Our trip to Bali!

For our anniversary in March, Zak and I decided to book a trip to Bali for an extended weekend to celebrate our four years of marriage. It was a 7 hour flight, we booked a direct flight to save on time since we were only spending a few days in Bali. We arrived really late at night and scheduled a car from the hotel to meet us at the airport which was great because there were about 1,000 taxi drivers hawking for a fare. Another tip, be sure to make a b-line straight to your luggage as soon as you see it or else a helping hand will grab it all for you and force you to tip them for their 'help'. You will also need to apply for a visa at immigration so have some cash on hand to pay.

We had a few weekend night certificates from Hilton to use up so we chose to stay at the Conrad Bali because of its amazing reviews. We booked a lagoon room which I would highly recommend! The Conrad was even nice enough to send us a bottle of champagne to celebrate our anniversary. I don't have anything negative to say about our stay there. I will let the pictures do the talking!









Bali is incredible. I am still in awe six months later about the beauty of this island, it even smelled beautiful! On our first day we explored the area around our hotel and walked the streets with mopeds zipping by. Riding a moped is an art form in Bali, I saw one with a family of five on it and others stacked so high that you couldn't see around them. Just down from our hotel was a great little restaurant on the beach called Kendi Kuning. It had really great reviews so we had our dinner there and we were not disappointed, their prawns were HUGE!!





The next morning we took a taxi to the other side of the island to spend the day at a private beach at the Nammos Beach Club, which is part of the Karma Kandara Resort. The trip to the beach took our breath away! The resort itself is situated on top of a cliff which overlooks the Indian Ocean. To get to the beach we had to take an elevator down the side of the cliff to the beach club, the view from that short ride could not be beat! It is still my computer backdrop :P

Here are some photos of our time at the Nammos Beach Club:











For our last day we hired a driver to take us around the island. My good friend Lisa recommended that I try out the local hot spot for babi guling at Ibu Oka, so this was our first stop! Here is the special that I had:



And you can't go to Bali without a stop in the Monkey Forest! The particular one that we went to was the one in Ubud. The monkeys at this forest were actually really chill and nice to be around. I have heard horror stories about the monkeys in Bali so this was a great surprise. Our driver was known pretty well by the monkeys so we had groups of them following us and climbing us up and down!











Next we visited the rice terraces, now I see a lot of rice living in Korea but these terraces were beautiful! It was so interesting to see that rice is harvested all year long since the temperature remains the same. The terraces were all at different levels of growth and more green than I have ever seen!





Our driver also stopped by a temple for us on the way back, it was pretty neat to hear about all of the history and learn about the sacrifices and ceremonies that still take place.







If you are staying in the Nusa Dua area of Bali and need a driver I highly highly recommend Agus! Here is his website: http://www.agusbali.com/


After our tour we hung out in the departure lounge at the Conrad, washed up and caught a red eye back to Korea. Although our stay in Bali was short, I will always remember this trip for its beauty and would love to return one day. If you live in Asia like we do, do yourself a favor and book a trip to Bali. You will no doubt create memories that will last a lifetime.

Thanks for reading xxx

Tokyo Disney!!!

For my birthday Zak and I made a last minute decision to use our flyer miles and head to Tokyo for a a few days. He asked me what I really wanted to do for my birthday and I said "TOKYO DISNEY!!" I am a big theme park enthusiast and have a very nostalgic love for Disney, so it seemed like the logical choice. :) We booked our flights and hotel about a week prior to leaving and it made me realize that it would be impossible for me to book a vacation any sooner than that because a week felt like a month!

So in typical Zak and Nikki fashion we wait until last minute to pack and figure out what we are bringing with us. If you remember in a previous post we had lost our beloved hard core sony cybershot while our family was in town so we bought another updated one to replace it. Well, unfortunately we realized that we had no idea where that one was either. We searched every nook and cranny for hours it seemed with no luck.. I mean the camera is BRIGHT yellow.. how could we lose it?!? Alas, people are thankful for our purchases because now we have given the city of Pyeongtaek not one but two shiny cybershots...for free. :(

Sadly we had to depart without the camera and headed to Incheon Airport. We decided to drive this time since we were only staying for a few days and parking was only 8000won a day (about 7-8usd). Thank goodness my husband knows how to drive like a race car driver because we almost ran into an idiot who missed their turn on the freeway that decided to STOP their car and put it in REVERSE at the fork in the road. I can't make these things up, I promise.

Upon arriving at the airport we picked up our duty free items that we purchased earlier in the week at one of the huge duty free malls here in South Korea (perk!) and made a last minute decision to buy another cybershot...sigh... this time though we didn't get the rugged one in hopes that it will turn up in a seat cushion one day.

So here are some test photos from our new camera on the airplane!

The flight is very short from Seoul to Tokyo, about 2 1/2 hours. At the airport I found something unique.. a smoker's room, outside! Way to keep the air fresh!

From the airport we took a bus directly to our hotel (The Hilton Tokyo Bay) it was about a 75 minute ride and cost about $30 per person. 

When we got to the hotel and checked into our room we realized we had a beautiful view of the Tokyo Bay! Here are a few photos we got:

And what better way to escape the outrageous hotel food and drink prices than this: 

At Tokyo Disney there are actually two parks, Tokyo Disneyland and Tokyo Disney Sea. They were both amazing!! Here are some photos from Disney Land:

 The weather was more favorable the day we went to Disneyland but that didn't keep us from having a good time the day we went to Disney Sea! It did actually start pouring rain the day we were at Disney Sea (my birthday) so unfortunately the only photo were these:

But we did however have TONS of fun there. It was a more thrilling park than Disney Land, as it included the Tower of Terror (my new favorite!) and other rides that are only in Japan.

And for your viewing pleasure:

Overall it was a great trip, I wouldn't change a thing about it. My birthday was a great success, and we are now looking forward to Christmas.

I am sorry for not blogging recently, I just got done with an 18 credit semester so that had me pretty busy. For now we are just enjoying the Christmas season and I am still waiting for it to start snowing regularly around here... call me crazy. :)

Hope you all are finding yourselves in good spirits, happy holidays!!

Thanks for reading xxx

Oktoberfest @ the Seoul Grand Hilton

As I was perusing one of my Korean foodie blogs Seoul Eats I noticed a post about Oktoberfest in Seoul at the Grand Hilton and jumped on the opportunity to get tickets for this event. It was a surprise to Zak and I managed to actually keep it under wraps for the week prior to the event. I usually spill the beans within 24 hours of planning a surprise, so this was a big step for me! :-P So this event was a one time rate for unlimited German beer and cuisine, a live band from Germany, and a whole lot of fun! We definitely enjoyed ourselves and drank enough Paulaner beer for the year, I love Oktoberfest. It was nothing but a ballroom full of people who like to drink beer and eat pretzels, my kind of people!

Me in the hotel room before we went to Oktoberfest, trying to contain myself of spilling the beans! Oh and thanks for the free bottle of wine Seoul Grand Hilton, I had to drink it before Oktoberfest or else my husband would have been on to me that we are going to a drinking event if I didn't pop it open... ha ha

And now onto Oktoberfest, this right here made every penny worth it:

Tapping of the keg!

This Korean boy in his lederhosen was just too cute, even though he looked forced to wear this by his mother...

Zak about to arm wrestle..

We drink Paulaner beer! I wish you could here me singing this, because I have literally been singing it since Oktoberfest..

Drunk Nikki being silly..

And the people we shared our table with, they pretty much won all the competitions, the lady on the left it one hell of a beer chugger.. and the one on the right dominated in womens arm wrestling.

And a video I have put together from the event, beware there are embarrassing drunk moments that you will probably enjoy.. but hey it was Oktoberfest!

In all this was definitely an awesome time, we cannot wait to go again next year!!! I might just order some lederhosen  ;)