My boyfriend and I left on the 24th of Feb on an afternoon jet* flight without any problems for a 2 week holiday. Luckily we were sitting near the front of the plane so had no troubles waiting to pay the VOA (except having to endure some 18yr old bogans behind us, but what can you do). After finding our bags and having a bit of issue with porters we were finally in a taxi and I was preparing for the worst as I had read that the roads were a bit chaotic on here. I closed my eyes and in we got and to my surprise it wasn't as bad as I'd expected (I've recently been to Italy and its pretty much on par lol). We arrived at our Hotel, Bali Mandira, in no time and soon sorted ourselves out and went to the pool bar to have our first bintang. I'm not usually a beer drinker but it definitely hit the spot. We spent 12 nights in Legian and I quickly learnt the true brilliance of a nice cold bintang. As for the room we stay in the lower floor in a superior room which suited us fine, it was a nice basic room and I had no dramas with it at all. The hotel itself was very nice there was even a wedding there one day which looked absolutely lovely!
Restaurants we ate at in Legian (all of which we had no complaints) were: Mozzarella (really liked), Parasol (in the Mandira but had the best pizzas), Made's Warung, Indonational, Tommy's Cafe, Zanzibar, Goody's, Posers, Bianco, Ours and Flying Fish. We also had a really spectacular dinner at the hotel for Matt's birthday, this I had to plan ahead and for Bali its very expensive ($100USD) but it was well worth it! We had a candle lit dinner with a rose petal path and private hut and the best Balinese food we had the whole time over there.
As for shopping and spa treatments, well we were a bit slack on spas/massages but we went to Briella for a massage which was nice and also had a 3hr spa treatment at the hotel spa which again was very expensive but was well worth it for a once off thing. Shopping wise I like to get most of my things from Ketut's which is a fixed price shop (Bali style) as I didn't like to barter but the shop is pretty easy to miss! it's just off Jl Sahadewa the last gang before the street ends. I got loads of singlet, dresses, and 3 wallets here and matt was able to get t-shirts and boardies so it was pretty convenient. Oh and she really really lovely, I saw a couple of ppl trying to barter with her so if u go there pls remember its fixed prices and her prices are already low.
We took a couple of day trips to see Ulu Watu temple and beach, Dreamland, Jimbaran bay (where we had a lovely lunch at New Langsam Cafe). We also decided to have a little fun and go to the Bvlgari Hotel to look around (we decided to play pretend and see what it would be like if we got married there). I have to say it is absolutely breath taking, the views where enough to sell that sibling you never really liked but then you saw the rooms which just made it all the more depressing as we realised we'd never get to stay here. Realising we did not fit in here, our driver pulled up in his shabby half air con'ed van and we sulked all the way home.
After our 12 night we spent 2 nights in Ubud which was not enough at all! We stayed at Komaneka on Monkey Forest Rd which was very nice, much smaller than Mandira which was made it more relaxing and private. We ate at Lotus cafe, Wayan & bakery (both nice), dirty ducks (I regret ordering the duck!!!), Casa Luna and tropical.
Komaneka was also very accommadating as we had a very late flight home and they were really nice helping us out as we killed a couple of hr between checking out and driving to the airport. they even give you a small parting gift as you check out which i thought was a lovely touch.