We started our Indonesia trip on Bali with very high expectations and it’s considered THE place to go. But unfortunately those expectations wasn’t fullfiled. During first night we went to a very famous fish and see food place on the Island (Jimbaran beach) and ordered living lobster which was cut and prepared in front of our eyes but still we get food poisoning next morning.
The traffic on the island is very very bad, we borrowed a motorbike to be able to explore surroundings but driving there was very dangerous and demanding at the same time. Just be aware when you are borrowing a bike that you need to have international driving license as the local policeman’s are checking it on every corner. Once we were stopped by a policeman and he was trying to get some money from us as I didn’t have internal license obviously (only local Slovak). The policeman was playing smart ass as he had a huge book with almost all countries in the world with pictures how the international license should looks like but fortunately after 20 minutes when he was listing and listing in it he wasn’t able to find Slovakia. His face turned red and then he just sad, go.
The beaches on Bali are polluted by garbage and if you wake up to see sunrise you can see local people walking up and down on it and trying to clean it. What we learned later that this garbage is going to trash cans but the government is dumping it back to see and currents will bring it back to shore … and you have cycle closed. Incredible
The island is so crowded that cities are being joined by houses which are build anywhere where is just a small place to do so.
Jimbaran
Beaches on Jimbaran have local flavour and not many tourists are going there.
Kuta
Unless you are tourist with all inclusive hotel there, don’t waste time visiting it. Nothing interesting there.
Ubud
It’s very nice village in the mountains where you can finally relax. Just do one of many walking paths around Ubud where you can see raise fields, local animals, people working hard or see painters capturing local vibe on blank surface. It’s worth make stop there.