Perth Day 2: Swan Valley

After the awesome "Pho" breakfast, we headed to Swan Valley. Perth's Valley of taste. Imaging free tasting of chocolate, cheese, honey, wine etc. YES! The place to taste all of those for FREE is Swan Valley. But the top of our MUST visit place is Caversham Wildlife Park (no, you don get to eat the animals for free) where we can pet the animal & feed kangaroo... that will be covered in Part 3 (too much photo to hau lien)

 1st stop: Old Guildford Courthouse (Swan Valley Visitor Centre)... a must go place to get all the necessary info. Got the direction for CHOCOLATE & WINE testing place & a map for navigation.

 

  Some cottage near the visitor centre... waiting for hubby to relieve himself. I loved my new AUD2 stripe shirt I got from Cotton On :) It's so loose and big, can hide my bulging tummy... Si la, must start to exercise or else I only can fit into maternity clothes liaw lo

Stop by the river near the visitor centre...

Ducks swimming by

 Taking a short walk by the river...The weather is just so nice, ngam ngam ho. Even after chasing after Alexander here and there, I don't feel hot.

 What a great place for Alexander to run & play

 Alexander ran & "BooooooOOOO" the birds...

 White parrots... a lot on the trees..

 Enjoying the majestic view

 Alexander and daddy fishing **play pretend**

 Pretty horses

 How daddy wish he was the one kayaking down this river.

 This is the place a chocolate queen like me need to visit, Margaret River Chocolate. WHY?? Because of the Chocolate Buffet. Free flow of chocolate le... ALL FOR FREE! Got 3 BIG Bowls, white, milk & dark chocolate.. I could stand there ALL day. White choc is the sweetest... I like the milk choc.. not too sweet, just nice.

 The varieties of the choc truffles is astounding. Each choc truffle is AUD1.90

 Had a hard time choosing the choc truffles...

 I wanna try all (they are so tiny ba) but it's too expensive. So we got 2 to try.

 The chocolate tester... giving 2 thumbs up!

The REAL Hot Chocolate AUD4.90. It was really really thick... way too sweet... even for me.

 Daddy's drinking cappuccino (AUD4.50)... way too much cocoa but that's GOOD! Mummy loves! Spend RM42 for the above drinks & chocolate, which was our tea break + lunch.

 I got 1 BIG spoonful of chocolate for Alexander. He loved chocolate. Wonder why hor :P

 Got 2 choc bars... AUD10.90 (RM35). I would lov to get more but ... sigh...$$ is 1 thing, luggage space is another issue :(

Wine testing time! Since I don't drink wine, we picked 1 that was conveniently on the way to the wildlife park. I heard they have cheese tasting, so I dun mind tagging along with hubby for the wine testing. Or else I would just skip this part... hubby not really a wine person anyway.

 The vineyard is at the background. But we did not see any grape.

 And the wine testing begin....

 Daddy enjoying white wine. There were some cheese available to go with the wine. So I tasted those hahaha... without the wine. Beh pai seh 1. But daddy could not decide which wine he liked, so ended up we din buy any hahahah

Bright sunny day... good for some JUMPING!! Lovely lovely day!

(part 3 coming up soon)

Wendy is BACK!

A surprise visit from Wendy... who is back from Perth for a holiday. Our young & full of energy ex-colleague... she's so much younger ~5 years from us (Sexylips & me) but is very mature in thinking le... no bullshit, straight forward kinda girl.

Last Saturday, our 1st outing was to Bing at Jalan Keretapi, the newest branch, us girls only Wendy, Sexylips, SexyBum & me. The place was HOT in red! From outside it looks kinda huge but in actual case, the interior very small le. Lucky we were there early to grab those comfy sofa seats.

Chocolate Fudge Cake... yum yum... SexyLips even got 2nd helping of the whipped cream for me... now u know why I'm getting so fat le.SexyLips is still in the growing phrase... he ordered Panini (sandwich thingy) & warned me to stay away. Who wants that... when I got my usual Ice Blended thingy, this time it's Vanilla with lotsa whipped cream. With the member card, got 10% discount yo hoooo. Spent the night just catching up la... the last I saw her was last year CNY.Then on Sunday nite last week, we had Wii Party!

A night out @ tHe Spring shopping for SHOEs! Girls can never hav enuf of it. Visited the all-new 2nd floor... it was like stepping into Sungei Wang. The Cinema is not opened yet, but now recruiting members for RM110 (100 is Prepaid & Members Fee is RM10 (normal price is RM20). So you can purchase movie ticket at the kiosk using the prepaid card, cool le.

Before heading home, Wendy, SexyBum & me shared 2 scoops of Dessert's Ice-cream. Guava & Banana with caramel, both low fat one le... I was suggesting we get 3 scoops but Wendy reminded me of my difficulty in wearing my work pants... le sigh...And today, our night last out before Wendy depart for Perth, at Jase's Tea Room... but I don't drink tea except green tea lar...

Warm ambiance, very homey with sheer curtain & comfy settee... we got there at 8.30pm and we had the place to our self. But as the night wore on... surprisingly many more people turned up... Kuching people really like lim teh le..

The bottles of the TEA Leaves where customer can decide which tea the wan...

While waiting for our drinks, I walked around admiring the decor... and I spotted these. Mayb it's not very clear here but there were lotsa spider web on this piece of ornament... ewww...I just could not decide on which tea to get, so I got Affogato, RM5.80. A scoop of Vanilla ice-cream, and topped with a hot shot of espresso. haha... IN the end I still stick to coffee. Affogato meant "drowned" in Italian.Wendy & SexyBum both got a pot of tea, Mango Flip & Pina Colada, RM9 per pot le. But can refill with hot water la. The waiters there are very young & super helpful. Wendy liked hers & SexyBum regret choosing Pina Colada

We shared 2 slice of cakes, Rum & Raisin Cheese on fire hahaha... it's bcoz of Wendy's camera flash.Mascarpone Cheese RM8 Very rich, very nice.Us girls... SexyLips was standing on the coffee table to take this shoot. He said it's the 45 degree shot that can make my face slimmer... & it really did... looks at how high my cheekbone are hahahahahaHere's a normal shot of us... using timer on Wendy's Camera..

Then Wendy suggested we do crazy posed & I turned into something so fugly damn itHave a safe trip back home Wendy.

Day 1 : Bali

The Journey itself took more than half a day from Kuching as we need to transit in Senai, Johor. Hubby dreaded this type of travel but no choice lor as the KCH-BALI route canceled bah.

The morning flight to JB left on the dot at 8.45am & reach by 10am. With only our backpack (travel light is my policy), we walk straight to Coffee Bean (as usual lar). Hubby was busy trying to finish a task on the PSP game while I was busy trying to absorb all the important info on BALI that's in Lonely Planet. Actually I started reading it on the plane. I planned to finish it by 2 days.Before boarding the plane to Bali, we had lunch at Mary Brown. The place was awful with so many flies around once we started to eat... ewww...

The flight from JB to BALI was 2 & half hours & we reach by 3.30pm. wow... AirAsia is not only NOT LATE, but earlier by half an hour le. AirAsia must b working real hard getting rid of the tag "always delay 1"

Once out of the airport terminal, we turn right where a booth was offering TAXI transportation to hotels with a price of RP55 000 (RM19). Bali roads are so narrow I would not dare to drive there with all the pedestrian, motorist & car. Scary lor. The hotel was only 10 ~ 15 minutes away.

After exploring the hotel, a splash in the pool & enjoying the beautiful sunset, we walk along the beach towards the heart of Kuta. But later on we cross the busy road & walked by the footpath along the road side as it was getting dark.

The road is a 1-way street but the motorbikes are riding heading the other direction on the walk path. So it was NO FUN trying to avoid all the motorbikes. And the walk turn out to be longer than expected so hubby started to grumble... when he gets hot & sweaty, he get irritated easily... poor baby... hahahah...

Passed by the famous Hard Rock Hotel... this was in my list of top 3 hotel to stay in Bali.
Just as hubby was starting to complaint, we passed by this place where a man was playing with FIRE Ball! Hubby got busy and took a few shots. I like them all, here are some of them:I was heading to Made Warung for dinner, where most people has recommended for a meal of REAL BALINESE food. And to quote from Lonely Planet, " Time has only improved the offerings: a menu of Indonesian classics prepared & served with more attitude & authority than the usual warung". Even got website le, the warung's view was super awesome...

But this was the real view... hahah... just a glorified no air-con kopitiam... The lamps were pretty le...

When the menu was passed to us, then I like was slapped awake remembering that Indonesian food is almost same as M'sian food lor... hmm... so actually only Ang Moh will find this place interesting, but this realization came too late. But I was slightly elated when I saw Babi Guling (but stupid lor, hav to order 1 day in advance) & Bebek, (an Indonesian duck dish) but both cannot be ordered. NO choice... settled with Indonesian Fried Rice, Indonesian Pork Satay, Beef Curry & brown rice. I ordered Strawberry Shake too :)Hubby had his 1st Bintang Beer here.

The only special dish was the PORK Satay. It was tender & full of flavor. The down side of travelling with only your partner is that u cannot order much bcoz u can never finished it. The meal cost RP166000 (~RM57) which was SO EXPENSIVE. hai... remember u all, don go eat at FAMOUS TOURIST SPOT as it's so so overpriced. We did passed by a food court earlier on but did not even care to check it out as my eyes were fixed on Made Warung.

Before jumping in a taxi heading back to hotel, a stop at minimart to stock up on H2O & junks are compulsory. Was so happy I found Tim Tam Biscuit that cost less than RM3.

In Bali, u need to flag down only the "Lang Chiau" (Blue Bird) Taxi as they use meter & do give back change & would not trick u in paying more.

Clubbing is not my thing and am glad hubby is the same. I cannot tell you anything at all regarding the night scene in Bali. But I heard it's bombastic, especially after midnight.

So that's all the adventure for DAY 1 in Bali.