Back from Bali

It's Thursday here now in Old Noarlunga. We flew back on Tuesday and the travel, added to the time difference, meant it took virtually all day. Kelly dashed out to the supermarket and quickly bought some essentials for an evening meal and also the boys' lunchboxes for their return to school in the morning. The carbohydrates - bread mostly - were a big hit as we weaned ourselves off from a week of rice and noodles.

We didn't escape Bali entirely scot-free - despite being very careful not to consume water from the taps - danger points include salads, ice and even brushing your teeth - Jo and I did get a bit of "Bali belly" on the morning of our travel back to Oz and took some of Kelly's anti-diahorrea pills. Thankfully, there were no little accidents on the flight.

Wednesday was always going to be a slow day. We went to the store for some food top-ups, picked up books at the library for Kelly and the boys plus a parcel at the Post Office. That was more than enough for Jo - she was exhausted and has since spent most of the time sleeping. She seems a little brighter this morning and hopefully the worst is now past.

A few final Bali photos:

Jo at the main statue on the peninsula "island"

The other statue on the peninsula

Jo and me at the entrance to Nusa Gede peninsula

The daily housekeeping team always made an effort

I've now booked some shows etc for us at the Adelaide Fringe, which officially starts today, I think. It's a huge affair - 2nd only to Edinburgh in size, we're told. Our first event is this Saturday, down at Victor Harbor.

Although I posted some photos on WhatsApp, I made no mention in previous posts of my nasty fall when out on a short hike just a couple of days before our travel to Bali, partly because I'm still in recovery mode. Most of the external cuts and scrapes have now healed but my upper body is still very painful when I move. My neck, lower back and stomach muscles are still restricting movement. I suspect some of them are still in spasm.

My mind still goes over the event and I often shudder about what might have happened. I would love to go over the river again and repeat that particular walk - or any of the others - but, right now, I know it's best if I don't go out alone - and Jo's not able to accompany me.

The walk is one that I've done several times before - it's circular and this time I chose to do it clockwise, so the first bit of the walk isn't really hilly at all, but then you come to a bit of narrow dusty track, with the river down a steep slope to my left. There's then a bit where you have to drop elevation down to the river level and this is done via a series of natural, irregular height steps down a rock face. It's OK when walking anti-clockwise as you have to climb the steps but a little trickier when going down - especially with my joints. I decided to be safe (!) and go down the rock "ladder" backwards but when I stretched my left leg down to what I thought was a solid step, it slipped away from me and I was gone.

Somersaulting backwards, I tried to grab anything that would halt my fall and I did manage to grab a bush which slowed my momentum. Thankfully, the actual landing was fairly soft on thick marsh reeds and grasses, but, on the way down, I'd obviously hit a few of the solid rock "steps" which caused the cuts and bruises etc but at least my head escaped solid contact and I was conscious - sore and bewildered but otherwise OK. My new earbuds were lost in the marsh (one of which Chris subsequently recovered) and the water bottle was lost but I managed to recover my hat and stumbled back to Riverside Cottage.

Apologies for being long-winded but I felt I had to re-tell the tale - if only to remind myself of what I went through and as a warning not to do it again - at least not alone. My confidence has been shattered and I'm now very wary of losing my balance in even the most simple of downward steps.