I’m now safe and sound back at home in Sydney - and despite still being unwell, I’m pleased to report that I’m mostly feeling much more clear-headed and refreshed after my trip to Bali. Phew!

This is the final in my series of mostly photographic blog posts featuring images from Bali. The images below are all from the wonderful and quite new Botanic Garden just outside of Ubud.

I spent a wonderful few hours roaming the six hectare site - and decided that I’d be doing so regularly if I lived there! The Garden has a wonderful diversity and plenty of dense, hidden spots to explore - and lots of shade to help keep you out of the piercing sun. There is an impressive collection of beautiful orchids, a very peaceful meditation space, a lotus pond, a great hedge maze, an Islamic garden and much more.

Also, unlike many other sights I visited in Bali, the Garden is very well organised and even features useful signage - but not in a way that is at all intrusive. All this and the Garden has been open for just a year!

Plus I enjoyed a delicious, fresh lunch in the Botanic Garden cafe which featured a number of veggies and a tall glass of juice from passionfruit all grown in the Garden itself.

So if you go to Ubud, the Botanic Garden is a must see! It was definitely a major highlight of my trip.

Finally, if you’re interested in seeing more images from my visit to Bali - or at least larger versions than I’ve posted on my blog - I’ve created some sets of them on Flickr, including a collection.

Today is my last full day in Bali - although I fly out at almost midnight tomorrow, so I get another day to do whatever I fancy.

Unfortunately I’ve spent the 36 hours up until this morning being extremely ill with a high fever (ironically making me *very* cold!) and lots of aches and pains, so that’s made me look forward more to the comforts of home, even though I think the illness has passed now.  Although I’m not remotely pleased about the long flight to get there!

So for now I’ll leave you with some more details from Bali.  This will most likely be the second to last of my photographic blog posts about my trip.

PS. Whoever spots the monkey gets a gold star!

This is the second in what I suspect will be a series of generally photographic blog posts so I can share a little bit of Bali with you - or at least the bits that have caught my eye (or my lens!).

Today’s installment features lots of the lovely plants and flowers I’ve captured over the last several days. I’m sure there will be more of these to come too! Enjoy.

I’m sitting in an airconditioned internet cafe on what is a hot and very sticky day in Ubud. So I thought I’d take the opportunity to cool down, drink some lemon iced tea, catch up on some emails and do a quick blog post to share some photographs.

So far I’ve been doing a lot of relaxing, including plenty of lounging by and swimming in the pool, enjoying exploring the beautiful hotel grounds and reading. I’ve amazed myself by slipping into relaxation mode much more quickly than I’d expected! To the left is the view from the private terrace outside my hotel room and what I wake up to each morning - click on it for a larger view.

I ventured into the centre of Ubud for the first time yesterday for a look around. My first visit was cut short by a thunderstorm of the torrential variety, but I’ve come back in again today to revisit a couple of spots I wanted to see in the sunshine as well as to visit the lovely museum of fine art and generally get my bearings a bit better.

So rather than write more about the place, I’ll instead share some photographs. I plan to do a few blog posts which are primarily photographs of different aspects I’ve been wanting to capture.

Today’s set of photographs are all details that have caught my eye as I’ve been wandering about.

Today it’s been officially announced that I will be taking up the role of Publicity & Promotions Manager for Mintd.com.

Mintd is a collaborative space for artists, designers and musicians from all over the world to sell their work and connect to new markets. The site is very new, but I think it has a bright future and it’s great to be getting involved at such an early stage.

This role will be to work several hours a week at this stage - and I will be doing it in addition to running my handmade jewellery business, undertaking freelance web and design work, continuing my part time web production job and even continuing with some voluntary Committee work with JMGA-NSW. Although I have decided to relinquish my role as the editor of Filings, the JMGA-NSW newsletter, having just sent my twelfth issue to print!

But before I continue with all of that, I’m going off on my very (very!) badly needed holiday to Bali tomorrow afternoon. And right now I must go and finish packing …

It suddenly dawned on me last night that there’s just over ten days to go until I leave for my very relaxing holiday in Ubud, Bali. EEEK!!

As a reminder, I’m going to be unable to ship items from my various online shops between 12 and 25 July. So if you need (or even just want!) some of my handmade jewelry during that time, you’d best think about it now.

Initially I felt very nervous about having booked it as it’s really not the type of trip I’d normally take. In particular I am entirely crap at relaxing - I honestly don’t think I can remember how to do it properly! So I have visions of getting to the second day of my relaxing holiday and having utterly no idea what to do with myself and desperately wanting to go home. But the good thing will be that I can’t - I’m going to be forcing myself to get on with it!

However, finally I’m feeling much more excited about going - even if I still feel entirely disorganised. In fact, I’ve just emailed the Bali Spirit Hotel to ask about extending my stay for a couple of days. The rest of 2007 is going to be frantic to say the least and if I’m taking a holiday I guess I really should make the most of it.

carbon offsetting

For those of you in Australia, I did a bit of research in relation to doing a carbon offset for my flights - something I decided a while back I should try to do from now on for long distance trips especially. Unfortunately a lot of the organisations which do this are commercial in nature and aren’t really overseen in any way - it’s hard to know at this point which ones to trust and if your money is really going to help.

However, I found a non-profit organisation called Carbon Neutral, which has links with Trees For Life - a South Australian organisation that my parents have had a lot to do with over the years. They appear to be working with Government to comply with recommendations being established for these sorts of organisations, plus any money you send their way is entirely tax deductible in Australia. Plus you can figure out offsets for other areas of your life apart from travel - for your home, running a car, etc..

So if you’re remotely thinking about this, I’d highly recommend having a look at Carbon Neutral.