Our Bali holiday in a nut shell

It’s been some time since we came back from Bali, emotions have settled down and the time has come to summarize our first exotic holiday.

The question I hear the most often is if we think it was worth traveling so far away with a small kid and if it hadn’t be easier to leave Gabriela with her grandparents and go just the two of us. Our joint, mine and Tomasz’, answer is „it was definitely worth it and we would absolutely not want to go there without Gabi”. And I am not writing this just to prove anything to anyone. We are really very happy that we have such a great little travel companion whom we are planning to take with us wherever we can. We believe that kids should not stop anyone from making their dreams come true but should rather become a part of them. Maybe it is easy for us to say, as we have a kid that is easy to travel with. She doesn’t suffer from motion sickness, she has no ear pain on the plain and neither any food allergies.  And, what is most important, she is very curios about the world. It is truth that kids don’t need much attractions and that a simple activity like jumping from any stairs can be great fun for 15 min and if those stairs happen to lead to a beautiful temple, then everyone can benefit from it. Gabriela has her fun and we get to enjoy our attractions at the same time.

Of course there is a few things that we would do differently next time (plan our trips and sightseeing a bit differently) but these are minor changes. The biggest issue is actually the one we are suffering now being back home – as Gabriela has a hard time getting back to preschool and spending a lot of time without her parents. But during the holidays she was almost perfect 🙂

Now some answers to the most common questions:

• How did Gabriela cope with traveling?
  • Perfectly. She slept during most of the flights (we had long night flights plus some during her afternoon nap), otherwise she played with the ipad and jumped around in her sit.
• What did Gabiela eat?
  • Mostly rice. She had a proper breakfast every day (eggs, pancakes, sausages, toasts with jam), but later during the day she had mostly plain rice (or noddles sometimes). Sometimes we managed to give her a piece of meat but not too often. She didn’t want to eat fruit beside bananas. But she wasn’t hungry!
•  What was the weather like?
  • Beautiful. 30 degrees all the time, it rained twice during the night.
• Is it possible to move around with stroller on Bali?
  • Not really. Pavements are very narrow, uneven, full of holes and motorbikes parked on them. In Nusa Dua they were just constructing new pavement and it was completely impossible to use it now. In Bird and Safari Parks you can use strollers without any problems.
• What is the food like on Bali?
  • Delicious and very spicy. But of course you can find something more mild. The most popular dishes are Nasi and Mie Goreng (fried rice or noddles with vegetables, chicken or shrimps and egg). In all-inclusive hotels you can probably get more European food, but we had only breakfast included and we were eating in different restaurants otherwise.
• Are the beaches beautiful there?
  • Not really. I mean in Nusa Dua the beach is far from perfection. The pretty ones usually belong to the hotels and you are not really welcome there.
• How did we move around on Bali?
  • We had a car rented with a driver every time. Driving on our own in Indonesia didn’t seem as a good idea.
• What places did we visit on Bali?
  • Temples: Holy Water Springs, Mother Temple of Besakih, Pura Tanah Lot, Pura Uluwatu, Pura Ayun
  • Palace in Klungkung and Water Palace Tirta Gangga
  • Coffee plantation Santria
  • Monkey Forest
  • Bali Bird Park
  • Bali Safari and Marine Park
• What places did we visit on Jawa / in Yogyakarta?
  • Temples: Borobudur and Prambanan, Malioboro Street and market