East coast or south coast?

East if you want quiet, black sand, a wreck to swim over and almost no other visitors, and if two hours from the airport is acceptable. South if you want cliffs, surf, somewhere different to eat every night and a short transfer home. Sanur is the middle answer: shallow, calm and good for early mornings.

The town centre has been thoroughly commercialised and we will not defend it. The ten kilometres around it have not, which is why we stay out of it — north towards Tegallalang or west above the Ayung gorge — and why the field walk starts at eight rather than eleven.

Can we add Nusa Penida or the Gili islands?

Yes, and it costs two nights rather than a day trip. The crossings are fast boats in open water, they are cancelled in rough conditions, and a day trip means two of them in one day. If the islands are the point, we would cut the interior to two nights and build the week around them instead.

May to September is the dry season, with May, June and September the quietest of it. January and February are the wettest, with rain that arrives hard and then stops, and cheaper by a wide margin. March carries Nyepi, which closes the island for a day.

Bali in 7 Days — Asia Crossings

Overview

An island that rewards a choice

Bali is about 150 km end to end and you could cross it in a morning if the southern traffic allowed, which it does not. Inside that small space sit a volcanic spine with crater lakes, a terraced middle belt of rice and water temples, a southern isthmus carrying almost every hotel on the island, and a dry east and north that most visitors never reach. The planning job is deciding which of those you came for, because the distances are short and the road time is not.

So this week has two bases and no touring between them. Three nights above Ubud for the interior, then a single move to one coast — east if you want quiet, black sand and a wreck to swim over; south if you want cliffs, surf and somewhere to eat every night. We ask the question before we quote, and we do not build a version that visits both.

Stepped rice terraces above a river valley near Ubud in Bali, Indonesia

A stone temple on the cliff edge above the sea at Uluwatu on the Bukit peninsula, Bali, Indonesia

The interior · Uluwatu

Length: 7 days, 6 nights
Group: Private, up to 12
Starts: Denpasar
Ends: Denpasar
Bases: Two — the interior, then one coast
Best months: May, June and September

Nights

The nights, in order

Ubud and the interior3 nightsTerraces, water temples and the gorge, outside the town.→The east or south coast3 nightsOne coast, chosen at the planning stage and not both.

Day by day

What happens each day

Day 1

In at Denpasar, and straight up the hill

The first evening above the gorge, with the frogs starting

The transfer to Ubud is about an hour and a half and considerably longer if you land in the afternoon, when the coast road north of the airport can take two hours for twenty kilometres. We stay a little out of the town — north towards Tegallalang, or west above the Ayung gorge — because the centre has been comprehensively commercialised and the ten kilometres around it have not. Nothing is planned.

StayHotel outside Ubud, BaliMealsNone includedTravelAbout 1.5 hours from Denpasar, longer in the afternoon

Day 2

A spring temple at opening, and the terraces on foot

Tirta Empul at opening, when it is a ceremony rather than a queue

Tirta Empul early, because the bathing there is a live rite and by mid-morning it is a queue of visitors photographing it. Then a walk through the fields — the paths north of Ubud at eight in the morning, with a farmer explaining the subak, the water-sharing arrangement that organises the whole landscape and has done since the ninth century. The afternoon is free. The swing platforms on the Tegallalang road can be left alone without regret.

StayHotel outside Ubud, BaliMealsBreakfastOn footAbout 5 km through the fields, undulating and hot after nine

Day 3

West to the terraces that go on past where you can see

Jatiluwih in the late morning, with the terraces running out of sight

Jatiluwih is an hour and a half west: a UNESCO-listed irrigation landscape far larger and much quieter than anything near Ubud, and the place where the scale of Balinese water engineering becomes obvious. Lunch up there, then the lake temple at Bratan on the way back if the cloud has lifted. This is the longest driving day of the week and it is still under four hours in total.

StayHotel outside Ubud, BaliMealsBreakfast, lunchTravelAbout 1.5 hours each wayOn footAbout 4 km at Jatiluwih

Day 4

Your day, and then the move

Arriving somewhere you do not have to leave again

The morning is unscheduled: a carver or a painter, a gamelan rehearsal, the market before the coaches, or Mount Batur before dawn if a two-hour climb up volcanic scree in the dark is what you came for. After lunch, the move to the coast. East to Amed is about two hours through the dry side of the island; south to Sanur or the Bukit is an hour and a half to two, depending on the traffic. One move, and then nothing crossed twice.

StayEast coast at Amed, or south at Sanur or the BukitMealsBreakfastTravel1.5 to 2 hours to either coast

Day 5

The coast, on its own terms

The Liberty wreck from the beach, or Uluwatu in the last hour of light

East: black sand, almost no visitors, and the Liberty wreck at Tulamben just offshore — a 1942 cargo ship torpedoed and later pushed into the sea by an eruption, lying in five to thirty metres, which makes it one of the few wrecks in the world you can reach by snorkel from a beach. South: the cliffs of the Bukit, the sea temple at Uluwatu late in the day, and the coves at the foot of long staircases. We book whichever you chose, with a guide for one morning and none after that.

StayEast coast at Amed, or south at Sanur or the BukitMealsBreakfast, lunch

Day 6

Nothing arranged

A whole day with nothing in it

No guide and no car unless you ask the evening before. On the east coast that means a boat out at dawn, a snorkel over the wreck again, or the salt farms on the black sand. In the south it means a cove, a surf lesson, or the walk along the cliffs. It is the day the week exists for.

StayEast coast at Amed, or south at Sanur or the BukitMealsBreakfast

Day 7

Out through Denpasar

Two hours from Amed to the airport, or forty-five minutes to an hour and a half from the south depending on where you stayed and when you leave. We build the transfer long rather than short: the coast road north of the airport is the least predictable stretch of tarmac on the island.

MealsBreakfastTravelAbout 2 hours from the east coast, or 45 minutes to 1.5 hours from the south

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Paperwork

Entry, the levy and the one date that closes the island

Indonesia is easy to enter and has three separate things to deal with, one of which is a date rather than a document.

No visa exemption for European, North American, Australian or Northeast Asian passports. Visa on arrival is 30 days, extendable once by another 30, bought on arrival or in advance through the immigration e-visa portal.
The All Indonesia arrival card is compulsory and free, filed within 72 hours of arrival.
Bali charges a separate tourist levy per person. It exists and it is collected; we do not quote the amount here, and your coordinator gives you the current figure and how to pay it before you fly.
Proof of onward travel is checked at the airport. Passport valid six months, two blank pages.
Nyepi, the Balinese day of silence, falls in March and closes the entire island for twenty-four hours, airport included. Nothing opens and nobody travels — not even to the airport. It is remarkable to be present for and impossible to plan around, so we either build the week to sit either side of it or move your dates.

Checked 20 September 2026

We do not publish visa fees or the levy amount. The current figures are on the official Indonesian portals, and your coordinator confirms them in writing along with the filing window for the arrival card.

Pictures

What the week looks like

Above Ubud

Tirta Empul

Jatiluwih

Amed

Uluwatu

Sanur

Cost

How we quote it

Travellers	Comfortable hotels	Boutique and luxury
2 travellers	On request	On request
4 – 6 travellers	On request	On request

Every route is quoted for your own dates, party size and hotel standard, itemised.

Bali has the deepest luxury tier in Southeast Asia and an equally deep supply of small, good places for a fraction of it, which makes the gap between the columns wider here than on any other route we sell. Nothing else in the week changes between them: the same car, the same guide, the same terraces. Ask and the figure comes back within a working day, itemised, with both hotels named.

Included

What the quote covers

What the price includes

Private air-conditioned car and driver for the interior days and both transfers, with a driver on call on the coast.
An English-speaking licensed Balinese guide for the temple and terrace days and for one morning on the coast. The free days have no guide, by design.
Six nights with breakfast: three outside Ubud and three on the coast you chose.
Lunch at Jatiluwih and on the first coast day.
A field walk with a farmer who explains the subak rather than a guide who describes it.
Entrance fees to everything named above, including Tirta Empul, Jatiluwih, the lake temple at Bratan and Uluwatu if you take the south.
Snorkelling equipment and a guide over the Liberty wreck at Tulamben if you take the east.
Airport transfers at both ends, built long rather than tight because the southern coast road is unpredictable.
A coordinator on an Indonesian number for the whole week, and a written note of the visa route, the arrival card window and the Bali levy with the current figure.

What it does not include

International flights into the first city and out of the last.
Visa fees and entry charges. We do not publish these figures — the current ones are on the government’s official portal, and your coordinator confirms them in writing before you travel.
Travel insurance, which we ask every traveller to hold.
Meals not named in the day-by-day, and all drinks.
Tips for guides, drivers and boat crew.
Personal expenses: laundry, telephone, spa treatments, anything bought.

Straight talk

Who should not book this route

A week with two bases and one coast is a deliberate refusal to see everything, and it will frustrate five kinds of traveller.

Anyone who wants to see the whole island. This week does not go to the north, the crater lakes and both coasts, and a version that does is four hours a day in a car on roads that are slower than the map. If you want that, take ten days and we will build it properly.
Anyone who wants nightlife. Seminyak and Canggu are restaurants, surf schools and the worst traffic on the island, and they are not on this route. Say so and we will base you there instead, and you will spend rather more of the week in a car.
Anyone travelling in July or August who wants it quiet. Those are the peak weeks, and the days either side of the new year are worse. May, June and September are the same weather with noticeably fewer people, and that is the single most useful piece of advice on this page.
Anyone expecting a Balinese beach to look like a Thai one. The south is cliffs and surf, Sanur is shallow and calm with a paved seafront, and the east is black volcanic sand. None of them is white sand and clear shallow water. If that is the picture in your head, the Philippines or the Andaman coast is where it lives.
Anyone whose dates fall on Nyepi. The island closes completely for twenty-four hours in March and the airport closes with it.

The interior first, and one coast chosen on purpose.

Plan My Trip

Start from this route

Tell us your dates and which coast appeals. We will send a quote and an amended day-by-day within a working day.