just got home yesterday from our first trip to beautiful Bali. It was our first time and all 10 of us had an absolute ball!
Flew with Garuda from Melb to BAli, no problems at all smooth flight both ways. Only issue was we got told from our Garuda check in lady at Melb that we could bring back 23kgs checked in baggage and 7kgs carry on home from Bali. When checking in from bali to Melb we were told we could only have 20kgs each checked in so altogether our group was 25kgs OVER. Luckily for us the Garuda man was really nice and we didnt have to pay anything, so be careful!
We stayed at Bali Garden Beach resort and loved it. The rooms are nothing special but they are clean enough, showers pretty good and aircon works brilliantly.
The pools and boardwork restuarant at the back of the hotel are fantastic. Food (esp Aussie sirloin steak) is delicious. Say Hi to Wisna and Guz, they are by far the best waiters we met in Bali and we will miss them very much.
Breakfast at hotel also very nice, pretty much the same stuff everyday but fresh omlettes and pancakes are beautiful. Overall staff and facilities fantastic, hotel was full but didnt seem over crowded, highly recommend!
My partner and I got engaged on our secong night in Bali, we had dinner at Jimbaran Bay, gorgeous BBQ seafood and the sunset is breath taking, will remember that spot forever. To top things off 2 of our closest friends flew over to Bali from Perth the next day to surprise us and celebrate our engagment. We were so surprised when they ran up to us on the street.
Did a few touristy things like went to volcano, day trip to Ubud, Waterbom Park, Snorkelling, turtle island, swam with the dolphins (which was brilliant). But overall it was the friendliness of the people that I will remember most about Bali, I have never laughed so much in my life.
Did heaps of shopping (obviously thats why our cases were so much over). It was extremely overwhelming shopping at the start I had no bloody idea how to barter but thanks to BTF and all the tips I got from here i got the hang of it pretty quickly.
I can strongly recommend shop 39 at the Kuta art markets, the lady in this shop was lovely she gave us a great price for t shirts, shorts etc and we didnt have to barter at all. We went back to her many times.Witri collection 252 in Legian was also great for handbags, Tony the owner was a great little man who gave us good prices
I had a collague of photos printed onto canvas from Shoot Photography in JL Legian. It turned out better than imagined and only $100 aus for 39 photos onto canvas.
All our food was pretty good too we ate at the boardwalk often, also tried Bubba gumps which was a great night. Ate at IFLORA a itialin resturant near our hotel twice (fett carbonara best ive ever had, ate it both nights) Nita one of the waitresses there is beautiful she remembered all 10 of our names and when we went back 4 days later she still knew them.
One of the highlights of our trip was when our tour guide, "Indy" (who i also strongly recommend- funniest guy ever) took all 10 of us to his family home in Ubud to meet his wife and children. We brought his kids and the neighbours kids some ice cream. The ice cream costed us about $2 and the kids had the biggest smiles on their faces when we gave it to them. It was priceless to see how an ice cream could make kids so so happy.
We will defiantely be going back to Bali real soon and I am telling everyone I know to get over there, I had the time of my life.
I must admit i was a little hesitant going over there because of bombings, bali belly etc but i felt so safe over there and as long as you are careful where you eat and stuff you should be fine.
My tips to first timers would be:
take a currency conversion card and a list of this BTF on how much to approximately pay for stuff, this sheet was my saviour when i was bartering for the first couple of days.
Take plenty of hand sanitisers
Hardly pack any clothes at all, seriously you can buy absolutely anything to need over there, including all your toiletries.
Take over any old clothes or anything you dont want, balineses people love anything they are given off tourists and they are so thankful
Take over lots of gold coins, the kids will ask you for coins constantly and I felt really bad that I didnt have many.
Enjoy, take it all in!
Thanks again to everyone on the forum for all your help!