just back from our first trip to Bali. 10 days of heat , humidity ,relaxation and good times. flew jetstar out of Sydney and the plane left 30mins late , but apart from that , the flight was fine. arrived at 9.0 pm local time , took about an hour to get through immigration and customs then outside to a tropical downpour. Welcome to Bali!!
stayed at the Santika hotel at Tuban beach. Can't recommend the hotel enough. suited us down to the ground. Premier room , ground floor 10mtrs to the pool , and 20mtr swim to the pool bar.Happy hour every afternoon from 4-6pm and the staff were terrific. i know most of you enjoy a Bintang which i agree is a good beer however my wife and i both agree that the Bali Hai is even better. hotel rooms were a good size and the rooms serviced twice a day. breakfasts were fantastic. plenty of choice and eggs cooked any way you like. only downfall was the hotel restraunt which we tried on our first night. food was average. but no problem as there were plenty of places to eat outside.
tuban beach area was great for us , as we did not want to be right in the busy part of town , being a couple of middle aged tourists. only a 15 minute walk to kuta square or a 6000rp taxi ride to my wifes idea of heaven. Shops !!! spent plenty of time browsing and buying heaps of xmas presents. Mataharis had a big sale on and got plenty of cash out of us.
exchange rate was around 7500rp for most of the time we were there which was what we bugeted for. always changed our money at the supermarket at Mataharis or the Kodak shop near the Santika and had no problems.
for those of you who like Indian food i can tell you that the Queens of India restraunt outside the dynasty hotel at tuban is the best Indian my wife and i have ever eaten. friendly staff and the best food and cheap!! 2 mains , 2 naan bread , rice ,3 beers and a soft drink for 210,000rp. we ate there 4 times and had something different each time.
went to the safari park one day and enjoyed it , though i would say it is more geared for families as there is heaps for the kids to do.
one thing we did do is go with bali baik tours for a day out to Kintamini and a bike ride down to Ubud.what a great day out. they picked us up at 7am and we then went up to near ubud to a coffee plantation for a bit of a look around,then on to Kintamani for breakfast overlooking the volcano and lake. What a view !!! then a short drive to pick up our bikes and off we went , mostly downhill , which was great as Linda and me hadn't been on a bike for about 20 years but it was an easy ride. we went down country lanes , through the paddy fields and small villages where the kids would run out to say hello and high 5 us as we went past.a few stops along the way to take pictures and learn a bit about the local customs and way of life. it rained for most of the way and we all got saturated , but no one pulled out and we had a great time. finished up at Wayans family compound for a great home cooked lunch of local food. Delicious! if you have been thinking of doing this trip but are worried about the difficulty , don't. as i said we haven't ridden for 20 years and had no problems.
i know i'm going on a bit so i'll finish off by saying that we had wonderful holiday and will definately be back.
thanks again to everyone on the forum for giving us all the information we needed , it certainly helped us out.
cheers , loudo.