Friday, 18 November

After a wonderful breakfast (banana pancake, toast with scrambled egg, egg and tomato jaffle, fruit salad, and hot tea), we headed out to walk around and see what was going on in Ubud. Monkey Forest Road was extremely quiet. On returning from dinner the night before, we had been approached by the manager of one of the restaurants with an offer of free beer if we would just come in and listen to the music for a while. We had declined because we all needed sleep, but it was a little depressing to see so few tourists.

Made had said he would get us around 10:00, so we went back to the rooms to repack everything for the move. We didn't want to offend anyone, so we had Made explain our situation before he loaded the bags in his car. When we got to Londo, we settled right in. The kids went upstairs to work on their schoolwork, and I started taking pictures. It is amazing how much those plants grow in two years. The lotus in this picture was just a tiny thing when we were here last. The rice fields had just been planted, and the fields were calm and glassy.

Well, we can't go to Ubud without a trip to the market on the first day. Lace had packed light - real light - we had to go buy her some clothes. Since we hit the market pretty late in the day, we didn't spend much time. We found what we were looking for (we thought), I did the bargaining, and then whipped out the camera to get some quick shots. I've never gotten market photos before because when I'm there, I'm shopping, and I don't want my bargaining power spoiled by a camera hanging around my neck. We had finished buying, but we had to walk past the shoe men in the courtyard. One man told me I could buy his shoes for "only 1,000 ma'am!" Hmmm, a 10 cent pair of shoes? I'll take 20. I didn't even try to bargain with him. I knew I'd end up paying more than I really wanted to for some shoes I didn't really want.

So anyway, the clothes we got didn't fit, and we had to shop more another day! Whee!