Bali: Australia's mexico (but better)

If Bali is Australia's Mexico (where Aussies come for beaches, scenery, cheap souveneirs, and a party atmosphere) then Kuta is Cabo. Same shopkeepers beckoning, same amazing cheap food on the street (though bali takes the cake on this one: Montana had arguably the best tacos of her life in our hotel restaurant in kuta), same skinny kids running around trying to sell you bracelets, same 18-25 year olds sipping fruity drinks out of enormous souveneir cups at bars... These things you find in any touristy developing country, but Bali does the amazing job of maintaining a culture and beauty that few other places do.

Everywhere you walk their are beautiful, moss-covered stone entryways and statues of animals, where the Balinese place daily offerings of incense and flowers-not sure if this is a Balinese tradition or specific to Buddhism, I will have to find out. The ocean is the absolute perfect temperature, and I am itching to rent a surfboard when we get back to Kuta. Yesterday Montana and I got hour-long Balinese massages in Kuta for under 5$... competition is fierce in the streets and massage places are everywhere. Now I have a high threshold for pain, and I suppose maybe I should have told her to not put so much pressure on me when I started wincing, but I figured I wanted a REAL Balinese massage, and besides, it would be worth it after, right? Well, my body did feel like jelly and I was incredibly relaxed, but started to worry when bruises started to form on my lower back last night, and to my horor were dark purple when I woke up this morning. Of course I'm sure they weren't helped by my fall in the rain last night, but yeah... I guess maybe next time I should tell her to restrain her freakishly strong little hands.

Today we took a shuttle to Ubud, which is about an hour drive north of Kuta. Or 2 hours if you count the amount of time you spent holding your breath thinking you were going to run over someone on a scooter, and the driver's munchie stop. Ubud is beautiiiiful! It's so relaxing, and a nice break after the busy streets of Kuta. I'm sure those of you who have read Eat Pray Love already have an appreciation for Ubud, but being here is really amazing. There are cute shops everywhere, not nearly as many tourists in Bintang tanks, beautiful rice fields... tomorrow we are going to the Monkey Forest Sanctuary to see some temples and some fiesty monkeys.

We've got a day and a half left in Ubud, then back to Kuta for a night, then we fly off to Bangkok on Friday. Part 1 of Southeast Asia has been everything I hoped for, and I know it's goign to fly by so am doing my best to take it all in and do as much as I can. Can't wait for what's to come!

This is my next destination...

BALI, HERE WE COME!!

3$ hour long massages, 1$ beers, markets, temples, beaches, beaches, and beaches.... 5 days of bliss to come

Farewell, Oz

Well it's my last few hours in Australia before I head to the Darwin airport for Bali... I'm trying not to think about leaving this amazing country but I didn't sleep last night just thinking about how amazing this whole experience has been. For fear of getting too emotional, I am going to wait until I am back in the states to get sentimental and whatnot. For now, I have BALI, THAILAND, AND VIETNAM to look forward to!! Hard to be down in the dumps with a month of adventure awaiting me. Soooo... here's to Australia, my home of the last 7 months, and everyone who has made this adventure some of the best times of my life... cheers to you and see you again soon!!! Aussie Aussie Aussie, Oi Oi Oi!!!

Dream come true! This was in January but just now was able to upload it

WA: Wild Wild West

Wow, so much to update on! It's been a while since New Zealand, but we have definitely slowed the pace down. After we flew out of NZ, we went to Melbourne for a few days. I don't know if it was because we had just left the quiet of the country or because we were anxious to get to Perth and be settled somewhere for a while, but Melbourne was a bit... well, i don't really know how to describe it. Our 700-person hostel may not have been cleaned since the millenium; we saw several couples screaming, and I mean screaming, at each other in the street, which was quite odd; and every time we tried to go to a restaurant or bar we had read about it was literally impossible to find.

Don't get me wrong, it was a beautiful city (the highlight for sure being Captain Cook's cottage, an aunthentic 19th century experience involving dressing up as the captain and his wife themselves... photos to come soon!) and I'm sure if I had been there for more than a few days it would have been more impressive and we would have been able to see a great deal more sites and get to know the city more. I do hope to go back someday, especially when I am not a starving backpacker and can afford to sample all of the famous Melbourne cuisine (and not stay in a hostel with 700 other backpackers).

We have now been in Perth for about a month, and it's a really great city. It's somewhere that the majority of Australian East-coasters, especially the young ones I know, have never been to, and when I told people I was going to live in Perth for a bit the common reaction seemed to be a blank look, followed by a "whyyyyyy would you go THERE?"

Well what do they know!!! I have loved my experience here!

Perth is really a well-rounded city: It's got a beautiful river, the Swan, plenty of beaches with bath-warm Indian Ocean water, a huge university, and a laid-back feel that you can't find many places on the East Coast. AND the people are wonderful!!!

The initial reason we decided to get off the well-beaten backpacker route of the east coast and head over to Perth is because Montana's stepdad has family here, a few of whom Montana had met before. Her cousins (second cousins, third, whatever, they are family to me now as well!) came to stay with her family in Venice Beach a few years back, so we were welcome to stay with the family in Perth.

I can't explain how wonderful it is to be welcomed into a foreign city with open arms, homemade meals, and a proper bed. Tony's (Montana's step-dad) aunt, three cousins, and most of their children have stayed in the area, and are all extremely close. Maria, the aunt, is a 90-year old firecracker with a sharper memory than I have. She hosts weekly meals at her house for her granddaughters and was more than eager to tell us their family history and how "we" (yes, I include myself as a Mathews now) all fit in.

Anyway, it has been such a pleasant experience having a support network here and people eager to show us around and make sure we are getting on alright. Montana and I did not end up working in Perth since we'll only be here a month in total, but having places to stay with her family has made it alright that we've got no cash flowing in... Hopefully I've still got enough for Asia! But seriously, I am going to miss all of Montana's family so much, already had to say goodbye to a few of them and it was quite sad!

I spent a weekend in Sydney a few weeks ago, and realized how much I miss it!!! It was so wonderful to stay with Jill, see everyone from Coogee, and wander the city. Despite the rain, it was as lively as ever, and I love the hustle and bustle. I would looooove to move back there for graduate school for a few years or something, I don't think I will be able to stay away for long! But no Australian husband as many had feared, so no worries, I will not be moving here for good!

Out for a family picnic by the beach, and going to enjoy these last few days in sunny Perth before off to Darwin for a few days and then ASIA for a month! I can't explain how excited I am for that, but the fact that I am only going to be in Australia for less than a week is actually breaking my heart. Not quite ready to face it yet :/

Glowworm caves, canyoning, Queenstown, and the rest of the end

We have been doing so much lately and I haven't had a lot of opportunities to be online so there is quite a bit to update on!

The vibe in New Zealand is still a bit down at the moment due to the earthquake. The initial shock is over for most people, but there is still 24 hour news coverage and heartbreaking stories about personal tragedies. It's hard to turn your eyes away from the news when it's on everywhere but we have managed to get going on our adventures and really lived it up in our last few weeks.

"Underworld Rafting" and glowworm cave tours were a big highlight. We did this on the West coast, in a tiny town called Charlstown, which was reccomended by the tour guide we met on the castle. There are other glow worm tours hugely publicized down in Queenstown but we were SO glad we did this one because it ended up being just the two of us and the guide. Sweet as! We got decked out in wetsuits, carried our tubes through the cave, learned a lot and sat in the dark for a while and experienced complete darkness. You may think you have experienced this before there is nothing like it. Eerily calming for sure. At the end we got in our tubes and floated along looking up and the thousands, maybe millions of tiny glowworms on the celing. They looked like fireflies, but stuck in one place, so basically like stars. Super cool experience, apparently there are some places in the states that do it and if you ever get the chance it is highly reccomended! The area surrounding the caves was breathtaking as well, they have filmed several movies there as it was lush rainforest and mountains all around.

We made our way down the coast and stopped at Franz Josef glacer, which was cool, except the day was a bit tainted by finding out about the Christchurch earthquake.

Next we went down to Wanaka, which is a beautiful (but expensive) resort town, reminded me a bit of Tahoe. Here we did canyoning, which is huge in NZ. You start at the top of a river (that is obviously in a canyon), repel down sides which can be quite high, do some zip-lining, jumping, and sliding. It was super fun but got a bit intense at the end when our guide stopped us and starting peering around suspiciously. Right before we were going to repel into a huge waterfall. Like 3-4 stories high. So the 3 girls go down, I am last, and some lady who works for the company comes over and is yelling things to our guide across the canyon. The guide, Millie, says "ummm yeah we need to get out of the water, it has risen too high) but I still need to get down this waterfall or else there is no way out of the canyon. So I go down the "dry way" next to the waterfall, but still have to swim across the waterfall which by now is gushing down twice the water is should be. I am hidden behind it trying to undo myself from the cables but my hands are so numb I can't do it and no one can see me and basically thinks I am drowning so the guide swings down Tarzan-style out of nowhere and undoes my ropes. After that we still got to zipline but couldn't be in the water. It was pretty exciting, not exactly scary but got my heart pumping for sure.

Next we headed down to Queenstown, which of course was just as gorgeous as every other place. We stayed in a hostel there and it was really fun to hang with people our own age (as great as holiday parks are, they are full of old British couples... not my scene). We also didn't have to drive for a few days so that was nice, the Dutchess needed a break for sure.

We headed to Te Anau next, which is a cute little town on a lake that pretty much acts as a base for exploring Milford and Doubtful sounds. These are in a huge national park called Fjordland, and naturally are a ton of Fjords on the ocean. On the drive in our tour guide, Ian, pointed out several places where scenes from Lord of the Rings were filmed. He was quite a character, an older, friendly local who was keen on pointing out tree avalanches (it became a joke between us, so if anyone is interested in learning about them I would be happy to tell you) and never turned off his mic the whole ride so we heard a lot of awkward breathing over the speakers. Then we took a couple hour cruise and had lunch which was fun, and we made some friends... I have said it before and I will say it again but MAN Brits are hilarious!

I now have wireless for a month or so in Perth, and even though half of my NZ pictures were eaten by my dumb computer, I will post some in the next couple days!

Cheers,

Mags

We Are Safe

I have received many worried emails and facebook messages from friends and family worried about me and Montana's safety after hearing about the huge earthquake in Christchurch. We are fine, across the south island on the west coast in Wanaka, and didn't even know there was an earthquake until we took a rest stop at a cafe from driving all day and saw it on the news.

It's pretty scary stuff, we are watching the news now and buildings are down everywhere, the death toll is 65 confirmed and rising. Keep the people of Christchurch and New Zealand is your thoughts and prayers-- this is the second major earthquake to hit the south island's largest city since September.

We managed to avoid the floods in Queensland, the cyclone in Cairnes, the floods in Melbourne, and now the earthquakes here. I am counting my lucky stars and thinking of those who have not been as lucky.



***
Feb 24th

EDIT:
Montana and I just heard that the hostel in Christchurch that we stayed in when we first arrived in New Zealand has been totally destroyed by the quake. It is assumed that everyone who was inside the hostel at the time is dead. It's one thing to hear about a far away disaster, but knowing that people staying in the same exact place we did were killed... probably some staff or long-term stayers we saw and interacted with at some point... gah, it's terrifying. There are over 300 people still missing and it's been over 48 hours since the earthquake hit. It's hard to believe that in this day and age we still can't pinpoint when and where exactly natural disaster will strike.

Life is short and precious, this is another reminder to go out and make the most of every moment we have.