September 9, 2006
To Bali: Flight to Denpasar Bali
"The restrooms are so clean!" Rachel said "I almost felt compelled to dry the sink after brushing my teeth." Only to discover later that it was because an attendant went in and cleaned the bathroom after each use. We are on our way to Bali Indonesia.
The day started just before six in the morning, Bob pulls up in "old blue" to drive us to the airport. We say our goodbye's to the cats and let them outside, then load two big green duffel bags, each close to 50# and two bike boxes in the back of Bob's old truck. Ron and Melinda, our house sitters and cat caretakers for the next year, got up early to wave us off.
The check-in goes smoothly, we are charged $100 for each bike as we expected. STA checks the bike boxes Patrick had left open and helps Patrick put some final tape on the open side. We came two hours early but it is nice to not have to rush. A one hour flight takes us to Salt Lake City, just as we walk off the plane, we see Atlantis lift-off on the TV monitors. Next a two hour flight to San Francisco and we find the waiting lounge for the Korean Air flight to Incheon Korea. It starts to feel like a foreign country already, there are only a few "muzungu's" in the crowd, (since cycling in Africa in 1994, we refer to travelers as muzungu's, meaning white person in Swahili. (You'll see this reference all through the journal).
We board a big 777 and take off for an 11.45 hour flight. Time actually goes pretty fast, we get two meals, lots of water and juice, two really bad movies (one Korean, one American), and a few catnaps. Because we travel westward, it does not get dark. We do lose a full day when we cross the date line, the day turns from Saturday afternoon to Sunday. We land at about 5pm at a large modern airport on some islands just west of Seoul. We never officially enter Korea but stay in "transit" in the international terminal. Everywhere are "tax free" shops. Judging by the amount of Asian shoppers, the deals must be real good.
We only have a 1 1/3 hour lay-over, just enough to use a real bathroom and stretch our legs. Just like in SFO, the Korean Air stewardesses are lined up in the seats at the gate, all dressed alike in soothing cobalt blue and tan uniforms. All with the same hairdo decoration that look like two sticks but made of stiff ribbon, and stiffly pressed scarf around their necks with one side over the shoulder, one side down as if permanently blowing in the wind.
We are confused about the length of the flight to Bali, it turns out to be seven hours long. Neither of us can sleep much anymore, so we watch the same bad US movie without sound (x-men with Jean Luc Picard). The flight takes us over central Borneo, we change course several times to avoid huge thunderstorms. From the window, we have a good view of the tremendous lightning flashes below us. The last two hours we enjoy the "Queen Live at Wembley" concert. We wonder what all the Korean people on this flight think of a half-naked Freddy Mercury....
We land at Denpasar airport close to 2 am (noon in Boise). The whole trip took us 30 hours. One of our duffel bags is first off the plane, both bike boxes and one more duffel bag shortly after, then on through Customs and Immigration that goes smoothly. It saves us a lot of time to already have our visas. The only hiccup in the trip is that the Sorgani Hotel forgot to rent a car to pick us up as requested. Patrick negotiates $6.00 fee from a taxi driver. He has to remove his taxi sign to make room for the two bikes that we tie to the roof of his small Toyota. Fifteen minutes later we are in Kuta.
At the end of a long alley is the Sorgani Hotel, a night watchman opens the gate into a courtyard, Ten minutes later we are checked in and crash.
Travelling by bike again becomes our new reality.
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