While there's plenty to keep anyone busy at Club Med, we didn't want to spend a whole week inside the resort. It was time to take a trip outside the gates and we chose to spend a day at the tourist hotspots of Legian and Kuta.
The area is famous for surf, shopping and nightlife, and is far more energetic in ambiance than laid-back Nusa Dua. It was also the scene of the horrific 2002 nightclub bombings, but today it's back on its feet.
We exited our cab and were immediately bewildered by a jumble of signs, sights and smells. We were on JL Legian, one of the main streets, and it stretched for miles in each direction. The strip seemed to hold a an endless array of surf shops, souvenir shacks, spas, bars and restaurants. And just when we thought it couldn't be more packed, we realised that leading off the street at regular intervals were little alleyways with even more stalls and shops. Picking a direction at random, we set off. Most of the souvenir shops seemed to have the same things on offer: floaty dresses and tops, togs and boardshorts, and the omnipresent singlets and t-shirts advertising the local beer, Bintang (I can't judge, I bought one in the end). It was simply a question of which shop you'd end up spending your rupiah at.
The surf shops have the usual, mainly Australian labels, plus a few we don't have in New Zealand like Cult. Prices are much the same once you've converted all the hundreds and thousands back to NZ dollars.
There are also the usual higher-end knock-off stores: we saw Paul Smith, Dolce & Gabbana and Prada but weren't tempted.
With four of us foraging through the shops we soon split into two pairs. It was only after Megan and I realised we hadn't caught sight of the others for about half an hour that we remembered we hadn't made a plan "in case" - and neither of us had our phones on us.
Feeling suitably ashamed, we picked up the pace, thinking we might catch up to the others, but soon decided we didn't even know if they'd been ahead or behind last time we spotted them. Our heads were on swivels as we trotted up the street, checking across the road and behind us in the vain hope of bumping into them.
The streets were crowded: heaps of tourists from all over the world (with a high percentage of Aussies here on surfing safaris), expat locals, hawkers, street sweepers and spa employees thrusting their menus at passersby. We didn't have a chance.
Eventually we realised it was crunch time: we had to decide what to do. We cast our minds back to all our training on how to stay alive in the wild. What was the first lesson? Stay put.
Accordingly we chose a safe spot and settled in to wait it out. The fact that we had chosen to "stay put" at a comfy roadside bar with a good view of the street and plentiful beer was just an added bonus, of course.As we sipped our Bintang and kept an eye out for the others, there was plenty of people-watching to do. A street-sweeper went past, with her little daughter skipping along behind her in a summer frock. Many women were carrying baskets of food or goods on their heads and we marvelled at their agility and grace. And there was the never-ending parade of scooters.
We'd just about finished our beers when the miracle happened. There, across the street was one of our group and she quickly spotted our frantic waves and cheers. We were reunited at last, thanks to our cool heads and sharp wits... or something. More beers were called for, purchases were inspected and we made plans for the rest of our day - with a contingency plan in place this time.Amy Williams travelled to Bali courtesy of Club Med and Pacific Blue.
Check out the pictures from my trip to Bali on Flickr or find out more about Bali.
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