$100 gets u a police escort with sirons and lights blazing in Padang! They will have lunch and a beer with u beforehand. Once at the airport and the boom gates have been lifted abruptly to let u in the lights and sirens go off. Wtf a certain charter boat owner talked us into doing this, we were not keen but he wouldn't take no for an answer! Was sort of fun but so wrong on so many levels

first trip to Bali with a mate who had been there a few times and he was showing me around the southern breaks so I had an idea where everthing was. pulled up at Dreamlands and walking to the beach and a group of Amercians were in front of us handing out cash to a local?? asked why and they were told you need to pay to surf Dreamlands. we just kept walking and the guy just started going nuts. got back to our ride in the carpark and the driver was shaken up and wouldn't tell us why. drove out of the place and we spotted the guy and reckon he was a gardener in the local resort and had threatened the driver as the driver kept saying "bad people in bali, bad people in bali". gave the driver an extra $10 and that seemed to settle him down

First time I've missed an Indo season in 12 or 13 years. Not helped by being locked at home in Melbourne. 10 degrees here and rain today. And decent waves down the coast (for the first time in a while) for those living down that way.