Looking for some advice on where to go in Bali. We live in Singapore and have family coming to visit in July. They want to do a side trip to Bali. It will be 3 families w/ 6 kids (ages range 6mo- 15yrs). Looking for somewhere with great beaches & restaurants and some shopping would be good, too. Any ideas? Is Nusa Dua too much of a 'planned community' area? I've only been to Seminyak and wasn't impressed with the beaches. Not sure we will have time to go up north to Ubud area, so nice beach town feel is what we are going for. Any input is appreciated! Thanks!

Bea,

My wife and I used to live in Singapore for 6 years (now in Sydney) and have been to Bali over 30 times now. Got married there, have rental houses, etc. We're going back to Bali for 2 weeks in May, and another week some where else in Indo yet to be determined.

The majority of good restaurants are all in/around Seminyak and Petitenget. I'm not massively impressed with Seminyak beaches either.

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Is Nusa Dua too much of a 'planned community' area?

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Slightly, but there are some nice beaches around. There are places outside of the resort areas. Tanjung Benoa is slightly better but it's a major pain in the butt going anywhere. Look into Finn's beach club. Nice place to go for the day. Any of the Karma resorts (Karma Kandara) are vvvvverrrry nice but pricey.

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I've only been to Seminyak and wasn't impressed with the beaches. Not sure we will have time to go up north to Ubud area, so nice beach town feel is what we are going for.

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Sanur is much more laid back. The beaches are marginally better than Seminyak. Jimbaran is nice, but avoid during rainy season as the monsoon sweeps all island's garbage onto the beach. Disgusting.

If you're looking for local handicrafts, there is one street you need to go to: Jalan Singapadu. It stretches for miles. Some parts sell carvings, paintings, decorative stuff, etc. The village of Celuk is good jewelry, Mas is good for wood carving. Ubud has a lot of art work. You'll notice quickly that you'll see a lot of the same stuff in the stores over and over again. The Ubud market is overpriced and doesn't offer anything unique... waste of time. Tegallalang is a really good place for handicrafts, but it's a bit of a hike (north of ubud).... very scenic and very worth the time.

More than happy to point you in the right direction if y'all are looking to rent a Villa.

According to another friend with a house in Bali, there's a group of Texans living in Jakarta who recently opened a real pit bbq restaurant somewhere in Seminyak. Looking forward to trying next time I visit.

Taco Beach is a great little hole in the wall for Mexican in Seminyak. I met the chef who created the menu while he was still in Bali, Mexican American guy from Houston who went to U of H. He ran out of cash while travelling, had to stop off and work for a few months to get air fare home.

La Luciola is hands down one of the greatest restaurants I've ever been to. Leave the kids at home if you can.

Ku De Ta does a surprisingly good breakfast / brunch. Cafe Bali is overrated yet somehow I wind up there almost every time I'm in Seminyak.

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Taco Beach is a great little hole in the wall for Mexican in Seminyak

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We ate at a pretty good Mexican place in Kuta, name was something like BJ's I think.

We rented a Water Spa villa on Jimbaran Hill. It was a set of four which might serve OPs purpose. From there it wasn't far to the beach at Dreamland or Balangan beach, which we loved. Miss Bali a lot. Have watched the Bourdain Indonesia episode several times lately.

Thanks, Moses. Your info is super helpful! Not only for this trip, but for future trips, too! I knew there was a poster who frequented the area, but couldn't remember your user name.

Is the taco restaurant outside of The W by chance? My gfs and I ate there during our girls trip to Seminyak. We ordered lots of tacos and margaritas and ended up not having enough cash to pay our bill. Luckily, the waiter was super laid-back and was fine with us coming back later to pay the difference. When we showed back up about 30 mins later all the workers died laughing and one young cooked ran back into the kitchen embarrassed. I asked if the made a bet to see if we'd even come back to pay and they chuckled and said yes. Haha. The cook evidently lost...

I think we may focus our search on Nusa Dua for this trip. Finn's looks amazing and will be on our list for sure. Would you say the best beaches are around Nusa Dua?

Again, thanks for all the tips. We had a baby a few month ago and are hoping to get some traveling in soon.

My wife and I are heading to Bali for 10 days next week. Moses... Do you know of any cool waterfalls/swimming holes we could go to? I'm staying at the 4 Season Jimbaron, then in a villa in Seminyak the last 4 nights.

Errr, I don't think it's near the W if memory serves correct. There's been an outbreak of Mexican restaurants recently... in Singapore, Bali, and Australia! Seems to be the trend these days.

The beaches around Nusa Dua are pretty good. Roughly the same quality as the beach you'd find at Finns. Lots of good surf breaks if you're into that as well. Dreamland is pretty good.

Also, don't let the locals fool into making the trip up to Lovina. They all like to mention how nice the black sand but it's not worth the drive IMO.

If you're interested in REALLY good beaches, make a trip over to the Gili islands. You can either take a boat directly from Bali, or take a flight to Lombok and then a car and boat ride. I've never stayed on Nusa Penida or Lembongan but they've got some great beaches as well. The Gilis are super chilled, no vehicles allowed on the islands. It's worth a look.

Thenational,

I've never done the waterfall trips. Jimbaran is down south, so there's a few good beaches around Nusa Dua. Pandawa aka secret beach is pretty. I have done the white water rafting trip before and that was relatively fun. I was hit by a motorcycle earlier in the day so I probably didn't enjoy it to it's full extent but the cold water helped keep all the swelling down! LOL. I wound up going to the local's hospital in Ubud later that day...but that's another story!

This goes for either of y'all, Sundara beach club in Jimbaran is pretty good. I like Ku De Ta but it can be a bit "wanky" (lots of the too cool for school types). El Cabron is a weird beach club, VERY european. I've been a few times, never liked it.

Jimbaran Bay is really nice. We stayed at the Intercontinental and would love to go back. Service was great and the food was too.

I would also recommend making the trip to the Monkey Forest and doing Ubud if you can. Also one of the best things to do there is to go to the Uluwatu Temple on the SW side of the island and check out the Kecak dance they perform right at dusk. It is amazing to see.

Watch out for the monkeys in both places though as they have been conditioned to come and steal items from people. They will run up and jump and grab a pair of sunglasses off of your head or a bottle of sunscreen out of the side pouch of your bag etc. Once they have it they will climb just out of your reach and inspect it. Out of no where a guy will come by and offer to get your stuff back for you. He will take a bag of peanuts and toss them to the monkey and he will drop what he is holding to catch the bag. Then the guy will ask for you to pay him $5 for the bag of peanuts as he sells them normally for passing tourists.

We also did a Canyoning trip in the north part of the island where we put on harnesses and went for a 4 hour trip down thru a beautiful stream. Along the way we repelled down 40 foot waterfalls, slid down smooth rock slides and jumped 20-30 feet off of some of the waterfalls. Definitely worth the time as well if you are into outdoors type things like this. I can't remember the name of the place, but if you google it I am sure it is easy to find.

Bali is a great place, you will have fun