Bali
An island of many parts. Choose the right one, or two, and Bali is far more than a beach.
Bali is an island in Indonesia, just east of Java, about ninety miles from end to end. It is small enough to cross in a few hours and varied enough that where you stay makes it a different holiday: surf beaches and busy resort towns in the south, a cultural heartland of rice terraces and craft villages around Ubud, volcanoes and lakes in the middle, and quiet coasts in the north and east.
It also has a culture of its own within Indonesia. Most Balinese are Hindu, and their religion is part of daily life in a way visitors notice at once: small offerings set out each morning, temples in every village, and a calendar of ceremonies that belongs to the people who keep it.
Auria Travel is an independent UK travel agency, and we arrange holidays to Bali of both kinds: a resort or villa stay booked as a package from a tour operator, and tailor-made trips that split the time between two or three parts of the island, or fit Bali into a longer journey through Asia.
How Auria can help you choose where in Bali
The most useful thing we can do is help you choose the right part of the island, because the names mean little until you have been. Do you want a beach and restaurants on the doorstep, or green views and quiet? Surf, or calm water for children? A large resort, a small hotel, or a villa with its own pool and staff? Our travel professionals will match the place to the holiday you have in mind.
If a tour operator has that holiday as a package, with flights, transfers and hotel, we will find it and book it. Many Bali holidays are exactly that, and need nothing more.
Often the better holiday is in two parts: some days inland around Ubud and some by the sea. Then we can put it together for you, with the hotels or villas, the transfer between them and the flights, including a stopover on the way if you would like one.
Bali has no railways and its roads are slow, so getting about is by car, and for a day out most visitors use a car with a driver and do not hire one themselves. Where it helps, we work with trusted local experts on the island to arrange a driver and guide for a day among the temples and terraces, a transfer between two stays, or an experience such as a cooking class or a walk through the rice fields at dawn. A stay in one resort needs only its airport transfer.
Ways to holiday in Bali
- Beach and resort stays
- A hotel on or near the beach in the south, with pools, restaurants and the sea. The most popular choice, and widely sold as a package.
- Split stays
- A few nights inland and the rest on the coast, or two different coasts. Two bases show far more of the island than one.
- Villas
- A private house with a pool, often with staff to cook and look after you. Bali has a great many, for couples as much as for families and groups.
- Luxury
- Resorts in rice-terrace valleys, on clifftops and on quiet beaches, known for their design and their service.
- Honeymoons
- Privacy, pool villas and warm evenings. Often combined with a second island or a city on the way.
- Family holidays
- Gentle beaches on the sheltered side of the south, water parks, and hotels that welcome children.
- Wellness
- Yoga, spas and retreats, centred on Ubud. As much or as little as you like.
Tailor-made Bali, kept simple
Tailor-made in Bali rarely means a complicated itinerary. It means the right areas, in the right order, with the right kind of place to stay in each. A week in one good resort is a perfectly sound holiday, and we will book it gladly; the suggestions below are for when you want more of the island than one base can show you.
Ubud and the coast
Three or four nights among the rice terraces, then a week by the sea. A natural combination for a first visit.
South and east
A lively beach area first, then the quieter east coast or the Sidemen valley.
Bali and its neighbours
A few nights on one of the small islands off the coast, reached by fast boat, for clear water and fewer people.
Bali and Singapore
Two or three nights in Singapore on the way, where many flights from the UK change planes in any case.
Part of a longer journey
Bali as the restful end to travels elsewhere in south-east Asia.
Combines well with: Singapore
The parts of the island
Bali’s areas differ more than their distance apart suggests. These are the ones most visitors choose between.
Ubud and the centre
The island’s cultural heart, in the hills: galleries, craft workshops, dance, temples, cafés and walks through rice terraces. Cooler than the coast, and green in every direction.
Temples
There are thousands, from family shrines to the great temples by the sea and on the lakes, such as Ulun Danu Beratan and Uluwatu. They are places of worship first. Visitors are welcome in the outer courtyards of many, dressed respectfully in a sarong and sash, and some areas are for worshippers only.
Seminyak, Canggu and the south-west coast
The liveliest part of the island: long surf beaches, beach clubs, restaurants and shopping, with sunsets over the sea. Busy, and not for those in search of quiet.
The Bukit peninsula
The dry limestone south: high cliffs with small beaches below them, surf breaks and many of the island’s smartest clifftop resorts and villas. Nusa Dua, on its sheltered eastern side, has calm water and large resort hotels.
The east
Quieter country under Mount Agung, the island’s highest volcano: the terraced Sidemen valley, old royal water gardens and, on the coast, the diving and snorkelling villages around Amed.
The north and the mountains
Lakes in old craters, waterfalls, coffee and clove country and a sleepy black-sand coast. Fewer visitors come this far, and those who do see a different island.
- Sanur
- A long-established, low-key beach town on the east side of the south, with a calm lagoon and a path along the shore. A favourite with families and with those who like things quiet.
- Rice terraces and the subak
- The terraces are watered by the subak, a system of shared irrigation run by farmers and their water temples for a thousand years, and recognised as World Heritage. Jatiluwih has the largest sweep of them.
- Volcanoes
- Mount Batur is climbed before dawn by many visitors for the sunrise. It is a steady walk with a local guide, and worth the early start on a clear morning.
- Ceremonies
- Balinese life is full of ceremonies, and you may well come across a procession or a temple festival. They are religious occasions, not performances. Watching quietly from a distance, and following what your guide or host suggests, is the right way to be there.
When to go
Bali is warm all year, a few degrees south of the equator, with two broad seasons. They are tendencies, not a timetable: it can rain in the dry season and be gloriously clear in the wet, and the hills around Ubud see more rain than the coast at any time.
- The dry season, about April to October
- Lower humidity, more sunshine and less rain. July and August are the busiest and most expensive months, when the south is crowded.
- The wet season, about November to March
- Hotter, more humid and greener, with heavy showers, often in the afternoon or overnight, and some days of longer rain. Quieter and usually less expensive, apart from Christmas and New Year.
- The months between
- April to June and September into October often bring good weather with fewer people.
- Nyepi
- The Balinese day of silence, usually in March. For twenty-four hours the whole island stops, the airport closes and everyone, visitors included, stays in. It is a remarkable thing to be present for, and it needs allowing for in your dates.
Planning your trip
Small as it is, Bali needs a little planning to get right.
- Where to stay
- This matters more than anything else. Tell us what you want from your days and your evenings, and we will suggest the area before we suggest the hotel.
- One base or two
- Ten nights or more divides well between the hills and the coast. For a week, one base is usually enough.
- Getting around
- Distances are short but traffic in the south is heavy, and a journey of twenty miles can take two hours. A car with a driver, by the day, is the usual way to see the island.
- Resort or villa
- A resort has restaurants, pools and people around you. A villa has privacy and space, and suits those happy to go out to eat or to have meals cooked in. Both come at every level.
- Flights
- The journey from the UK takes around seventeen hours or more with one change, often in Singapore or the Gulf, which is why a stopover is worth thinking about.
- The sea
- Many of Bali’s beaches have strong surf and currents. If calm swimming matters, especially with children, it should guide the choice of area.
- Booking ahead
- July, August, Christmas and New Year fill early, and the small hotels and well-known villas earliest of all.
Thinking about Bali?
Tell us who is travelling, what you want from the holiday, whether lively or quiet, beach or green hills or both, and roughly when. If you have seen a hotel or a villa you like, tell us that too. We will suggest the part of the island that fits, and whether one base or two would suit you.
