JUST BACK TRIP REPORT
Bali is crazy, crowded, exciting, exotic and exhilarating. We loved every minute of it. We were a family of 4 (2 adults, 2 children 9 and 7) and we spent 2 weeks there in mid September. Despite all the press etc about the Timor situation, things were very calm in Bali and at no stage did we feel unsafe. Also, despite frequent warnings, we were very careful about what we ate and drank and did not get sick.
In summary:
GRAND MIRAGE, TANJUNG BENOA - The first week we stayed at the Grand Mirage. High standard resort with a fabulous view to the ocean and enormous rooms, satellite TV etc all marble. We had 2 adjoining rooms. Ask for the seaview upgrade it is worth it to wake up to the sea every day. While the food etc at the resort was expensive there were a huge number of restaurants and shops immediately outside the resort. We ate out at a different restaurant every night they were all fairly cheap less than $20 for a meal (including drinks and beer) for 4. The shops were great too, including the local supermarket. We could buy ice creams and drinks for $1 and take them back to the resort and put them in the mini bar.
The resort also has the famous Thalasso Spa so I was wrapped in seaweed and a hot blanket, pummelled by a thousand spa jets, and had a lavender aromatherapy massage for $US45. What an experience. I could have been the salad for dinner that night.
Parasailing, banana boat rides and jet skis were available on the beach. We found that if you bargained with the guys on the beach we were given really good rates for the 2 children to tandem parasail it was 70,000 Rp for the 2 of them, and for the 2 adults it was 90,000 Rp the documented rates were 150,000Rp for one parasail!! So don't be a mug always bargain. My daughter's medium length hair was beaded for 35,000 Rp (also bargained for this price).
Taxi trips in to Kuta were 20,000Rp and took half an hour.
DAY TRIP
We took a day trip organised with a local for 10 hours at 200,000 Rp for the day. We visited a wood carving factory, the Monkey Forest at Ubud, Kintamani and did the ½ hour elephant ride at Taro. Everything you have read on the forum is right:
- don't visit the Monkey Forest first thing in the morning as the monkeys can be aggressive and hungry we went in the early afternoon and it was fine
- the hawkers at Kintamani are abominable but as the locals explained it is very dry up there and the locals can't grow food etc easily and they need to earn a living somehow I suppose. As a result of this though their prices were very cheap.
- the road to Taro (where the elephants are) was SHOCKING!! It took us 2 ½ hrs just to get there but our kids wanted an elephant ride no matter what and we will never forget it it was great. As we went late in the afternoon we saw the elephants quitting for the day and taking swims in their pool. The facilities there have recently been upgraded and are very good.
BARGAINING
I found that if I accepted bargaining as part of their culture and never lost my patience that I normally got something at close to the price others have been advising on the forum. Enjoy the chance to have a giggle at each others ridiculous opening bids they at 200,000Rp and you at 10,000 Rp. It is somewhat of a game. And after all $1 doesn't mean much to us but DOES mean a lot to them.
I found the rudest people at the markets were in fact the tourists who probably were frustrated with the bargaining or couldn't be bothered.
As an aside the hawkers at Kintamani, while annoying, definitely give quite cheap prices. We obtained colourful men's shorts made up of lots of bits of different fabric, some even lined for 20,000 Rp each. (I wished we had bought more of these).
Prices I paid for various items are as follows:
Snakeskin wallets 90,000 Rp for 3
Sarong's small - 10,000 each
Long sarongs - 20,000 each generally sometime more, sometimes less
Large teak wooden torso AUS$90
Large teak leaping dolphins carving 120,000 Rp
Large carved wooden tissue box 50,000 Rp (probably paid a bit too much for this but it is magnificent)
Medium carved wooden boxes 30,000 Rp
Small carved wooden tissue boxes 15-20,000Rp
Childrens T-shirts and shorts 20,000 Rp each the grey Nike and Adidas T-shirtts are the thickest and best quality
Small Bali fabric backpacks for kids 20,000 Rp each
Carved white wood modern statues (small) 25-30,000Rp each
Bali Lace Tops 40,000 Rp each
Long Batic Wrap Bath Robe 45,000 Rp
House shoes (sequinned and/or decorated) 20,000 Rp each
Large wooden boat kites 25,000Rp for 2
Colourful skirt and top sets, very nice with a bit of styling 40,000 Rp each
Bad Girl Skirts and Bad Girl Shorts in Bali fabric 20,000 Rp each they are great
Beach Wallets 4-5,000 Rp each depending on how many you buy
Caps 5-8,000Rp each depending on how many you buy
4 large intricately carved wooden frames 150,000 Rp
I agree with what everyone else on the forum says buy more than one item from a seller and you will get a better price.
Again as everyone has been saying on the forum there are VERY few hawkers around on the beach and virtually none on the streets.
I did all my Xmas shopping while I was there and I suggest you do the same really unusual gifts at a very reasonable price.
Just one thing to watch out for they have intricately carved bones everywhere we couldn't get ours through customs as they sometimes haven't been cleaned very well. We only paid 10,000Rp for 2 and they said it would cost $105 to nuke them we just surrendered them. That was the only thing we lost.
We visited the Nusa Dua Galleria shopping centre and it was a real giggle to see the ridiculous prices they had on everything. But for some tourists who don't want the hassle of bargaining etc it was probably OK and still cheap in comparison to AUS. But for me I loved the hussle and bustle of the stalls and things were generally 50 75% cheaper (or more) than the Galleria.
TRANSPORT
Generally, we didn't use taxi's and just arranged transport with locals. We were able to bargain fairly easily and generally paid 5-10,000 Rp for short distances and 20,000Rp for longer distances eg from Kuta to Nusa Dua/Tanjung Benoa.
TIME SHARE
Yes timeshare salesmen are everywhere. They use Australian/English people to approach you in your hotels they get your names from the airport. It isn't a particularly hard sell yes we went to listen and of course weren't interested. The trick is that they offer you a weeks free holiday in a range of places around the world. But I am having a lot of trouble even contacting the company (through fax, mail or internet web site) so the chances of cashing in on the week is almost non existent.
Don't waste your time!!! It is all a rip-off.
WATCHES
We bought a lot of these but check the stitching on the leather bands etc as this can give way fairly quickly.
We mostly bought ones with metal bands Tag Heur, Nike, Raymond Weil, Rolex, Gucci etc for about 60,000 Rp each. The leather banded ones were cheaper at about 35-45,000 Rp or so. The metal ones seem to be lasting reasonably well. Often times the sellers would throw in spare watch batteries to sweeten the deal.
JIMBARAN BAY
A visit to Jimbaran is a DEFINITE must. It isn't a cheap meal (when compared to the rest of Indonesian food) but still good value compared to AUS. We paid 498,000Rp for a family of 4 to eat a kilo of lobster, squid, snapper and prawns. An extra crab was thrown in for free and there were lots of interesting accompaniments provided. You can choose your own sauces and I highly recommend half satay and chili. Yum!! I wouldn't order their squid though as they seem to overcook it and it ended up like leather.
The forum was correct and the scales there are ALL hopelessly out by big margins. I took a sealed 1.5litre water bottle to check the scales and it weighed from 2.8 3.5 kilos depending on which Café I went to.
In the end I was approached by Kaety who runs Café Astra close to the Café Intan and she said if I stayed quiet about it she would use the proper' scales. They went to get them and sure enough the scales worked fine. I suggest you try her Café and ask for the proper scales.
Bargain for the prices of the drinks there as well they were charging 20,000Rp for young coconut drinks and 5,000 Rp for soft drinks but we got them for 10,000Rp and 3,500Rp respectively.
PLAYSTATION GAMES
We bought 67 (that's right!!!) playstation games back from Bali. We bought them from a variety of sources, including Matahari's store, Kuta Square, ground floor for 15,000Rp each, and the Dynasty Kaset and CD shop (near Kuta square close to Yan's restaurant just ask).
We tried to buy games from the small store outside Matahari's, but some of their games didn't work and they didn't have a very big selection. I HIGHLY recommend the Dynasty Kaset and CD shop. It is run by a group of young people and is a very slick and professional operation. They were even willing to bargain a little if you purchased a lot of CD's at once. They also have an excellent selection of music CD's even though these weren't cheap (between 60-85,000Rp).
We started off checking that all the games worked but in the end it wasn't worth it. Every single game we have brought back has worked. We obtained a mod chip from an electronics company in Brisbane and have had NO problems at all.
Just remember that you don't get any instructions with the games that you buy in Bali but these can be downloaded from the Internet anyway.
It is interesting to note that about 6 of the games we bought back Final Fantasy VIII etc haven't even been released in AUS yet.
TANAH LOT
We visited Tanah Lot and found it to be really interesting. We didn't stay for the sunset but it was quite stunning. We were lucky to be there at low tide and were able to visit the sacred snakes. These can be found in a small cave presided over by some Hindu priests. They will ask for a small donation before you go in. They then take you into a dark cave and in a hollowed out section of the cave there are 4 snakes (I think they are sea snakes) all wrapped around each other 2 small and 2 large. You are then asked to stroke the snakes for good luck the whole while the Hindu priest in calling out an incantation. Apparently if you are a bad person they might bite you!!?? It's amazing that I am still alive.
PATRA JASA
The second week we spent at the Patra Jasa at Tuban. It was close to their airport but the noise of the planes wasn't a problem. The deluxe family rooms were huge but my impression of the resort was that it was getting a little tired' and needs a bit of a revamp. There are 3 swimming pools (one for adults only) and the kids pool has a slide. All the food was so expensive at the resort and we didn't eat there once.
Instead we ate at the Pantai Beach restaurant, at the end of Jalan Wana Segara, Tuban. It was 2 beaches closer to Kuta and you can walk into it from the beach. The view of the sunsets was magnificent and the food was equally excellent. Everything we ate there was first rate. Their Dendeng Belado (chilli strips of beef) and their mixed satays (served still smoking in pottery containers) was great, as were their pancakes and pizzas (which the kids ate). They have happy hours from about 5pm and their Anker Beers were VERY cheap. We could eat and drink as much as we could and still spend less than $20-25 AUS for a family of 4.
Next time I would stay at a place a little closer to Kuta but not much.
DYNASTY SEAFOOD SMORGASBOARD
Someone on the forum recommended that we attend the Bali Dynasty Seafood smorgasboard I think it was on a Sunday night. In short don't waste your money!! The only seafood was tuna steaks, mackeral steaks and a few small, tired prawns on skewers. Not worth the money. Someone on the forum also said kids were free but only those under 6 are free and between 6-14 it is half price. The desserts were also very ordinary and not worth rating.
MONEY
As a general rule, I will NOT bother with travellers cheques again you lose with the commission and you lose when you try to change money. We stayed at resorts where they had safes either in the room or easily accessible so cash will be OK to take. You ALWAYS get a much better rate for cash and I STRONGLY suggest that you take clean new $100 bills as they pay more for them.
Hope that this report is of some assistance to others as I know the Forum helped me tremendously.