Camplung Mas – Legian
This hotel is situated on an alley from Melasti Street. The rooms were big and great for a family. Despite our booking saying 2 rollaway beds – we in fact had proper quad and triple rooms. The pool is small but inviting. There is no separation from the smaller kiddy area of the pool and the deep section – hence the many comments about not great for very young kids. The appearance of the hotel was nice for the budget rating. Grounds were neat and tidy. The rooms were a little tired looking but more than adequate for our needs. TV is Indonesian only – so we hired a DVD player. There was one down a small alley off Melasti St. There was a small red sign indicating DVD hire and a money changer. These people were honest and really really nice. We hired the DVD player for 100 000Rp for the week, and I continually went to them to change money as their rate was good and they were honest.
The hotel was full – and one of our rooms wasn't ready until 6.30 that night. Our first night was awful as we had room 80 – and the upstairs room was sooooo noisy. A group of very young guys and an elephant were up there moving furniture all night long, it was their first night and they were a bit too rowdy for our liking. I swapped rooms with Suzy to room 65 – which was brilliant and were very happy there on in. I think Suzy didn't mind the noise – or they calmed down – but either way the arrangement suited us both.
The breakfast at the hotel was very ordinary – especially after 11 mornings. I don't think I will be able to eat eggs for a very very long time. We had a barbaque meal one night which was as rank as a meal could get. So if you are staying at the Camplung Mas – it wont be for its restaurant that's for sure!!!
Thanks to Tuberose's JBR I was pre-warned about the mosies in the rooms and lack of towels. In response I packed lots of towels which I gave away at the end of our stay. It was good to do as the rooms and pool towels often ran out. And they insisted on only giving us 3 towels despite us having 4 people in our room. They have a standard note us asking guests to hand us towels if we wanted to reuse them – but despite doing this (or even having clean unused towels in the room) they always changed them, and couldn't always replace them in time.
Also I bought some $6 mossie nets from Action and we used these over our beds at night. We were thankful for these as our first night – we did without them and awoke to that awful buzzing sound over your head.
The reception described the pool area as being 24 hour and we did make use of this area each night – so sit and talk around. We even had a very late middle of the night swim one evening – but no skinny dipping.....as the pool bar guy was always there!!! The kids loved the pool table area and this was well used.
I found the waiters etc at this hotel to get easily confused and managed to mix up our orders – forget about our orders – try to charge us twice etc often. We met some people who stay at this hotel on every trip (20 plus trips) and rate is highly – which is a pretty good endorsement for any hotel. I would just encourage any would be guests to remember it is budget and not to expect too much.
Ubud Village – Ubud
This hotel was our only first class hotel of the trip. I have always wanted to stay at this hotel and be very centrally located in Ubud. It was no disappointment. We were upgraded to a delux room. The hotel was at 50% occupancy. The hotel reminded me of the Camplung Mas in the architecture but the rooms and bathrooms were much much nicer. The pool area was small but pleasant.
The hotel restaurant is very nice, and they were happy to accommodate a request for banana pancakes instead of eggs!! Each night they show a movie with the meal and the same movies are on in the rooms.
There is building works next door to the hotel – apparently the same owner and the hotels will use the same pool area. The situation of this hotel was brilliant. Only doors away from Café Wayan and Lotus Lane. We also were very close to Crack Pot which is a batik place where you can do your own batik. We did 4 panels for 250 000Rp.
Graha Ubud
This hotel is hard to get from a wholesaler – but looks like a nice small hotel. They have rooms and suites, both looked great. A very cute small pool and eating area. This was situated directly opposite Verona Spa (great spa!!!) and close to the Ubud Village hotel.
Ketuts Place - Ubud
I walked to this hotel out of curiosity and had a look at their rooms and pool area. Both of which looked fine. The mandi/toilet behind the pool looked a bit dark and dismal – and the normal rooms had more tradional Balinese bathrooms by the look of it. The problem with this hotel was that it was a hot boring walk back to Ubud central. Its too far out for my liking and uphill walk back to the hotel after shopping!!
Hotel Inna – Kuta
My aunt stayed at this hotel and I had the opportunity to look at the rooms and spend 2 days by their pool. The rooms were nice – an old version of observation city Scarborough – same layout, for those Perth readers. The hotel frontage and lobby were lovely. The pool was large and the pool lounges in high demand. Its situation right behind Kuta Square and right on the beach make this hotel perfect in my opinion.
I loved our time there as the kids loved the pool, I loved reading overlooking the ocean. There was ample opportunity to buy anything and everything with hawkers at an arms reach if desired. I met a lovely lady selling jewellery called Sally (but she had it spelled Selley on her hat). The beach massage only steps from the pool.
I heard an awful report about this hotel just before leaving for Bali – but can only report food things about it. The only thing my aunt mentioned negatively about it was that she couldn't work out how to get the hot water to work until she rung reception and they told her what to do (p.s. she is blonde – but the instructions were even blonder!!!)
Green Garden Hotel - Legian
This was our last hotel of our stay. We had a ground room only 6 steps from our room to the pool – so instantly a hit with the kids. We had rooms 17 & 18. The rooms were again a little tired looking, and the smallest of our stay and wardrobes smelled on mothballs. However, this hotel was by far the cleanest of all that we stayed at. The pool had a lovely waterfall and green night light. The rooms had safes in the wardrobe – easy to operate.
I noted that the water was never really really hot at this hotel, and in fact they did have some plumbing issues one day and had the water off for ½ hour. The room had satellite TV which was an instant hit due to 24 hour cartoons!! The great thing about this hotel was the extensive and reasonably priced menu. We ate heaps at the hotel and had lots of room service. They gave us 2 bottles of water each day and had great transfers thrown in.
Entertainment each night in the meal area – made it an entertaining place to be. I also loved the green lighting of the walls of the restaurant – earning the well suited hotel name.
I spoke to the owner and had extensively emailed the hotel before out trip. I have glowing praise for their great communication and smooth running. I believe that many people are return guests to the hotel – which would be reflected in their ongoing success. The hotel is a short walk to good shopping etc and the flea market up the road told us the building going on next door was another Green Garden Hotel in the making.
The hotel has good information to guests and has promotional cards that can be traded in for t-shirts. We used our mossie nets at this hotel too – as again mosis in the room were an issue.