Day 4: The Day That Started at 2am

Our first full day in Bali began at the completely unreasonable hour of 2:00am.

Despite not getting to sleep until around midnight New Zealand time, the children had apparently decided they were fully adjusted to Bali life and ready to begin the day. The adults strongly disagreed.

After several failed attempts to convince everyone that it was still nighttime, Henry finally gave up on sleep altogether and was parked in front of cartoons at 3:00am. By 5:00am, the rest of us had admitted defeat and got up too.

Naturally, we started the day with a swim.
We tried very hard to keep quiet and not wake the rest of the resort. We were unsuccessful.

After our early morning swim, we walked to the beach to watch the Sanur sunrise together. It was beautiful, although we quickly realised that while we were taking photos of our family, several other people were also taking photos of our family. At times there seemed to be a whole crowd of people photographing the kids, who appeared to be handling their newfound celebrity status quite well.

After breakfast and yet more swimming at our accommodation, we went to visit Nanny, Jack, Gabe and Uncle Graham at his place (15 mins walk away), where the kids swam for at least another 2 hours. Once the kids were looking like well ripened prunes, we visited the turtle conservation centre, where the kids loved seeing turtles of every shape and size.

Then it was back home for Jai to have a sleep (with a gelato stop along the way, obviously), while the rest of us squeezed in some more swimming. By this point, the children had spent so much time in pools that they were probably evolving gills.

Later in the afternoon, I discovered that I had already managed to lose something in Bali.

Before we left New Zealand, I'd bought myself a very glamorous pair of $8 plastic slides from The Warehouse because everyone said I would need shoes for Indonesia... and I didn't actually own any.

Ironically, I'd spent most of the day walking around barefoot with my shoes safely tucked in the bottom of the pram.

Or so I thought.

When it was time to head to dinner with Jackie and Campbell, I reached into the pram to put my shoes on... and found exactly one.

Somewhere during the day, the other shoe had quietly made its escape.

So, after less than 24 hours in Bali, I officially owned one shoe.

Needless to say, my very expensive $8 investment has become a $4 shoe. didn't have a particularly long life expectancy.

So we walked (me barefoot) to Jackie and Campbell's house to look around the villa they're renovating before heading out for dinner together.

Considering everyone had effectively started their day before sunrise, the kids were incredible at dinner. Henry was so tired that he was falling asleep in his chair. We moved him to a nearby couch where he slept peacefully for the rest of the meal before being carried home.
Not a bad effort for someone who had started his day at 3:00am.

Trip Statistics

- Wake-up time: 2:00am
- Cartoons before sunrise: Yes
- Sunrises watched: 1
- Random people taking photos of the kids: Lots
- Turtles admired: plenty
- Gelato stops required: 1
- Hours spent swimming: Nearly all of them
- Children asleep before making it to bed: 1
- Family memories made: CountlessRead more