Monday 16th October

Arrived into Suvarnabhumi Airport on time, sadly did not get to see sunrise from the inflight camera. Another 3 hour connection wait, and plenty of time to faff. Oddly enough at this airport you are not allowed to travel with battery packs of more than 32,000mAh. (Although, I’ve since learned that some Chinese airports also enforce this restriction). At the time though, it was the first I’d heard of such a prohibition. I was completely clueless that it was not allowed in checked baggage under any circumstances; thankfully mine was just at the maximum limit so could be brought onto the plane as carry-on. I had been looking at purchasing a 50,000mAh device before the trip; luckily I made do with my old one. My travel savvy is slipping people!! This is a worrying development. There was a large Tupperware box with about 8 or 10 confiscated powerbanks at the security screening area. Turns out if there is no marking on your device, it gets taken. Considering I just brought my mobile phone with me on this trip to use as a camera, I’d have been lost if I had to surrender my battery pack. Close call there.

Boarded the flight to Bali, again travelling with Thai Airways and greeted by lovely attendants. All smiling and bowing. Are you supposed to bow back? I’m not sure, but no-one else was, so I just smiled and found my aisle seat. We made our way to the taxi area, but hung around for what seemed like an age. After 30 minutes the pilot addressed us over the intercom and informed us that a passenger had fallen ill and we were making our way back to the terminal so that they could be assessed by airport medical personnel.  After another 30 minutes we got another update that the passenger was too ill to return to the flight and so their baggage had to be removed from the plane before we could continue. Hopefully we could sneak a taxi spot soon and not have to wait too much longer. About two hours after our flight was scheduled to depart, we finally left Bangkok. Anxious that I was running late, I ‘think’ I managed to send two SMS messages to the group to let them know I’d be tardy arriving into Bali. Not good when we had a transfer organised and a gruelling 4 hour bus ride ahead of us before reaching our accommodation. Still, there was nothing else I could do.

Landed in Ngurah Rai International Airport an hour late, pilot had managed to claw back some of the lost time. While I had initially applauded my seat at the back of the plane, due to its minimal noise and being far away from infants and pretty much all of the people; I now cursed my position as I was one of the last to get off - frustrating when you are in a hurry. When the plane finally emptied I hot-footed it straight to immigration only to be greeted with the chaos that was four planeloads of tired tourists arriving into Bali at the same time.

There were three queues at passport control and I swear to God each of the other two queues looked like they were moving at light speed compared to mine. Murphy’s Law. Yet I knew that if I abandoned ship and joined another, it would probably result in the same frustration. I obviously looked a little stressed as an official ambled up to me and murmured “Priority queue?”. I looked at him confused and was like “Excuse me, sorry, what?”. “Priority queue” he persisted and winked at me. Ding! Light began to dawn on me at that point. “How much?”. “Only $50 US”. Cue my jaw drop. “Best price $30”. Sadly I had to shake my head, I’d only brought the bare amount of cash to exchange and most of that was Euro not Dollar. I was dogged, and would persist with the soul-destroying queue.

I watched as the guy at the top of my queue made a big show of opening and rummaging through his bag, frantically searching for something. Comments filtered down the line that you needed to display your boarding pass with your passport. The latter was not enough on its own. Shiiiiit! Where was mine again? It had been in my pocket. I’d used it to fill out the customs card on the plane. What did I do with it after? Bookmark? Nope. Hmmm, shiiiiit! Wallet. Nope. Hidden document compartment in rucksack. Nope. Ah crap, crap, crap. Where is it? Could I have left it on the plane? No, I never do. Feck, feck, feck! Rummage, rummage, rummage! Stress levels are reaching high doh now. I’m shattered and in need of sleep, plus aggravated in the knowledge that I’m holding up the show for the rest of the group (who are hopefully still waiting for me on the other side).

Aha!! Phew! Sandwiched between itinerary and travel insurance documents I located the boarding pass. I’m sure it wouldn’t have been a massive problem not having it, but I’m late enough as is. Now let’s go to the baggage carousel, grab my bag and find the group.

Bag was one of the first off the carousel! Boom!! Tide’s beginning to turn. It’s the little things. Hauled it up on my back and trundled towards the lobby. Pulled out the mobile phone, attempting to activate free WiFi so I could contact and locate the group as who knows where they would be after all this time waiting. Looked up and low and behold saw the beaming familiar faces of Tony and Robin, both waving at me. Whoop whoop!! They disappeared as soon as I clocked them, no doubt off to tell the rest I’d finally made it. Suddenly I could hear Francois trying to rally the others to chant “Lisa, Lisa”. Grinned to myself, and rounded the corner, spotting a familiar bunch of misfits. God, I love travelling with these guys.

Hugs, hellos, and how are you’s were made. For the record, I’m travelling with Tony & Lu, Robin, Francois, Geoff & Jenny, the latter lovely lady being Geoff’s partner, and a newbie to our group.  I apologised for keeping them waiting and we didn’t hang about for long. Our driver was anxious to get started on the long drive to Pemuteran, which would be our base for the next two weeks.

We all hopped into the minivan. Geoff and his 6ft+ frame opting to squeeze into the back seat with me and Jenny. Made me laugh as there wasn’t room to swing a cat in the back. Knees up to his ears nearly. With a final rejig and some contortionist clambering we rearranged the back seat positioning to give him a little more room, not much mind, but a tad more than what he had initially.

Leaving Denpasar was a trial, traffic everywhere. We made very slow progress just exiting the airport area, scooters and motorbikes everywhere, people overtaking on the left, people overtaking on the right, cars weaving all over the shop; I can tell driving in this country is going to be quite the experience.

The drive from Denspasar to Pemuteran, while only 135km, involved losing nearly 2 hours trying to exit the airport and the surrounding area, followed by 3 hours traversing up narrow and steep mountainous paths in the dark, since the sun drops from the sky around 6pm in Bali.

While the minivan was old and rickety, and sounded like she wasn’t going to make quite a few of the ascents, she did have air conditioning and that was the saving grace, coz my goodness the humidity was something else. There were a few instances where I though the driver would have to turf us out and get us to push, but the van chugged on slowly and valiantly up the steep hills.

After 5 long hours we reached our destination: Tri Jaya Guest House in Pemuteran. We were greeted on arrival by the manager Ketut, and presented with, most welcome, fresh cold towels and chilled watermelon drinks. Lovely! Since it was so late (10pm), we opted to eat dinner at the guest house; I had grilled tuna which was small portion sized but tasty. To be honest I wasn’t too hungry after all the travelling and mainly just wanted a cold shower and to sleep uninterrupted for hours, with no alarm set, until my body decided to wake up.