H-moon Recap: An open letter to the women who massaged us

Mr Fix It and I are huge fans of massages.  I even have my own personal aesthetician who does facials and massages and waxings for me on a regular basis - she was even at my wedding :)  One way Mr Fix It coaxed me into going to Bali was by raving about how you can get these cheap massages on the beach for like less than $5 for an hour!  Sign me up! 

Unfortunately, the women who offer these massages on the shoreline or on the cliffs are typically really old ladies who are not the cleanest people in the world and while I love immersing myself in the culture and truly do like interacting with the locals, they hound you about a massage even when you don't want one which becomes quite annoying.  Most of my time on the beach was spent faking that I was asleep :)

Before we left the land of Oz, we decided to get a massage in a place we passed at the local shopping mall we visited.  Below are a few letters to let these people know what we thought of our experiences:

To the Asian guy who gave me a massage in Australia:

I just wanted to thank you for the wonderful full body massage you gave me while I was visting the Gold Coast on my honeymoon in April.  $60 for a 60 min massage is pretty typical of the price we pay in the states and you did great considering it was a 'walk in' joint.

I do, however, want to apologize for my husband.  I guess having 'rooms' that are really only a bed with curtains between them might not be the greatest idea when you have customers who don't appreciate your services.  At first I didn't think anything of it when I heard him say a couple times that his girl was pushing too hard on him.  That is really unusual considering he usually likes deep tissue massages.  And maybe she didn't realize that he had just pulled his back surfing the day before which was why he was trying to get the muscles worked out.  Instead, he felt like she was reinjuring him instead of helping.

I felt really bad for her once he finally sat up in the middle of the massage and told her that he was done and wanted her to stop.  He tried to maintain his patience and be polite.  But when your manager came in to see what all the fuss was about, he couldn't keep it in anymore and just had to say that 'she didn't know what she was doing' and she shouldn't be giving massages.  You really didn't need to keep apologizing for her.  I felt bad that I think he almost made her cry.  It wasn't your fault and you did a fabulous job on me so no worries.

Thankfully, I found my hubby shopping down the mall and just let him vent for a few minutes about what a sucky job she did on him.  Next time, I'll just come by myself :)

To the two young ladies who work at the Balinese massage parlor we stopped in on our first night in Bali:

How can we ever thank you for the fabulous job you did when we stopped in for a massage during our honeymoon?  My husband had a horrible experience in Australia the day before and after a six hour plane ride, we were so excited to stroll past your shop just around the corner from our hotel.  Though your massage was about $25 for an hour, which was definitely more than the lovely old woman on the beach was offering, it was way worth it!

I would say you both had magic hands.  I must admit that I wasn't totally excited about *every* part of the 'Balinese' massage though.  I am not a fan of having the balls of my feet slammed against with your fist.  And the slapping sound I heard as you smacked my back at that one point was not anything I'd ever heard before whilst getting a massage.  It was also interesting to see you try to stretch my legs in ways that made me believe you thought I was a Gumby doll.  Unfortunately, I'm just not that flexible.

But regardless, I still felt great afterwards and my husband was feeling totally restored and repaired at this point.  It was a great end to our first night in Bali.

Kind of a bummer that we came back a couple nights later and you both weren't working :(  We ended up with a guy and girl that didn't quite meet up to the standard you had set.  By that point, I was truly over the whole massage experience in this part of the world.  Mr Fix It was not impressing me with these massages he raved about.  Oh well.  At least we had *one* good experience abroad...so thanks for that!

Source

To the old woman who wouldn't leave me alone while I was sunbathing at Bingin's beach:

I appreciate that you make your living by preying upon all the people who frequent the little eatery up there on the cliff top.  It was nice to have a place to grab some grub and lounge around for a few hours while my husband was out surfing in the water.  It was not so nice however to have you continually 'pinch' me in an effort to entice me into employing your services for a 'may-sauge'.  Really?  Pinching my arm up and down while I am trying to listen to my ipod and lay on a mat is not my idea of relaxation.  Maybe that's your idea of a massage but definitely nothing I've ever experienced before. 

I should have just given you $5 to get you to leave me alone and go away, but I was trying to be polite.  Thankfully, Mr Fix It did not make me go back there again the next day when he went to surf.  Lounging by my resort infinity pool was way more enjoyable than being attacked by the likes of sand crabs who think they are masseuses. 

Personal Photo

I like doing this (above) as opposed to this (below)

Kuta Beach Massages Source

At our final resort at the Blue Point Bay Villas, we scheduled a couples massage at what was truly a resort type spa...while not the greatest full body massage I've ever received, it was at least decent.  However, I felt the 2 ladies who were running their hands all over me and Mr Fix It's body were maybe just a little too friendly.  The woman who was massaging me gave me my first ever experience of a breast massage...something that most masseuses I've worked with have never done before.  When I mentioned it to Mr Fix It as we left the spa, he indicated that his lady also got a little touchy feely and came very close to his manhood at least one or two times to where he tightened up a bit wondering if he was going to be offered a 'happy ending'?

Source

This (above) was not as relaxing to me as this (below)

Source:  Blue Point Bay Villas

We ended our honeymoon with one final attempt at the Bali massage experience by getting a 30 minute head, neck and foot massage in the airport in Denpasar.  That was actually not that bad and you can't complain about getting a massage while stuck in an airport :) 
TODAY'S TIP:  Don't think that one culture's idea of relaxation will translate well into another culture!

H-moon Recap: Me, Tarzan...You, Jane!

One of the very coolest things we did on our honeymoon was a tree top walk in Lamington National Rainforest in Australia.  This little 'hike' was part of O'Reilly's Retreat where we stayed for only one day. 

I loved O'Reilly's because it reminded me of those summer or science type camps you would visit out in the middle of the woods in nature.   We had a great time hiking through the rainforest which I'll share in a future recap...but for today, I just wanted to share a few pieced together personal video clips of this little walk through the trees.

You walk along a boardwalk through the woods...we did this the morning that we left O'Reilly's and the sun was out and the birds were chirping and it was so nice out weather-wise.  Just off the boardwalk is a little set of chained together bridges that take you 'up' into the trees.  Most of the 9 suspension bridges that you walk through the trees are about 55 feet above the ground.  Though it's weird because you don't feel like you are really off the ground at all...that is, until you get to the two observation decks.  These are actually 110 feet off the ground and are only accessible by a metal ladder which is surrounded by a protective wire cage.  You'll see all this in the video.  So take a look...

It was actually somewhat scary climbing those ladders.  As I have mentioned before, my tough guy, Mr Fix It is afraid of heights.  So I spared him the embarassment of the video that shows where he started to panic a little climbing to the lower observation deck.  He didn't make it up to the second one like I did but I was so proud of him for pushing himself and climbing up with me. 

This was by far one of my favorite activities on our honeymoon.  What was your fave thing you did on your h-moon?  Or if you haven't gone yet, what are you most looking forward to on your h-moon or what was a fave activity on a previous vacation?

TODAY'S HONEYMOON TIP:  We found out about this little hiking adventure through the resort we stayed at.  So be sure to check with resorts and hotels you are visiting to ask them about referrals and suggestions on local activities and entertainment.

H-moon Recap: Random run ins all over the world

Unfortunately, I don't have much in the way of pics to include in this post, but it's one that I love and want to journal about because it deals with meeting new friends (and running into acquaintances) halfway across the world!

Australia didn't provide much in the way of random run ins...however, once we got to Bali, it was a different story.  For one day, while Mr Fix It was out surfing in the ocean, he came in and mentioned that some guy walking by was named John as well (that's Mr Fix It's real name if you didn't know).  I asked, "How do you know that?"  He said, "Because he works in Huntington Beach about 10 minutes from us and he is friends with Pat."  Pat is a friend of ours who attended our wedding with his wife, Shelley.  I've known Pat and Shelley for over 10 years as their daughter grew up playing softball in the same league as Little Miss.  We have been on teams together, coached together and Shelley and I served as board members on the softball board for a couple years together.  How random that somehow Mr Fix It runs into a guy and strikes up a conversation with him about where he lives, works, etc and somehow it gets around to a mutual friend that doesn't often come up in our conversations.  Very strange...

Then one day in Bali we headed down to a place called Bingins Beach where Mr Fix It likes to surf when he is in Indo.  He told me about these little huts that people own and use for restaurants and to offer massages to surfers and others who come down to the beach.  He took me to this one hut and when we walked up, the ladies there all came up and greeted "Mr. John."  (I shared some pics and a post about the food here.)  They remembered him from his last trip there which was four years ago!  Mr Fix It had told me that they will remember you once you visit and won't forget your name, but I was totally surprised at how well they remembered him.  So much so, that one of the elderly ladies asked him 'where his lady friend was.'  He didn't really respond and she said, "You had a girl friend with you that I gave a massage to...where is she?"  Mr Fix It laughed and said "Watch it...I'm here with my wife now!"  I asked about this girl and found out it was a spanish girl that Mr Fix It had met on his last solo trip to Indo and he hung out with her for a bit.  Though they 'hooked up' he swears he wasn't intimate with her and I laughed...turns out that it was during the year that Mr Fix It and I had taken a break from our dating relationship so what did I care.  We all thought it was funny how the woman 'threw him under the bus' in front of his wife.

At our resort in Bali, Mr Fix It befriended a couple who was celebrating their honeymoon on their one year wedding anniversary.  They lived in South Africa and though Mr Fix It had run into the guy several times and had a few surf conversations with him, it wasn't til the very last morning that we were leaving that I met his wife.  They invited us to sit with them at breakfast as we were both leaving the resort that day.  We literally sat for probably 3 or 4 hours just getting to know them and sharing stories about our lives and countries and such.  We talked about politics and our election system and religion (found out we are both Christians and they have served in mission trips)...it was great.  By the time we left, we had gotten their names and e-mail address and they had extended an invitation for us to visit them in Durban, South Africa for a surf trip.  Mr Fix It *insists* that we will absolutely be connecting with them and trying to meet up some time in the next few years for a South Africa trip.  :)

While hanging with the couple from South Africa, he told us a story about how he almost got into a fight with another surfer out in the water one day.  The other guy had been cutting him off catching waves and what not.  He then proceeded to tell us how convicted he felt about telling the guy off and threatening him and so he went back over to him a little later and apologized and had a short conversation with him.  We kind of laughed about it.  Later that afternoon, we headed off to the airport and began our plane trips back to LAX.  Once we arrived in LAX (like 21 hours later), we were waiting for our luggage and then in the customs line.  Mr Fix It made friends with a guy who was standing near us and had just returned from Bali as well.  They began talking about how much they love Indo and surfing and what they do for a living.  Then randomly, the guy mentions this altercation he got into with another South African while surfing in Indo one day.  Turns out, we had run into the same guy that our South African friend had told us about!  So random.

We totally laughed about it and told him how we had become friends with that guy.  Isn't funny how in this huge world, somehow, we are able to make it all seem so small by the friendships and encounters that we build along the path of our life? 

Have you ever had any random run ins while far away from home?

H-moon recap: Wildlife adventures

This week, I get my wedding video back and I was waiting for that before I start full blown recaps...even though I've had my pro pics for over a week now.  I will explain it all in a post in the next day or two.

But for now, I wanted to share about the little creatures we encountered (mostly in Australia) on our honeymoon.  I was super excited about the wildlife we might see as I have heard Australia is known for it's different and unique wildlife.  I was sad we didn't go to the Australian zoo since we were only about 2 hours or so away from it.  But we still had a few moments...

In Burleigh Beach, we woke up one morning and stepped out onto our balcony to find the most beautiful little bird.  Mr Fix It quickly told me to throw him some bread and the little colorful beauty immediately walked over to him and began chowing down.  I grabbed my camera and caught the following:

A few minutes later, there were FIVE of them on our balcony!  One night while we were in the jacuzzi, the managers of the apartments came out and told me to come out on their back porch.  I wrapped a towel around me and headed out with them to find Graham feeding these kookaburra birds (known as the Laughing Jackasses of Australia) out of his hand.  He was feeding them raw ground beef!!!

When we headed up to O'Reilly's Retreat in Lamington National Park, we came across a few other little critters.  As we headed to our room while unpacking the car, I jumped about 5 feet in the air when something just to the left of my foot caught my eye.  Mr Fix It laughed hysterically at me (after he freaked out wondering if I had just come across a snake) and we calmed down enough to find that the retreat was covered with these little ones:

We called them mini kangaroos but one of the retreat workers told us there called pademelons.  There were a ton of them along with these little turkey looking birds off of our back porch in the field by our room.

On the way back down the mountain, we came across the Alpaca cafe where we had lunch on a patio with a gorgeous view of the valley...and these alpacas:

Finally, there was our big 'I can't believe that happened to us story!' in Australia.  We only spent one night at O'Reilly's rainforest retreat.  So while we were there, we decided to do a good long hike throught he rainforest of course.  We spent about 4 1/2 hours hiking through some muddy but beautiful foliage finding waterfalls and such.  (I'll share more about the pretty sights in a future recap.)

At one point on the hike, the trail map indicated you will have to wade through water that could be up to your waist to get to the other side of the trail.  I told Mr Fix It that wasn't happening...but thankfully, when we got to the crossing point, it was only just above the ankles.  Still, we didn't want to get our tennis shoes and pants all wet, so we decided to roll up our jeans and carry our socks and shoes across. 

As I took off my shoes I noticed this huge red blotch stain on the heel of my sock.  I took off my sock and said to Mr Fix It "Is that blood?  Did I cut myself on something and not know it?"  He looked at it and said, "Yeah, what the heck did you do?"  I told him I had no idea.  I proceeded to take off my other shoe and guess what?  The same exact thing on my other sock and heel!  Only this time, I noticed a tiny little black worm like thing in my sock.  I said to him "Oh my gosh!  Are those leeches?!?  There's leeches in my shoes!"  Sure enough, we had both had some little leeches find their way onto our shoes and they were sucking on our skin through the socks.  They didn't come off easy either and Mr Fix It only had a couple little spots of blood...not nearly the big huge amounts that they got out of me! 

The rest of the trip, we cracked jokes about the thirsty little blood suckers that attacked us in the rainforest.  I tried to get a shot of them but this was the best I could do...we found this one on Mr Fix It's shirt while we were standing on a deck at our hotel...no idea where it came from!  Watch closely, he's only there for a second...

Bali didn't offer us much in the way of animals other than insects like mosquitoes and this one cow I would pass each morning on my walk to the internet cafe.  It was a scraggly sickly looking thing but Mr Fix It said that cows are apparently worshipped in Bali.  Whatever.  They also had some pretty mangy looking dogs roaming the streets while we were shopping.

Overall, it was fun to come across a few animals and such on our trip.  I think I liked the leeches the best just because it gave us something truly memorable from our big day. 

H-moon Recap: Nothin' to do

Is it wrong to go halfway around the world just to lay by a pool or on a beach?  Cuz that's mostly what I did.  Considering we flew almost 35 hours in total on planes between Southern California, Brisbane Australia and Bali, Indonesia, we didn't do much of anything while we were there.  And definitely did not do a lot of touristy things...no visiting the hustling bustling city of Brisbane.  No ferry trips to the many islands off the coast there (something I actually wanted to do was visit Moreton Island but hopefully we'll make another trip back there one day).  No theme parks or the famous Australian zoo.  Just layin' around pool side and shoppin' in the malls in Australia and the streets of Kuta in Indo. 

Doesn't it look like that fountain is trying to pee on me?!?

We slept a lot!  A lot more than I do at home.  In fact, in Australia, we would go to bed at like 8 or 8:30 at night.  Then we'd wake up in the middle of the night at like 3 or 4 in the morning...have some fun messin' around (wink, wink) and then turn on the tv and watch Good Morning America from the States (one of the only things we could get on the tv at that time of the morning in Australia).  Then we'd nap from like 5 to 7 am and get up for the day. 

Funny thing was, in Australia it seemed like the whole city would turn in early.  I mean the weekend night life was a bit more 'lively' but during the week we noticed that most shops and stores and such closed fairly early...some places even closed at 6 or 7 pm!  I am way too used to being able to get just about anything I need at 11 pm here in Cali. 

I think we just really needed some rest after all that had been going on with the wedding.  In Bali, we definitely stayed out later....shopping, eating, getting massages (more to come on that later).

I should clarify, that even though we didn't feel like we did much (other than drive to different beach spots and surf in Mr Fix It's case), we definitely had a few fun moments and activities and encounters that made the trip memorable.  And we met some great friends along the way too and had great conversations with locals and fellow tourists.

For now, I'll share a few pics with you of randomness...more to come though about the 'fun' we did have and all the little critters we encountered on the trip, too!

The entrance to a resort called Dream Land in Bali.  Looks pretty, right?  We ran into some friends who said it was not so 'dreamy.'  They said there was trash floating around them when they went into the ocean and that the vendors on the beach would not leave them alone while they were laying out.  My sister visited this resort on her honeymoon 3 years ago and said you just need to go further down the beach away from the crowds right in front of the resort.  We didn't bother...just stopped while passing by to snap this shot.

A shot we took of ourselves on the patio where we sat at the Alpaca Cafe on our way back down the mountain from Lamington National Forest in Australia.  What a pretty view we had while we ate lunch, right?

I don't know why Mr Fix It wanted me to pose in front of this funky statue in the Bali Airport but he did.  So I obliged and smiled pretty...this was just before we boarded the flight to Hong Kong and then onto LAX on the last day of our honeymoon. 

H-moon Recap: Eat, celebrate, swim with lots of photos!

So today's recap is going to be a little random, as in all over the place.  But I'll try to offset that by not writing too much and just sharing lots of pictures!

We'll start off with the incredible infinity pool at the last resort we stayed at:  Blue Point Bay Villas.  This is me in the pool.  You could sit on the edge of the infinity pool and look out at the ocean to the surf below where there would be at least a good 60-100 surfers on any given day.  I like this because Mr Fix It could surf down there and I could hang in the pool and watch from above, though I couldn't make him out from that far away. 

In Australia, we ate mostly seafood..a LOT!  We both love seafood and we asked a few locals to make some referrals for us.  They didn't let us down.  One gentlement from Sydney told us to head about 15-20 minutes from our place in Burleigh Beach to a place called Ashmore Steak & Seafood.  I have to admit, I am a horrible blogger...I didn't take a ton of pictures of lots of the food we ate and the few I did get are from my crappy camera.  I really should get a better camera if I am going to keep blogging - and start taking more pictures!

Anyway, this place looked like a huge car dealership with the way the windows and lights were set up.  It was not like any other eating experience we've ever had.  They let you see the meals in a glass display case when you walked in...that's right, raw steaks sitting out for you to view.  Mr Fix It liked this cuz he could see how big they were before he ordered.  His meal was served up like this:

I got the lobster with a new thing I found called Avocado Seafood...it's an avocado filled with seafood - DUH!  Since I am a huge fan of both, I was in heaven!!!

We also ate at a place called Omeros Brothers in Surfer's Paradise.  Very, very yummy food!  Then there was an Italian joint where we met an exchange student from Germany working as a waitress.  Mr Fix It wasn't in love with the bruschetta we ordered...it was like tomatoes on pizza bread.  There was a super yummy, authentic Mexican type place downstairs from our apartment where we met a Canadian waitress.  What was with all these foreigners serving us our food?  :)

In Bali, at Blue Point, we found a bowl of fresh fruit in our room when we arrived.  See that thing in the back left of the bowl?  It's kind of prickly...Mr Fix It couldn't remember the name of it but he peeled it and made me eat it.  It was really interesting...tasted like berries, apples and other sweet fruits all in one.  Very different.

Also at our resort in Bali was their restaurant.  This is a view of the room where we had breakfast and dinner a couple times.  (I would eat lunch by the pool - I got this tempura type seafood and vegetable thing with these yummy fries that was so good I ordered it two days in a row.  It came with this insane crispy asian salad that I scarfed down like I had been starved for a week!)  Anyway, you would see the same people in this restaurant each morning and night because the resort is not super huge and it is really your only eating option other than driving into town - which we did do on the very last night.

This table right in the corner of the room was what I determined to be the best seat in the house because it was right in front of the open windows overlooking the surf and ocean below.  The first night we were there, it wasn't open so Mr Fix It asked if we could reserve it for the next night.  They said they couldn't because there was a wedding reception happening there the next night.  But....

...instead they said they'd let us eat dinner upstairs which had a good view out the window.  Mr Fix It went to check it out to be sure.  The next night when we arrived, they walked us up these stairs to our own private room!!!  We had this all to ourselves...a view of the ocean, the pool, the wedding chapel.  It was so super cool!  And we were all by ourselves!

Here is a view of the ocean below from our private room...we got there at the perfect time as the sun was just about to start setting and by the time we left it was dark.

Here is another pic on my crappy camera (and through a window) of how pretty the wedding chapel looked like all lit up at night.  And let me say, that wedding chapel was PACKED!  The resort is known for weddings...and they did 'em up right.  While I laid by the pool, there were at least 2 weddings each day!  They were all Japanese couples (very beautiful brides) and they were mostly just the bride and groom - no guests.  Though I did see one or two weddings that had about 5 or 6 guests (looked their parents or siblings). 

See that umbrella by the pool that's on the far left of the picture but up on the higher level above the 3rd one in?  THAT was my spot - every day!  It was perfect.  It was right by this pretty tree on the edge of the cliff and it was the only lounge chair in the entire pool area that you could lay in and see the surfers down below over the cliff edge. 

Mr Fix It decided to get a picture of the girls all dressed up for the wedding reception entrance

Before we got to Blue Point (while we were sill at the Wina Villas), we went to a beach called Bingins that Mr Fix It likes to surf at.  He had told me about this place saying that you walk down these stairs on the cliffs in Bali and they have these hut type houses built into the side of the cliff.  People own them and use them to offer food, massages, shops, etc for the surfers who must walk through them on their way down to the beach.  While Mr Fix It surfed, I would lay on a little mat/lounge on a table watching/listening to my iPod. 

When we got there, we met this woman named Wyan.  She totally remembered Mr Fix It from 4 years earlier!  She made us lunch one day while we waited for the surf to pick up and I don't remember what it was called but it was DEE-LICIOUS!  I jokingly referred to it as a high end version of Top Ramen :)  But seriously, so good!  Noodles with carrots, cucumbers, tomatoes, fried egg and other sauce and such.

Here is a pic of the little 'hut' type things I was trying to explain.  Mr Fix It is sitting by himself at that little blue table in the middle.

And finally, here's me in the pool again - this time with my hat on.  Yeah, I spent a lot of time in there because man, it was so hot!  You needed to cool off...and that pool was scrumdiddlyumptious!

Here's what would have been my favorite picture of our entire honeymoon if Mr Fix It wouldn't have been making that stupid face wondering if the camera was going to go off...whatever!

H-moon Recap: We're seriously going to die...

...or at least vomit a few times!  No, really...our honeymoon plans took us from LA to Brisbane, Australia to Bali, Indonesia and back to LA by way of Hong Kong...it looked like this (except for I left out the layover in Hong Kong):

We started off leaving LAX right on time at 11:25 pm on Qantas airlines headed non-stop for Australia.  Because of the time/date line change, we would be traveling for 13 1/2 hours but arrive on Monday morning at 6 am.  I have to say, QANTAS was amazing!  I was pretty exhausted when we boarded...after all, I'd just gotten married the night before and then spent most of the day hanging out with family and friends and then packing and zipping off to the airport.  But just to be safe, I took half an Ambien sleeping pill so that I would conk out on this flight.

We were super excited about QANTAS...Mr Fix It had never flown with them before and he loved them.  They put us in 2 seats that were basically an aisle seat (which Mr Fix It insists on) and then a window seat (which I love).  But the window seat was actually pretty big because all the other rows had 3 seats in them except for ours...so we had a nice gap between me and the window to put my carry on bag down and stretch out my legs.

Anyway, I had asked Mr Fix It to buy neck pillows for us and eye masks.  He obliged and bought me a blow up one and him a stuffed pillow type one.  BEST investment we ever made!  Those things are amazing and a must for long flights!  We both slept great with no problems with kinked necks...and the eye masks were great too (even though it was already dark most of the night).  Here is a crappy pic of Mr Fix It with all his sleeping garb on:

So I slept really good for the first 6 hours or so.  When I woke up, Mr Fix It said they had served dinner on the flight while I was sleeping and he said it was good.  Qantas also offered free movies and tv in the sets in the back of each seat.  So each passenger could watch whatever they wanted.  I hadn't flown in a long time and I loved this new feature!  It made our flight go by fast...even though I fell back asleep again after breakfast.  :)  But when I woke up just about 2 hours before the end, we suddenly had some problems...lots of turbulence.  Mr Fix It is a tough guy, but he has a fear of heights...silly I know, but true.  He has an even bigger fear of flying and bad turbulence meant he now had white knuckles as well.  During our final descent into Australia the plane took a huge drop that sucked up our stomach.  It didn't really bother me, but even if it had, I couldn't be afraid because I was trying to calm Mr Fix It.  Poor guy. 

On Sunday, a week after landing in Brisbane, we headed back to the airport and got on a flight on Pacific Blue airlines to head to Bali.  It wasn't bad but Mr Fix It wasn't impressed with this airline.  The total trip was like 5 hours or so I think.  On this flight, you had to pay to watch the tvs and movies however, the entertainment system had some glitch so after about an hour they just gave us all free access to it.  That was cool because I watched a lot of Sex and the City.   

We have a portable DVD player that we had bought a few years ago and Mr Fix It was afraid that the battery wouldn't last long enough to keep us entertained on the flights...we had also brought a few DVD's of course.  He waited until just about 3 or 4 days before the wedding and dragged me around the county looking for a battery for our DVD player that would last a lot more hours.  Of course we couldn't find one so he eventually had one overnighted to his house on the day of the wedding and paid a ton of money for it!  Then we didn't even need it since the flights had tv's for each passenger :)  Though I did make good use of it watching movies by the pool and in our rooms during the trip.

On Saturday, May 1st, we headed back to the airport in Bali to go home to LAX.  Let me just say that the Bali airport is just silly...they did have food and shops and such, but nothing like the airports we visited in LAX, Brisbane, and Hong Kong.  (Which by the way, Hong Kong was so huge and really nice!)  In Bali, when we arrived the previous Sunday, we had to take a shuttle from the tarmac to the main terminal which gave us a great view of their scary airport digs.  Makeshift fences in the midst of rice paddy fields did not give me a warm fuzzy feeling about the safety regulations and condition of the landing strips and such.

The flight from Bali to Hong Kong was uneventful...I watched Twilight and had a good meal.  I was happy to be in the Hong Kong airport where things seemed more normal.  We were hungry so we ate these amazing nachos at a sports bar.  Mr Fix It slept on the floor waiting for our flight to board...but we didn't have to wait very long considering we had a 3 hour layover.  Again, we departed on time and I was so excited to be on the 13 1/2 hour flight back home.  But....

The ride home was horrible!  Once again, I did sleep for the first 4 or 5 hours.  But then we hit a ton of turbulence.  Mr Fix It said it lasted like 2 hours but it didn't seem that long to me.  However, when I woke up (after again having taken 1/2 an Ambien), I felt nauseous and kinda hungry, too.  So I asked the steward to bring me some fruit.  Almost immediately after eating an apple, I told Mr Fix It to let me up...we were sitting in the middle and aisle seats of the 68th row of the plane.  I ran into the bathroom and threw up due to all the turbulence.  BLECH!!!  Thank goodness I was at the back of the plane only 2 rows from a restroom.  I felt so much better but then only 30 minutes later, I got up and threw up again.  We were supposed to be in our seats, but the flight attendants knew better to leave me in the restroom.

Needless to say, I was so happy when we finally landed at LAX - and this time, because of the winds in the jet stream, we arrived like an hour and fifteen minutes early!  We had to be shuttled from the farthest tarmac I've ever seen at LAX and then ended up waiting for like 2 hours to get through customs, get our luggage and then find a taxi to take us home. 

We finally walked in the door to our home at about 11:45 pm.  It would be our first time sleeping there together as husband and wife.  But as soon as we walked in, Mr Fix It said it felt weird not having our dog, Kuta there waiting, jumping and wagging his tail around happy to see us.  I turned my head from him and said "Stop it!  Don't do this right now," and I was totally streaming tears down my face as I'm sure he was, too.  We decided we were hungry again and headed over to a local restaurant for a midnight meal.   I had the most amazing strawberry crepes...we drove home and climbed into bed and slept really good. 

As much as I loved the honeymoon and we had pretty smooth flights and traveling experiences, I was so happy to be done with airports!

H-moon Recap: A Rainforest stay vs. a hotel at the beach

So in Australia I told you yesterday about La Pacifique apartments and showed a video tour of how amazing the place we spent 5 nights in Burleigh Beach in Queensland was.  Well, on one night (Wednesday), we took an almost 2 hour drive to Lamington National Forest.  It's a park inland from the beaches that is a rainforest up in the mountains.  It was the only night that we actually booked before we left for the honeymoon. 

We stayed at a place called O'Reilly's Rainforest Retreat.  We were expecting a super cool resort type feel and though it was definitely nice, when we arrived, we felt more like we were in a youth camp in the woods.  :)

Again I will say that it is hard to truly get a sense of what a place looks like from pictures on a web site.  We were definitely not getting what we expected, but it was still very pretty and a very cool place to stay.  And our room was great.  Here is another (much shorter) video tour:

Me in the jacuzzi :)  We kinda overdid it with the bubbles...they were spilling out into the room :)

Fireplace in our bedroom - we did of course use that the one night we were there!  You just gotta!

So I will share more about this beautiful place in an upcoming recap.  For now, I'll share about the other hotel we stayed at in Kuta, Bali (Indonesia).  It's called the Wina Holiday Villas and Mr Fix It has stayed there several times before on his trips to Bali.  He loves it as it is right across the street from Kuta beach.  You may remember that our pup who just passed away was named Kuta after this location.  :)

Anyway, the Wina Villas were pretty nice considering that you're staying in Bali - it is afterall a 3rd world country and very different from where we live.  I will post some great pics and video of the 'city' and culture there in upcoming posts.  For now, here's a few pics of the hotel.  Unfortunately, I didn't get any pics off of my camera so these are all from their web site, but they are pretty true to reality :)

The main entrance

The pool side restaurant where we had breakfast every morning (Included in the reservation)

A view from the restaurant looking out at the pool

(we did not spend any time at the pool other than to jump in and rinse off after we came in from the beach)

What the rooms looked like.  The first night we stayed there, we had to have a room with two beds that they pushed together.  Then they switched us to a room with a large bed for the next two nights.  A little bit of the hassle with not having pre-booked reservations but not a big deal.

The cool thing about this place was that we could walk to the beach, the main strip of shops and restaurants and of course the little internet access they provided in the hotel itself.  :)  It was way cheaper to use the internet in Bali than in Australia.

The hotel was great.  Nice and decent food.  Unfortunately, we didn't have very hot water.  And one day we had to let it run for 15 minutes to get it 'warm.'  So we were quick with our showers.   And you needed them, because it was totally humid in Bali.  The temperature was in the upper 80's but the humidity made it feel a lot hotter.  Still not horrible though.  It was nice enough to walk around in shorts and tanks at night time and during the day we were out traveling to beaches anyway looking for surf for Mr Fix It.

Being the super friendly talkative guy that he is, Mr Fix It made friends with everyone wherever we went.  One day we got back to the hotel and one of the guard gate workers smiled at Mr Fix It.  He asked him if he needed a water or anything to drink.  I don't think the guy understood what he was saying because he just kept smiling and nodding.  Mr Fix It went in to the hotel bar and ordered a soda and when it was delivered he told the waiter to take it out and give it to the guy at the gate - I forget his name but Mr Fix It knew it. 

When we left later that night, the worker smiled and thanked Mr Fix It several times.  He's just kind of a good, generous guy that way...and that's why I married him!  :)

H-moon recaps: How rain affected our plans

Our honeymoon was pretty amazing.  Though I have to admit, I felt guilty about traveling halfway around the world just to lay around and be lazy.  We didn't really do any 'touristy' type things.  I really wanted to see the Australia Zoo while we there and we considered it, but we just decided to hang around and not do too much.  Our h-moon was mostly about laying out at the beach and surfing.  Unfortunately, we didn't do as much of that in Australia as we hoped since it rained a little much.

If you remember, the honeymoon was all Mr Fix It.  And he did not believe in making reservations.  We booked our airline flights through his credit card air miles and we did book a one night stay at a resort in Australia as well as 3 nights at a resort in Bali, but the rest of the time we were there, we had no plans and no reservations!  So once we landed in Brisbane, Australia, we got a rental car (of course one big enough to fit Mr Fix It's surfboards and we were surprised to fit them into a regular mid-sized car) and headed straight out of Brisbane towards the Gold Coast and Surfer's Paradise.

For whatever reason, Mr Fix It didn't want to stay in Surfer's Paradise.  He had been talking about it a lot but I guess he felt it was too expensive.  So we went a little further south to a surf spot called Burleigh Beach. 

I'll share more about our hotels and such soon, but for now, I'll just share some pics of the weather and surf.  The first three days we were in Burleigh, it rained off and on was cloudy.  That didn't stop Mr Fix It from still making sure he got out in the surf for at least a couple hours.  As soon as we rented our hotel, we headed across the street to Burleigh Beach and he jumped in.

This is a pic of the beach where he would surf.  The waves prevent you from seeing that there are actually about 60+ guys out in the water.  It was like that almost every day, even on the rainy days.  It was not this nice on the first afternoon we were there (this was taken a few days later), so I just laid on a towel in my pants and a sweater and took a little nap while Mr Fix It surfed :)

Here's another pic of the same beach spot where we would go when the weather was nice.  That little building on the right was a little place with several different restaurants.  We thought about going there to eat one day but ended up deciding to head somewhere else as we thought it was a little pricey and not very enticing:

In the coming days, we drove down the coast even further south out of Queensland and into New South Wales to look for more surf spots and beaches.  Here are some pics from a few places we stopped.  As you can see, the weather was not great and there weren't a whole lot of surfers or surf.  But they were still very pretty spots and beaches.

This spot was one of the more popular places called Kirra Beach.  It is a popular place and had about 100+ guys running around trying to catch waves right up until the sunset!  I didn't even get a picture of the chaos of the surfers just to the right of where this shot was taken.

The clouds in these shots (in Austalia) are just simply amazing!

This was a shot we took while driving down to NSW. It shows how ridiculously rainy it was. I took it through the car window because Mr Fix It thought it was cool how they carved a tunnel out of this mountainside:

Even with the rain, Mr Fix It did have a few fun days of surf in Australia.  And I had one or two good days laying out on the beach, too. 

In Bali, it was a totally different story.  There was a brief shower the first night we arrived in Bali while we were out shopping and checking out the town.  But the entire rest of the week we were there, we had beautifully sunny and WARM weather.  Humid, too, but it wasn't that bad.  Here is one shot of the sunset in Bali from the last resort we stayed at in Uluwatu. 

More to come with video and such - overall, the weather and surf was pretty good in both places. We didn't mind a little rain. The trip was still relaxing. Funny thing was, we both admitted that we totally overpacked! Since we were gone for two weeks we thought we'd need several outfits, but ended up not wearing probably half of what we each brought! :)