Category: Announcements
I don't claim to be an expert but I will say that if you plan your trip long enough, fuss and fret about it as you would over a newborn (I wouldn't know but I am told...), pore over hotels, motels, B&B's, special lodgings, vacation rentals, etc. for hundreds upon zillions of hours, send out countless email inquiries, harass-beg for early bird rates and extra extras, your obsessive laboring will bear fruit and will gift you a trip that shall henceforth, be your benchmark for bliss.
At last...
I knew Bali was big but I did not know that it was big to the litany of Amed, Candidasa, Canggu, Denpasar, Gianyar, Gilimanuk, Jimbaran, Karangasem, Kerobokan, Kintamani, Kuta, Legian, Lovina, Negara, Nusa Dua, Nusa Lembongan, Padangbai, Pecatu, Pemuteran, Sanur, Seminyak, Singaraja, Tabanan, Tanjung Benoa, Tanah Lot, Tuban, Ubud, Uluwatu, Umalas, Ungasan big. (Gasps. Now there's a mouthful.)
Initially, it was Ubud for the arts, Jimbaran for the seafood fiesta, and Nusa Dua for the seascape escape. Easy peasy.
Before long, it was Umalas for the ricefield vistas, Uluwatu for its towering chalk cliffs, and Sanur for its sunrise views. Not so lemon squeezy...
I changed my mind again and decided on a Gianyar forest retreat, Candidasa for its underwater wonders, and Lovina for cavorting with the dolphins. But...
As happenstance would make happen, as luck would have it, as good fortune would bestow, we ended up dividing our time between Canggu, Seminyak, and Pecatu. That is how you do bliss.
Ametis Villa in Canggu was selected almost solely on the strength of these two statements on their website:
1. Canggu is a place that most surfers will know about, apart from that, it is quite (sic), very local and offers lovely views of rice fields as opposed to cement in Seminyak.
2. Ametis is located in the sleepy coastal village of Canggu. It is now the preferred destination for savvy travellers seeking an alternative to the urban sprawl of neighbouring Seminyak. The serenity of Canggu is a refreshing change to the hustle and bustle of Seminyak with its crowded streets and limited parking.
Well, I am an odd girl and found it good for a laugh.
Since the commonly-held view of Seminyak is a locale with some of the best lodgings, restos, and beaches in Bali; I came to the conclusion (convoluted, to be sure) that any place that feels itself worthy to be derisive of Seminyak must offer something special.
Canggu does! Although, I should confess... the word "surfers" sealed the deal.
The hard-core tourists in us had originally penciled in a trip to the Tanah Lot Temple, Alas Kedaton, and the Mengwi Royal Palace on our day of arrival. But we were well and truly knackered by our Singapore exploits (Tut tut, self. It is a sad day when you say "exploits" the same time you recall "museums", "cereal prawns", "endless walking"; god, what a marmishly middle-age thing to say.) and found indoors too great a force to resist...
How to even entertain the outside world when...
The. Sorriest. Coffee. I. Have. Ever. Had. The. Misfortune. Of. Having.
While not strictly true, since I once salted (eeeek) a cuppa as I sleepwalked through the kitchen for my caffeine fix, Cebu Pacific’s “brewed coffee”, was-- on preponderance of evidence, in satisfaction of that considered substantial, beyond all reasonable doubt, verily, verily, past any quantum of proof by which coffee goodness is gauged-- the sorriest coffee I have ever had to pay for.
Premium, my foot! Yeah, yeah. And I'm the Queen of Bathsheba!
Miko declared that she was done with hers after three unsuccessful attempts to convince herself, it was indeed coffee, and not wash water; but I had about P40 worth of mine before I gave it up for... well... the sorriest coffee I have ever had to pay for. But I wasn't the one who couldn't resist telling the flight attendant how terrible it was.
Pink guava juice at check-in was just the thing to counter that disastrous drink!
Fresh fruit and flowers are love.
It’s not as if we were tired, but we couldn’t drag ourselves out of the room, and spent a good three hours engaged in our favorite pastime, Aimless Talk, e.g. discussing, among other monumentally meaningful things, whether there were indeed tomato plums (we know there are plum tomatoes).
The certainty with which you make a statement is frequently half the battle, much like law school recitations.
Cynch: Plums that taste like tomatoes cannot be anything other than tomato plums.
Not so in this instance.
Cynch to Self: They are red plums, you plum!
Incidentally, Annsley is convinced that boys are such red plums. (They are a bunch of grapes as well, but that is another story from another trip for another day.) They promise so much and deliver so little. Of course she didn’t say that. I did. But the beauty of blogging is that you can put words in other people’s mouths. Unless Annsley, of course, and by right, exercises her superduper mod powers, very prior restraint-ly, in which case this portion will be expunged or otherwise annotated.
From Poli:
Please join Beth and I as we celebrate the beginning of our new life together.
Hope to see A-ok at St. James the Great, Ayala Alabang, on June 13, 2008, a Friday, 3:00PM.
Cocktails and receoption follow at 4:30PM onwards.