Candidasa Beach Cottages are on the East South Eastern coastline of Bali. Land at Denpasar and take an eye opening taxi journey up the coast to the right! Not the left, that's Kuta. Go right. The scenery changes, I promise. It is a bit shanty and scattered and part this and the other for a few miles. It makes you wonder why everyone goes to Bali, but then it settles. The thick, enormous trees settle over the road and the rice fields emerge on the left. All of this you can see if you can take your eye off the road. The driving style is special. Horn hooting, the odd blind overtake and blast of gas. The latter from yourself.
Candidasa village appears after two jet lagged hours of driving and the cottages are down a small road from the 'main' road. Great entrance and very friendly. Our cottage is right by the sea and pool and the wonder of Bali. The picture is literally the view we have.
I am unreliably informed that it is 7,300 miles from London to Bali. But just about the right distance for Kate and I to put between ourselves and reality for a few weeks. We cannot erase nor want to forget some poop that has occurred but it is very nice to be able to at least recharge our batteries beyond flat and into the positive. Without which, I think we may have started shouting at door to door salesmen more, placing dustbins on the road where our car should be and generally getting rattier than Roland.
I am sending thanks to my parents through the Internet - thank you! Both have sadly died, my mum this year, but without their legacy, Kate and I would be in a cottage in rain soaked Devon and not here. Maybe the Internet in some way is glued to the universe through its electrical vagaries. Maybe if I say thank you enough, some cross dimensional force that manifests itself as life in our universe will shake a bit and the wave which created mum and dad will pick up the thanks and smile charmingly to itself. Maybe I've had too much beer? Watch for smiling waves.
So Kate and I are going to have a swim now and wash off some grime from a hard morning of sweet FA. And no, I don't think the Football Association is a sweet organisation. More likely to be a bunch of crooks who are more removed from a football than I am from Colliers Wood, which right now is 7,300 miles. Thank you Mum and Dad. X