"Bali Is...Simply Baliscious!"

So we're here in Bali. Arrived late last night and were whisked off to a lovely hotel by the sweetest, most happy taxi driver I have ever met. His name is 'Wayan'.

(Apparently it is one of about four or five of the most popular names here in Bali, so if we were to ask around for 'Super Smily Wayan' it would be like travelling to the Middle East and asking if anyone knew a 'Mohammed'.)

No mind. We took his card, rang him, and this afternoon 'Super Smiley Wayan' kindly transported us to the lovely village of Ubud...but not before we had a delicious breakfast, swam in the divine eternity pool, and admired the painstakingly crafted miniature garden outside our little villa-esque hotel room. Aaaahhh bliss.

My first impressions of Bali were that I had somehow fallen asleep in the too cramped seats of the Air Asian Airbus we took yesterday and had awoken to find myself inside a Walt Disney World attraction.

Everyone here is so full of smiles, good cheer and shiny, glowing faces (well it is pretty hot and humid), that I find myself wondering if I have indeed come upon a society which can exist in perfect harmony and happiness?

(This coming from a hardcore Londoner I suppose speaks volumes but still...)

Even with the crazy traffic of motorbikes and huge people carriers jostling for space on the too narrow village roads, the sound of honking and shouting and swearing (just a way of life in India - and a lifesaving one at that) is absent. Bizarre.

But let me level with you: 'picture-perfect' perfection aside (you should SEE our gorgeous villa - more on that tomorrow) I fell utterly and hopelessly in love with Bali earlier this evening, when after a simply sumptious Italian meal, we wandered into a cafe where i had the most DIVINE homemade chocolate truffle for 60p. Followed by the best latte that ever was....for one pound.

I have died and gone to heaven...a heaven run by very happy chocolate and caffeine addicts like myself.