Kuta

Day 1: Another smooth Air Asia flight over to Bali (albeit with an hour delay) and I arrived in the evening to yet more rainfall :( I sorted a taxi and headed straight for the guesthouse in Kuta that Jay was staying at. The taxi driver spoke unbelievably fast throughout the journey and I didn't have a clue what he was saying so I just kept muttering ''yeah'' from the back seat every few seconds to try and be polite!

No let up in the rain when I arrived near the beach so I checked straight in to the guesthouse before dashing out for some dinner. Early impressions very reminiscent of Koh Samui in terms of how touristy the place is. A few other travellers had warned me off coming to Kuta for this reason but I'm all for making my own impression of places. This wasn't really the time for exploring though as the rain got heavier so I headed back to the guesthouse for the night.

Day 2: I met Jay at breakfast and, after catching up, we hired a couple of boards and headed for Kuta beach for some Surfing. I've only tried Surfing once in my life and it didn't go so well. So badly in fact, that I vowed never to attempt it again! I found it really difficult and couldn't even get close to standing up despite 2 solid days of trying. Very frustrating. I was willing to give it another shot though and hoping to pick up some tips from Jay, who has been doing nothing else for the previous few days.

I wasn't actually as bad as I thought I would be. I managed to remember what I'd been taught in my first lesson and, with some additional advice from Jay, got closer to standing up than I have done previously. It's really hard though and I could only get both my feet on the board for about half a second before face-smashing the water. Repeat this process over several hours and it gets quite demoralising! Jay seemed to have his technique sorted though and was managing to stand on a pretty regular basis, despite the waves not being ideal for staying up too long.

Being the supreme novice Surfer I am, I decided to try doing all this topless, without wearing a T-Shirt or the skin-tight tops that Jay and many others were wearing. The local Balinese guys were Surfing topless so I thought nothing of it. Turned out to be a big mistake! Whereas the locals are using a smooth, hard board; being a complete beginner, I was trying with a soft board, that apparently has the same effect on your skin as sandpaper would (maybe not quite that bad). After a few hours face-smashing, I discovered a pretty painful rash on my stomach and one on the inside of my knee. Furthermore, practically all my fingertips had been scraped off by holding on to the board. All pretty painful and Jay was having the same problem with his fingers. We called it a day late afternoon, me now wondering if it was all worth it. Turns out you need your fingertips quite a lot - who would have thought it!!!

That evening, the 2 of us headed out for a few beers in Kuta and I cannot put into words how annoying this place is. Flowing away from the beach are loads of skinny alley-ways (known as gangs) and each of them is lined with stalls selling all sorts of fake stuff and other gear you don't want. Furthermore, the local ''shopkeepers'' have picked up the term ''boss'' from somewhere, meaning that walking through the alleys, you are bombarded with stuff like this:

''Hey boss, where you going boss? Want some information boss....looking brother? Hey, my friend, marijuana boss? Hello boss, Boss??"

You will all think I'm exaggerating but they really say it that much and it is so annoying. I've been in Asia for a long time now and so I'm pretty used to having to ignore some of the street sellers or walk through them saying ''no thank you'' or, more recently, just ''no'' (patience has run out I think). But this place is something else and I hated it instantly if I'm honest. As for the term ''boss'', I've not a clue where they have picked it up from, despite asking a few that I could tolerate. I don't think they even knew!

Anyway, Jay was pretty acclimatised to it by now and we made our way through the gangs to get some dinner and then have a few beers in one of the bars. We had a cool evening as they thankfully leave you alone when you go into a restaurant or bar but my early impressions of Kuta weren't good. I was looking forward to getting back on the beach the next day and trying to Surfing again. That should tell you how bad it was.

Day 3: Back to the beach again to give the Surfing another try. Only this time, I made sure I had a T-Shirt on and also taped up the fingers that were VERY sore from the previous day.

Unfortunately, it didn't really work out because after a few attempts, I decided it wasn't worth the pain. The plasters on my fingers lasted all of 5 minutes before coming off in the water and the rash on my stomach was really painful when I laid on the board. I decided to give it a miss for the rest of the day and instead just amused myself with watching Jay getting annoyed at the water when the waves weren't to his liking. My argument that it was pointless getting annoyed at nature didn't seem to wash with him!

We spent a couple more hours there before heading off for some food at a place he knew and then hung around in Kuta that afternoon, trying very hard not to get even more annoyed with the street sellers. Afterwards, we headed back down to the beach for a couple of beers whilst watching the local Surfers show us how it's meant to be done. Some seriously talented guys out here and it looks quite fun when you can stay on the board for more than two seconds! Loads of people down on the beach so it was quite cool hanging out for a few hours.

Laying on the beach doesn't free you from the hassle though - countless locals selling all sorts of stuff that you don't want. My personal favourite was a guy who we saw several times over the 3 days selling nothing but a huge Crossbow and Arrow, who seemed genuinely surprised when we said no. Just the thing you're looking to buy when you're watching the sunset!

I'm pleased to say that it wasn't all bad in Kuta though. Whilst chilling on the beach, lots of teenagers also came up asking if they could have their picture taken with us. They seem to really like taking photos of westerners so we were happy to oblige and it made their day. Similar to the experience I had being interviewed by those schoolgirls whilst sight-seeing in Saigon.

That's it for Kuta for now. Lessons learned for me - always wear a top when surfing with a soft-top board and make sure the surface isn't like Sandpaper before you rent it! Sport hurts kids.

We will be heading back to Kuta towards the end of my time in Bali as it's nice and close to the airport and I'd like to give the Surfing another go once my wounds have healed. Before then......Ubud.