Side Trips During Christmas Break

While making plans for our time off over Christmas, we decided to make sure we saw some of the things that make our area special, as we knew we were leaving here in just over 2 months and might not make it back here anytime soon. Some places we chose to see were a larger city – where Batik is made and an ancient Buddhist temple (1200 years old!) which is about 2 hours from our home. We also decided to “camp” with some friends on a beach about a 4 hour’s drive from us on the south coast.

On December 29th we took a short trip to a larger city. We met some friends who work in a different area at the airport there and spent 2 nights, taking time during the rainy days to visit a big mall and shop at some of the tourist stalls. It was NUTS! It was hard to make them understand that we were not tourists looking for trinkets.

We arrived home on the 31st after taking in  a Buddhist temple on our way home. It was incredible in structure and creativity. We all climbed all the way to the top in pouring rain. There were also strong winds while we were up on top of the structure, so that was a bit crazy. Despite each of us having our own umbrella, we ALL got SOAKED. Spencer’s umbrella turned inside out!! We got some pictures anyway, risking the life of our camera.

We spent New Year’s Eve sleeping and New Year’s Day catching up on laundry and stuff. Then we packed again and left the morning of the 2nd to the beach.

We didn’t stay in tents, but our accommodations included a little bungalow with one room – room enough for 1 bed and a small bathroom with a “bok mandi” (tub-like thing that holds water – you scoop water out of it and pour it over yourself – their version of a shower) and (YAY) a western toilet. The kids slept in another little bungalow – theirs had a local style “squatty potty” but they had a “real” shower. We brought a pack n play for Julia to sleep in. The beach had tan sand but it was quite clean – not even seaweed on the shore. It was a public beach across the road from our bungalows and we mostly had it to ourselves. Around 4 PM the kids were done with school and came out to surf. Josh was able to borrow a boogie board and spent a lot of time fighting the waves. The boys gained confidence each day and by the end really enjoyed jumping in the waves. Spencer even rode some small ones on his kickboard!! We brought a small tub for Julia – filled it up with water from the ocean and set it up on the sand. She played in it for hours!!

We arrived back home on the 5th and our friends left for their area on the 6th. School started again on the 8th. I’ll try to post more photos on the Photos section of our site – check the link on the right.