BootsnAll Travel Community

Greetings,
My better half and me are visiting Bali in March for 9 nights.
Based on our research we thought of breaking our break at 3 places:
1) Kuta for shopping/night life/spas
2) Ubud for culture, rice fields, trekking and river rafting
3) Nusa Dua to relax and have no real agenda...

Another option was to consider Senur instead of Nusa Dua.
Are surfing lessons reasonable? What should I expect to pay for the same?

We are open to suggestions...
Thanks

Hi;

We did 10 days in December, after visiting Bali 25 years ago. 5 days Ubud (spas, restaurants, slow and quiet), and 5 days at Legian (10 minutes to Kuta, but out of the rat race). Had a great time at both locations (especially Ubud), and it was a good mixture.
Really depends on your age (I guess) and what you're after. We are well-travelled (in Asia) 50 year olds. Nusa Dua and Sanur (for me) are "quiet" - I got that at Ubud. Legian (for us) had enough of a buzz and busyness about it, and was still a couple of km from Kuta.
You should also remember that Kuta, Nusa Dua, Sanur etc are relatively close to each other - a short car/taxi hop, so it's not as if you miss the others by staying at one of them.

Doing the "tourist" thing - Kecak Dance at sunset at Uluwatu and a visit to Tanah Lot are wonderful. The rest you make up as you go along..

Ubud is "relax". Kuta is "tourist". Nusa Dua and Sanur, and I guess Legian and Seminyak are somewhere in between.

Hello Lee,
Thanks for your insight.

Walter - loved UBUD, its everything you would want, great museums, big market places, restaurants, lots of shopping.
Did not like Kuta, seemed like real young crowd (teenagers) and someone on every corner selling you a timeshare. Did not go to Nusa Dua, was told that its not close to a town, and very quite, nice, but hardly anything to do unless your hotel has something going on. Loved Sanur, some great restaurants, on the beach, reasonable to eat and drink, some very nice shops, and some great SPA. We are going back in Feb, will be spending 1 week Sanur, 1 Week Ubud and 4 nights in Candidasa (now thats a real quite place) but liked the hotel we stayed at last time, so going back but only for 4 nights. Regardless of where you stay, you will have a good time, you make it a good time. The people are great, the prices are more than reasonable, so go enjoy yourself.

If you want to really experience Bali, I recommend getting out of Kuta ASAP and exploring the countryside. We loved Ubud and stayed there for several days (Gayatri II Bungalows) before hiring a driver to take us to the North shore where we discovered Mimpi Bungalows in Yeh Sanih near the beautiful black volcanic beaches of the North Shore. Disregard the website prices - we bargained the room down to 200,000 rupiah for a room for four and definitely got our money's worth. The place is owned by an energetic German lady who will personally escort you on excursions if you want and they have a fantastic rooftop restaurant.

We also loved Amed where we rented our own little cottage with inground pool for 120,000 rupiah/night (Bali Yogi Bungalows). This is the real Bali on a black sand beach in the shadow of Gunung Agung! We rented scooters and drove up into the hills along the coast where we met locals who looked like they'd never seen tourists before. Very special! I kept track of all the places we stayed in our blog.

Have a great trip!

I second Amed as the place to go for relaxing and quiet. Nusa Dua is more about high end hotels. Nothing Bali about it in my opinion. Although Dreamland beach is nearby. But if you're staying in Kuta (I'd suggest Legian or Seminyak as alternatives), you can take a day trip there, no problem. Ubud is great too.

If you're into spas, I spent 30 days traveling around Bali getting 30 spa treatments done for only $300. You can read about it all and find some good ones on my Travel Betty blog. Have a blast!