World Travel Report: Bali, Indonesia
Bali, just the name gets people excited. This island has been attracting surfers, backpackers, vacationers, art collectors, spiritualist, and soul searchers for decades. Exotic beaches, friendly culture, great weather, and good food are just some reasons why Bali Indonesia scores well on my travel scale from 1-5.
Travel Score = 4.5
Affordability= 4
Food= 4
Culture = 5
Safety = 4.5
Activities = 4.5
Hotel Value= 4
Transportation = 4
I spent two months traveling around the circumference of the island on a bicycle. It was a great experience but not for everyone. Normally people rent mopeds for about 5-10 dollars a day, however buses, tourist vans, and taxis are all available at reasonable prices.
Bali does well in affordability. It has been at a 30% discount for the past 3 years for anyone holding US Dollars. Depending on where you stay and where you eat will make a huge difference for anyone's budget.
With it's famous name and reputation you can expect plenty of high-end resorts; but Bali hasn't lost touch with it's South East Asian backpacker roots. All throughout the island you can find budget accommodations ranging from 5 dollar dorms to negotiating a week for 10 dollars a night at a nice beachfront bungalow.
On the popular Kuta Beach the backpacker area is around Poppies II then to the left on Legion street. Here you can find good deals on accommodation and most of them have a swimming pool and a good social atmosphere as well.
There are good restaurants between Poppies I and Poppies II and on the road connecting the two called Bedugal. Here you can find colorful plates of Balinese style food for between two and five dollars. Also popular on the Island is buffet style Balinese restaurants. Basically you take what you want to eat and they calculate and you pay. It never costs much.
The Balinese food is a tropical Asian style. They make use of all sorts of vegetables, spices, and herbs. They are big on the fried rice called Nasi Goreng. They have no problem finding a spot for tofu and tempe (a fermented bean curd) in many of their dishes. You can also easily find chicken satay and Babi Gulang which is a small suckling roast pig!
There is a lot to see and do in Bali and each part of the island offers something different. Surfing is huge in Bali so if you don't know how, Kuta beach is the place to learn. Between visiting Hindu temples and feeding monkeys or both at the same time; there's something for everyone here.
Buleleng on the north coast offers good snorkeling and even spear fishing right from the shore. Visiting the two crater lakes in the volcanic center of the island makes for a great afternoon. Traveling through the country you will see incredible nature and beautiful terraced rice fields.
Ubud is the best place to take in the rich Balinese culture. The entire town is filled with art shops of different varieties. All over the island there are specialist villages doing oil paintings, woodwork, silver smiths, hand carved masks, even traditional musical instruments! A lot of the work ends up at the shops in Ubud making it's way to tourist's hands.
In Ubud you can spend an afternoon in the famous monkey park but you really do not need to venture in if you want to see monkeys. They are everywhere here and part of the fun is watching them steal food from unsuspecting travelers. Some are fearless and if you're not careful you may find yourself in a tug of war with a monkey over a bag of chips!
In Ubud you can see the traditional cultural play "Chakacha". It's quite exciting, but be careful the front row is at risk of getting burned by flaming coconut husks which they use as a soccer ball near the end of the play!
What really makes Bali glow is their art and culture which permeates through every aspect of life on the island. There seem to be exotic sculptures, masks, and paintings of Hindu gods and warriors all over the place. Along with beautiful exotic beaches and wildlife you realy feel like you are a guest in a very special place.
The inspiring people and rich culture really separates Bali Indonesia from just another beautiful tropical island; there for I give it two big thumbs up and highly recommend a visit!
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Hi Dan!! How are you? Amazing post! The beachfront bungalows would be my favorite place to spend a few nights. The Chakacha and the rest of the culture are probably unbelievable, it seems so nice and rich!
I'm glad it has good affordable prices as well, I've always wanted to go there, many places on my list as you can see hahaha
Keep up the great work buddy, I know how frustrating it can be to not get more attention, but you are doing so well with your posts that I'm sure they will receive much more visits soon!!
Have you thought of including the "life" tag to these posts? I think it has a lot more traffic and maybe would drive more visitors to your posts.
Best of luck Dan, cheers!!
Yes, it's a great place. After reading my post, it reminded me of what a great time I had there. I made myself want to go back!
Yes I should add the life post to these reports. Great call. Will remember that. Thanks for the encouraging words!
Dan
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STOPI love Ubud and Kuta, although very touristy. I love the vibe!
Great post about Bali, I will write about it too one of these days. Keep writing! :)
Thank you. I'll keep it up. I'm just now learning the importance of reaching out to others on here. What really screwed me up and got me negative is that before I joined I read endlessly about how you'll succeed if you put up good content....period. That was a lie. You HAVE TO reach out to others or you'll be on the super slow track to anywhere good on here. Which is really screwed up for me, as I now feel I have to be phony and spend time commenting on others stuff, interested or not. As far as a form of entertainment, I prefer not to be infront of the computer. It is what is. I'll "keep writing!" Thanks for your kind words and encouragement. -Dan
I've also written tips in the past about being successful here in steemit. BS! Quality content is a myth lol. I wish I can erase those... But our wealth are forever here. Unlike the money people who have 13 weeks to get it back lol. Those who remained 100% positive and are treating steemit like a holy grail are
I'm more of a 50/50, not only here, but about many things in life. I just cannot be easily tamed. And I just have a mistrust of any system controlled or semi controlled by people. But let's see how it goes. I'm still writing lol for 2nd and last reason above.
You just got my 3 cents! It's good to know I'm not alone with what I'm thinking and experiencing. I'm literally reaching out to one whale after another. And telling them I need your support to keep me on here as a content creator. So far so good. And your bullet points are totally spot on.
Good for you to do that. You are not alone in what you are experiencing. There are writers from last year who share the same sentiment. But they kept writing and I support them.
I'm not reaching out to those, but they are free to find me lol. I'm ok with a few supporters atm. ;)
I just don't want to wait where everyone goes crazy powering down, because the old and new writers are leaving...nobody wants to join or stay anymore, or steemit's value is not going up lol. They can keep the platform supported by the same circle haha. Let's see.
Our steemit conversations are a real trip. I feel like you and I are in the steemit matrix, and we just took the red pill, digesting it together. Crazy! Good to know we are not alone as we travel through steemit time and space. What a bizarro world in so many ways! I've got to get busy pretending I'm interested in other people's blogs now! lol
It's nice to be on the other side, I'm really cynical in nature. If steemit is like Facebook but with the rewards, and how come millions of people are not yet here? Yeah right, still beta. But still, hmmmm
I hope we can form a group on discord chat for all the like-minded and cynical people ha! Minnow revolution.Just for fun! ;) While writing and being creative lol.
Yes, minnow revolution. I had no idea that our friend @flipstar invested like 30k in the platform. After seeing his up-vote being worth so much, I had to get my brown nose on. He's a real good guy, and now a valuable up-vote. Maybe I should plop down ten Gs, and start up-voting myself! lol But I don't see that happening.
Let me know if you start the revolution. You're @Diabolika, with a name like that seems right up your alley!
Ahhhh....this is what I'm talking about. it's 1pm here in Thailand and I've spent my whole morning on here. I'm heading to the beach. I'll catch you later ;)
Great post. I will definitely add this to my list of places in the world to visit.
Excellent!
this post will be very handy for my bali trip
When are you going to Bali? I think you will like it there. :) I will also write a review about Bali!
The plan was in 2 weeks. But I am already procrastinating with booking a flight and so on.
Also I still like it here a lot and people are talking to me I should extend my visa one more time.
I have to decide in a week or so.
Looking forward to your review
Glad to hear that
Someday I'll surf Bali. Someday. :)
Great post and great pictures. Well done!
Thanks Luke. I'm starting to learn the system and my spirits are on the rise. I just was unaware of the importance of reaching out to others on here in order to succeed. @eturnerx has been helping me along. Today he recommended an up-voting bot. It literally blew my mind. I've never heard of a "bot" Sounds so techy and complicated. It's been really hard for me this whole thing. I just got a smart phone a couple months ago for the first time, and joined facebook like two years ago. I never post on it. All I know is travel, teaching English, and investing. Thanks again for your encouraging words.
I also wanted to thank you for supporting me. Literally the difference you and other's with steemit power have made for me, makes a HUGE difference! I mean it's a real big deal. Just an up-vote from people like you and an occasional resteem suddenly is making this all worth while. You can directly see it reflected in my earnings and up-votes since the day I reached out to you.
Hey Dan,
Your post is looking amazing, great information along with the pictures.
Chin up your doing great, keep up the momentum!
Thank you so much. Appreciate it. I have some more insight into the platform from my perspective and why I got so negative. Maybe it's something useful for you to consider when talking to the higher ups.
Basically I read a lot about steemit and watched videos too, all about how the platform works BEFORE I signed up. A common theme that I picked up on, is that if you post quality good informative work then you will succeed, and you will have post after post make good money and a growing following......end of story. That's it. I was reading and seeing that over and over.
That is not the reality of the platform. That more or less was a straight up lie. I don't like being bait and switched. The reality is that posting good info and content is not the recipe to success here. You NEED to go onto other peoples blogs and comment on their stuff, whether you are interested or not. I don't recall reading that as being part of the recipe to success when I started here.
I feel like I now have to be almost a phony and spend my whole day commenting on other people blogs as if I'm interested. Even if I am interested, I prefer other forms of entertainment away from my computer screen.
So for me to learn that I now am going to spend the whole day on my computer commenting on others stuff so I can succeed on here was not what I anticipated from the start. I now have accepted it and will do what I can. But that is the cold hard truth from my experience from before I even signed up.
Hope you understand a little better about where my confusion and negativity has come from.
On a more positive note. I have enjoyed the friends I've made and the back and forth penpal style relationships, and especially the real life meet ups with @luczypher in Mexico, and @fitinfun in Bangkok. So for me that has been a bonus worth appreciating. I sincerely enjoy the growing friendship that you and I now have. Thank you again for your help and encouraging words! :)
Truly yours- Dan
Glad to hear you are on track.
Steemit is about interacting, but you don't need to be phony, find posts that you are truly interested in that maybe only two a day, but make them count, as it's putting your best foot forward each time you comment or resteem.
You don't need to spend all day commenting, maybe give yourself a set amount of time to look for posts that interest you and comment, when you follow others that write about what you are interested in, there posts will pop up in your feed.
Which means your structuring what interests you without having to spend all day doing a few tasks, it will take time to set up, but it will all come together.
Steemit has changed over the last year, that happens with growth and their will many reasons why people will come to Steemit and feel like you did, because we all have different exceptions as it's something a little different, it's not apart of our habits.
Tweaking our habits just a little at a time will help to ease into it to get the best solution for you.
Super Glad your staying on Steemit keep on Steeming!
Well I certainly figured out what I needed to do to make my time to earnings a lot more valuable. I feel like I have cracked the code, and I'll say this who you know on here and the power they have makes a huge difference. You can totally see the direct correlation in my up-votes and earnings over the past week. I have not been phony, I can't be, it's not in my nature. But I have reached out to some real power players in the steemit world, and they suddenly have my back seeing that I constantly put out quality interesting posts and that I have been an undervalued contributer to the steemit platform. Once I gain some steem power of my own I will surely be looking to help lift up the next crop of minnows! Thanks again for your continued support. -Dan
Wooow ... I have not gone to Bali for a long time. Seeing your post, I so miss bali.
Yes it's a lovely place isn't it.