February 27, 2023 – March 30, 2023
Well color me surprised….after having a lot of fun in Thailand and not sure what Bali and Indonesia had to offer, let me just preface my blog with this: Indonesia is on my list of must return places!
When I was planning our trip I thought it would be nice to stop off somewhere in between Thailand and New Zealand so that the air travel wouldn’t be so bad. I did a little perusing and came across some information about Komodo National Park in Indonesia and thought that would be interesting. After talking to Lee, he thought we should spend a little time in Bali as well since you always hear about what a cool place it is.
Our first impressions of Bali were from their airport, it was so clean and beautiful we figured it was a good omen. After leaving the airport we are a little overwhelmed with the amount of traffic – even worse it seemed than Chiang Mai. It took us about an hour to get to our hotel and we enjoyed talking to our driver (as much as we could, his english wasn’t the best) and asked him if he would be interested in driving us around one day for some site seeing. He was very excited and wanted to take us every day (he was desperate for work).
We pulled into the long driveway of our resort and passed rice fields and even a farmer herding his ducks (so, so cute). They use the ducks to eat the bugs and weeds in their rice fields. By the time we got to the open air lobby it was pouring down rain. We were immediately greeted and given a welcome drink (something refreshing with lemongrass) and checked in. The young man who checked us in was incredibly warm and kind, told us we were family, and it was a sign of what was to come.
He drove us to our villa in an enclosed golf cart and when he opened the door to our villa I was so wonderfully surprised. It looked nice from the pictures but in person it was incredible. It was incredibly private, overlooked a black sand beach, we had our own gazebo, open air sitting area, large pool, nice big king-sized bed, and a big bathroom with indoor and outdoor shower. One of the nicest places we have ever stayed at and the price was very reasonable.
That night they had a buffet dinner with some traditional balinese dancing and the wait staff were incredibly kind as well as everyone we interacted with. We also had a couple of massages while we were there and the women were very sweet. By the end of our stay I wanted to give everyone hugs, I can’t tell you how welcoming they were. We learned a few balinese words and also loved their words of respect and kindness for us (Ebu Mona and Bappa Lee).
Besides our wonderful stay at Komaneka at Keramas Beach swimming in our pool, getting massages, and doing some yoga, we also walked on the beautiful black sand beach in front of the resort (they advised us not to swim since the current was strong, but there were a number of surfers out, so who knows). We also spent a day with our driver up in Ubud. We stopped to see the people painting with batik material, and a coffee shop that served kopi luwak coffee. The beans are eaten by the civet (smallish mammal), fermented in their bellies, pooped out and then the beans are cleaned, dried and roasted. It was actually very good coffee, though expensive to buy in any type of bulk. We then went to a monkey forest and had a great time watching the monkeys, although they could be a little fierce when they wanted to be. We watched one try to attack a child and get into it’s stroller (I’m sure they know where food is). One even gave me a little scare and lunged at my leg. Besides those little incidences they were a lot of fun to watch, especially by a pond where they would swing in the branches and then jump in the water.
Leaving the monkey forest was a traffic nightmare. Ubud is very touristy and not a place I would want to stay. We actually got out of the car and shopped while our driver battled the traffic. We then had some lunch and a stop at some touristy rice field terraces, but they were still really beautiful to see.
We also went surfing one morning about 15 minutes from the resort, with an instructor we found. The waves were much smaller here than in front of our resort but I think Lee still had a good time and I did as well even though I really struggled getting up on the board, the old body just isn’t as quick as it used to be.
I should also mention we found a wonderful restaurant close to the hotel that we went to twice and they remembered us when we went the second time and again the hospitality was amazing. I know that tourism is their main economic driver and so they want to be good to the tourists but I have never experienced such kindness, although the people in Thailand were incredibly kind as well, I think the difference is that the people in Thailand were very kind but a little shy while the balinese are just very kind and very willing to talk to you.
Needless to say we had a wonderful time in Bali, while it is very touristy and busy, where we stayed was on the outskirts of the city so it was quiet and we had a wonderful time. The only bummer was Lee caught a cold, he started feeling sick the night before leaving Bail. As a side note, we also had our interviews for the peace corps at this resort, and we felt like both our interviews went well. Given the time zone differences, we were interviewing close to midnight, and hoped we didn’t come across too groggy! The kindness of the people there, and realizing just how lucky we have been to have so much, put us in a good place for our interviews.
After Bali we flew to East Nusa Tenggara and then took a boat out to a little island called Seraya. Wow, what a difference this was from Bali. The town we flew into was much more quiet and the little island was even more remote. The boat ride out to the island was so beautiful and we were greeted at the dock by the general manager (it felt like Fantasy Island). We had a cute little beach bungalow with an outdoor shower on a nice white sand beach, it was beautiful. One of the things I had read in the reviews were people raved about the house reef. So after settling in, we went and got a bite to eat, digested and then went out for a snorkel. The reviews were not wrong, it was incredible. Just the diversity of the coral alone was incredible. There were big fat sea stars, fluorescent blue and green coral, lacy coral, brain coral. One of the times we went out we saw a small black tipped shark. Lee went alone one time and saw a big turtle and I went out alone one time and saw a giant parrot fish (I think) with a mouth full of human looking teeth, breaking off coral and taking a big chunk and moving it to another place.
There were giant angel fishes, schools of pencil fish and big schools of other fish that I don’t know the names of. It was by far the best snorkeling I have ever done. After seeing how incredible it was, I decided to do a scuba refresher lesson and do a dive off of their boat pier. And I was so glad I did. I saw lion fish, 2 sting rays, huge corals, lots of clown fish, and I even saw an electric clam (look it up). I can’t tell you how bad I wish we had brought our under water camera!!!
Lee also took out a paddle board and paddled to the islands several miles away and while he was out saw a manta ray and more beautiful scenery.
On our last full day on the island we took a tour to Komodo Dragon National Park, which consisted of several islands. We stopped at Padar Island first. It was interesting to find deer hanging out on shore when we arrived (they seemed out of place to me and didn’t look too healthy). We then climbed to the top of one of the hills to view the island from up top. It was very scenic. We then took the boat to the other side of the island to stop at one of the pink sand beaches. The sand has a light pink hue from the pink coral in the area. It was really pretty to see it contrast with the very blue water. We then went to Komodo Island to see if we could find some of the dragons. You have to walk with one of the park rangers and after about a mile of walking came to one of the drinking holes the komodos frequent and were able to see two of them. They are pretty lazy looking but something must have upset one of them because he got up and hissed at us. They aren’t something I would want to mess with, and have been known to kill people.
After leaving Komodo island we had one last stop in the middle of the ocean at a spot that is known for the manta rays. When we got to the spot we saw one and hurried and jumped in the water to get a closer look. The current was pretty strong but we soon saw several about 20 feet below the surface and they were huge. I would say at least 10 feet across. They were very gracefully swimming and we were able to follow them and observe them for a few minutes before it was time to get back into the boat. All in all it was a great day with some beautiful sites.
We left the next day to make our way to New Zealand. It consisted of a boat ride back to East Nusa Tenggara, a plane ride to Bali, about a 10 hour layover in Bali (we got a cheap hotel room close to the airport to rest and shower) and then an overnight flight to Melbourne and then a final shorter flight to Wellington, New Zealand on the North Island. By the time we landed I definitely had the cold that Lee had in Indonesia.
We picked up our car and prepared ourselves for driving on the left side of the road! We got some groceries and headed to the hotel for some rest, went out to dinner that night in the downtown area of Wellington which was pretty lively and called it a night. We did some hiking close to Wellington before making our way to Margrain which is one of the many wine country areas. We stayed at one of the vineyards and went to a small restaurant for dinner. The food was delicious and when I went up to pay our waiter (who was also the owner) asked where we were from. We said the US and he asked where and we said Utah. He said that is where me and my wife are from. They had moved to New Zealand from Bountiful for him to pursue his PHD and he had grown up in the Willow Creek area. What a small world!
A couple days later we had made our way up to Tongariro National Park where we had plans to do the Tongariro Alpine Crossing. It’s a point to point 13 mile hike and we had purchased our shuttle passes, however the morning of the hike I was still not quite feeling great and decided it might not be the best idea to do it, so instead we decided to just drive the car to the trailhead and hike however far we wanted and then hike back. I ended up hiking about 6 miles and was glad I didn’t attempt the whole trail, Lee went further and was able to get to the look out of the crater as well as to see some of the volcanic lakes which he said were beautiful. We also stopped at a waterfall in the park called Golum’s waterfall which was a scene in the Lord of the Rings movie where Golum fishes. There were other areas we saw that were scenes in the movie but since neither of us were fans of the movies so we didn’t pay too much attention.
After Tongariro we took a couple days to make our way to Rotorua where we stayed a couple of nights. We went mountain biking one day, which was fun, especially biking amongst the Ponga trees. The brakes were on “opposite sides”, and Lee did manage to go over the handlebars on one of the steeper trail sections. Thankfully the landing was soft and Lee’s head is hard, so no damage done! On our last evening there I had purchased tickets to have what was supposed to be a dinner to learn about the Maori culture and I was really looking forward to. We got to the center and everything was quiet and I thought maybe we were a little early but upon further inspection of the ticket found out I had booked it for the next night. Aaarrgh!! Oh well, guess we will have to go back to New Zealand another time!
The next morning before making our way to Auckland we took a pit stop to go on a glow worm tour. The tour was on a family farm and the tour was given by one of the cousin in laws. It was a fun tour with just 3 other people and the cave system was really pretty with a stream running through it. We walked through the cave system and saw a few glow worms but got to a larger room in the cave turned our lamps off and the whole ceiling lit up. It looked like lots of stars. it was very cool. The glow worms are technically larvae of fungus gnats, an insect that looks like a mosquito. They use their bioluminescent glow to attract prey into the silk threads covered in a stick mucous that the glowworm builds.
After the tour we finished our drive to Auckland to get ready for our early flight the next morning to the South Island. We really enjoyed our time the north island, with the beautiful rolling green hills and large mountains, but we were excited for some of the things we had planned for the South Island.
As we were starting our descent into Queenstown in the South Island the scenery from the plane was spectacular. Tons of peaks and glaciers and then for the approach the plan flew into the narrow valley over the lake and between the mountains outside of Queenstown. It was an incredible welcome to the South Island. We got our car and we were excited to start the three hour drive to the Milford Sound Lodge. I had found the lodge a few months early (it looked awesome) and it was completely booked, however I checked a few weeks before getting to New Zealand and there happened to be a two night cancellation and I grabbled it. The drive started out with scenery similar to Idaho and the Teton NP area and then eventually we started to head into the rain forest and towering peaks.
We got to the lodge and it was better than we expected. When we pulled up to our room, we were greeted by a Weka bird, who was not afraid of us. He sort of looked like a plain hen. He hung out around our room for our visit and at one point surprised me by pecking my foot. We had a nice lodge room with a river and a mountain right outside our room. After settling in and taking a walk around the area, we went to the restaurant for a delicious dinner.
The next morning we bundled up for our kayak tour, it was a little chilly. The tour took us about 3 miles into the sound and back and we really enjoyed being out amongst the unique towering cliffs and the ability to get up close to the waterfall and shoreline. Other options for touring the sound are larger tour boats and while they cruise to the Tasman Sea we were happy we went with the kayak tour for a more quiet up close look at Milford Sound. We were also glad we took the tour on the day we did. Right as we were wrapping up the tour the rain started and it did not stop.
We work up the next morning to waterfalls all over the mountains out our window, it was quite the site. We were sad our visit was over but ready for the rest of our adventures. Driving out of Milford Sound we passed a campground and decided to go take a look at New Zealand campgrounds. We were stopped by a South African woman who was having problems with her van (there was a man there as well), her battery was dead and then we realized she had no jumper cables. After realizing there was almost no one in camp (and the few that were there had no cables) she asked us to take her down the road about 15 minutes where she was hoping a friend of hers was waiting. She hopped in our car and with a sigh of relief said “thank you so much that guy was a creeper!” We had a nice chat with her, and we were glad we were able to help a fellow van lifer!
We spent the next couple of days in a cute town called Te Anau which was on a large beautiful lake. We had a couple of nice quiet days there with our highlight of finding a tramp (trail in the US) for a really great trail run. It was in a rainforest and just super lush and green. We also stopped at a bird sanctuary there and saw a few more of the native New Zealand birds.
Our next big destination was Christ Church which was quite the drive, so we broke it up into two days, with a stop at a really cute town on another beautiful lake called Lake Tekapo. We enjoyed a nice walk around the area and had a great dinner and met a man from Pittsburgh who worked in the building Lee used to occasionally travel to for work when he lived in Detroit. The man was there with his 5 year old daughter and a friend of his from New Zealand. His family was working on getting visas to move to New Zealand because they didn’t want their kids growing up doing active shooter drills in school. Pretty sad statement about the US and all the school shootings that have been happening.
The next day after another beautiful drive we made it to Christ Church. We checked out the surfing beach and Lee promptly decided he would be surfing one of the days we were there (even if it was cold, both water and air). We then made our way to our Airbnb and decided to go for a run at the park close by. We decided on a time and place to meet after our runs and went on our way. After my run I got to our meeting point at our designated time and waited…..and waited. After 30 minutes I decided I better go back and get the car and look for Lee. I drove almost the entire park and no Lee, and then right when I was about to give up I found him. He had gotten lost and was wandering the streets around the park looking for how to get home. Lesson learned, take your phone when you are in a new city!
We enjoyed the city for a few days, and also had our final interview for the Peace Corps while were there (it was our couple’s interview) and found out at the end of the interview that we were going to be invited to serve!! So that was a memorable event from Christ Church. The other one was the day before leaving Lee decide it was time to surf. It was a cold windy, slightly rainy day, but the surf was actually pretty good. He tried to convince me to go but I was not having it, I hung out in the car and observed occasionally from the shore. He got his rental board and wetsuit at the innovative locker setup at the beach and out he went with hardly anyone out there. He surfed for at least a couple of hours before the high school kids started to show up. When he got out he was shivering so hard, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him that cold. We got him out of his wetsuit into some dry clothes but he was frozen for quite a while, but he had so much fun surfing he said it was worth it (or at least he thought until a few days later).
After Christ Church we drove to Fox Glacier which was another beautiful drive. We stopped to get coffee at a food truck in the middle of nowhere and a pretty beach along the way, both of which had horrible sand flies that attacked my ankles (I was still itching from them a couple of weeks later). Our stay in Fox Glacier was at an Airbnb that was a room at a couple’s home. They invited us, as well as their guests in the other room, for “nibbles” and a drink. They were a very nice couple that had moved there from Auckland and their other guests were from Switzerland. We enjoyed chatting with them before heading out for a great dinner at a restaurant just down the street. We got to bed at a decent time because we had an exciting adventure the next day.
The next morning we headed for Fox Glacier Ice Climbing where we had a day of ice climbing on the Fox Glacier planned. When we got there we met our guide who was from Atlanta but had gone to school at CSU from 2017-2021 (same years Jack was there, and of course Lee’s alma mater) and was also thinking of moving to Utah with his girlfriend in a few months when his time in New Zealand was done. Then we met the father and son who were climbing with us and found out the father lived in Hawaii, had moved there in the past few years since his wife was from there and his son worked in Michigan in the auto industry. It was so funny all of the connections we all had halfway across the world in New Zealand.
After getting outfitted for our trip we headed to the helicopter. This was my first time in a helicopter and I was a tiny bit nervous but also very excited. The trip oly lasted 5-10 minutes to the glacier, and was a smooth and scenic ride. We then spent the next half day learning the skills to ice climb and practicing the skills at a few different “crags”. We even got lowered down into a crevasse with running water that was pretty cool, albeit a little unnerving. The ice climbing was fun, although it seems like rock climbing requires a little more puzzle solving, but none the less we had a great day. The scenery was amazing and the weather cooperated (which was great since the next day the glacier was socked in and we wouldn’t have been able to go).
We got up the next morning to head to Wanaka (another beautiful drive) and Lee said he wasn’t quite feeling right. By that evening he was feverish (I think the chill from surfing caught up to him) so we just took it easy after doing a little exploring of the cute town. Unfortunately the Airbnb we rented only had a double bed so Lee didn’t get the best rest with his feet hanging over the end of the bed and both of us crammed in like sardines. We did do a little exploring of Mount Aspiring National Park, but nothing too crazy.
After a couple days in Wanaka we left for Queenstown which would be our final New Zealand destination. We stopped at a couple of ski resorts on our way there, Cadrona and The Remarkables, it’s always fun to check out the ski resorts. We then made our way through the middle of Queenstown which was crowded with tourists. Luckily our Airbnb was a little ways out of town and was quiet and peaceful. Since Lee wasn’t feeling great, we mostly relaxed at our Airbnb with a few short scenic drives until our grand finale the day before we left.
On our last full day in New Zealand we made reservations to go on the largest swing in the world – The Nevis Swing. It had a free fall of 70 meters and a 300 meter arc. Luckily Lee was feeling well enough to take it on. We took a 4-wheel drive bus out to the swing with the last stretch of road was a one lane very steep dirt road with a steep drop off one side, looking back this was probably more dangerous than the swing. We got to the swing and suited up in our harnesses. We walked out over the suspended bridge to the hut where we would take our swing. We watched a couple of people do the swing before our turn which was a little unnerving but also fun to watch. We also asked a man to take our picture and his hands were shaking like crazy. I asked if he was getting ready to go on the swing and he said, no, he had just been on it, so that made me question what we were doing!
When it was our turn, we got clipped in, sat down and they then dropped the platform out from under our feet where we just sat suspended over the canyon. They asked if we wanted a countdown or a surprise and we said surprise. After what seemed a long minute we were then free falling through the air and then swinging over the canyon. It was quite exhilarating and not as scary as I thought it would be. If I had a chance to do it again, I would definitely do it. It was a great last adventure to our spring New Zealand travels!
We feel so lucky to be able to be doing what we are doing and to have been able to experience so much beauty, culture and meeting new people on our international excursion. It’s a trip we will remember forever!
