This morning started with a jog along the beach for me and a sleep-in for Mum. After breakfast at the American buffet, we went for a walk down Legian Street, which is where a lot of the shops are near the hotel. Total purchases: Pair of 'Adiles' (think about what the real brand is called...) for Rp100,000 and a hat for Rp50,000. Despite this, we were offered loads of wallets, jewellery and everything else in between. The most amusing sight was rather offensive bumper stickers. "I ♥ Jiggy-Jig" was the least offensive of the lot.
Today's big thing was elephants! There were big elephants, little elephants (who were still huge), grey elephants and even elephants with freckles.
The elephant park was two hours from Legian, which meant a very long and very windy drive up there with Ari, the driver. This wasn't so bad, especially because the car was air-conditioned, except that Mum got very carsick and we ended up having to pull over so she could throw up. Despite this, we still saw loads of nice scenery, with temples absolutely everywhere. Driving through the city was very slow thanks to traffic which can only be described as 'anarchic'. I'm pretty sure the term 'zipper merge' has never been heard of, the indicator is a recent invention and thank God the intersections are too small for hook turns.
The elephant park itself was pretty big, considering it was just elephants. The park itself is on the edge of a little farming village, and is home to 30 elephants. There's a hotel, the elephant's home field, a rather nice restaurant and a museum of elephants. It's all very nice, and buffet lunch was excellent.
Actually riding on an elephant was the highlight of our day - we rode on an elephant named Roxy, through the elephant park and the surrounding forest. Elephant riding is neither fast nor graceful, but still good fun. Mum loved it, and I actually quite enjoyed myself. We didn't fall off, but we did drop Mum's little camera bag overboard. Roxy kindly picked it up and so we now have a dusty and elephant-snot covered camera bag. Yay? Otherwise, the ride was uneventful and good fun. Not sure I'll do it again anytime soon, but it was well worth doing once.
The plan for tonight is to relax for a little while and then head off to the Italian restaurant for pizza and whatever delicious goodies we can find for dessert.
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