Bali, Lombok and Gili Islands

Roger and I met our 2 adult sons Josh and Louis who are living in Australia at the moment at the airport in Bali - a great place to meet up and begin our family holiday

We began our visit in the Legian area as I wanted to see the nightlife and shops of the Kuta area but to stay outside of the main nightlife noise – we stayed 3 nights Ossotel Legian.

There are gorgeous white sand beaches (good surf) and many hotels/restaurants who set up low tables and seating to see the great sunsets from here.

Kuta has some noisy bars and clubs but early evening it is great to stroll and shop. We found heading through Legian to Seminyak the shops and restaurants became more upmarket.

We collected a car and drove to visit Ulawatu and Tanah Lot (both fantastic visits) on our way to the North West corner of Bali – staying at Mimpi Resort for 4 nights. Here we explored the coral reefs around the national marine park and Menjangan Islands (Josh is a marine biologist so helps us to identify what we see).

Very early on our 8th morning we drove all along the North coast of the island to take a ferry from the East coast onto Lombok Island.

Here we stayed for 4 nights exploring the volcanoes and scenery of this very different island - we hired scooters and had some great journeys along the coasts.

With some local help we arranged our own boat (about 20 mins) to travel over to the Gili Islands (Gili Air) and this we great and much cheaper than the public busy ferry. The Gili Islands are very chilled without any motorized vehicles and fantastic sunset bars Cycles are readily hired and this was the best way to get around.

For the final 3 nights of our holiday we sailed back to Bali (collecting our vehicle waiting at the port) and drove to the interior town of Ubud. Here the dress is very traditional and local crafts music and dancing can be enjoyed.

There are some amazing views of rice paddies here and we enjoyed an early morning and early evening walk into the village areas to see locals delivering their offerings to the temples. This made us feel like we'd had a taste Balinese culture and made the most of our holiday.

The only part of the whole holiday we did not enjoy was waving goodbye to our sons as we flew back to the UK and them to Brisbane (but we have plans afoot you can be sure).