The hostel's alligator is on that rock (hard to see).

Jellyfish just outside the hostel.

Check out the sign.

These tarpin were 4-5 feet long and all around the canoe!

"The Split".

Update in Bali: I wrote this last night (your morning), but it took all night for the pictures to upload. It seems I jinxed it and Jeff did actually get food poisoning from the airport in Cambodia. Since it is also a rainy day today, we are just going to lay low :) I will post again soon with our current happenings and our stories from Puerto Rico and the cruise!! Eventually we will also cover Seattle, Vietnam, and Cambodia.

Lots of love from Jen & Jeff