After 2 fantastic nights at the Novotel we set out on the 3 hour drive to Amed. We had booked 5 nights at the 'Bali Beach House' or ' Rumah Pantai'as the locals call it.- a private house on the ocean front. Nengah, the Balinese man who lives at the BBH with his wife and 4 yr old daughter ( in a separate house ) picked us up. The first part of the drive was tedious and it seemed to take forever to get away from the built up area around Kuta. However after this, the rest of the drive was really interesting and got more and more scenic the closer we got to Amed. The last hour of the drive - up around Amalapura, was spectacular with green rice terraces and mountain scenery - it is the type of scenery I've always seen on postcards and books but had never really seen in real life, till now.
As we passed thru the mountains and went towards the coast the scenery changed again and became much drier.We finally turned off on the road along the Amed coast. Amed really consists of one long road that winds along the coast and is dotted with hotels, restaurants and scenes of rural village life. I loved being able to walk in this area and get up close to how the people really live. It was a wonderful change from the commercialism etc of Kuta.
Any way - we arrived at the Bali Beach House to a welcoming committee on the road side - being the many staff that work at the house, and we went thru the front gate and descended down the steps into a ' walled paradise'. The BBH is spectacular - I won't go into great detail as there are some great pictures on their website - www.balibeachhouse.com. However - a brief description is - a 2 storey, 3 bedroom, 3 bathroom house with a garden and pool. The house is right on the black volcanic beach and you walk out the front gate and your on the beach. If you keep walking into the warm ocean - within a few metres you are swimming over beautiful coral.
The staff at the house are fantastic and become ' part of the family' We really enjoyed chatting with them and learning and practicing some basic Indonesian phrases each day. My girls had a wonderful time playing with Nengah's daughter and the local children. The families in this area are desperately poor - making a subsistence living from salt farming . We gave some of the children presents of textas and coloured pencils but what they really wanted and would have appreciated much more - was clothes !!
Days at the BBH were very relaxing - lots of lying round the pool or reading in the bale -( theres no tv!!), mixed with more strenuous activities such as : fantastic snorkelling and trekking thru the hills and the villages around this area. We snorkelled out front of the house , .(the water is really warm and the visibility really clear) down the coast a bit on the Japanese shipwreck and at Tulamben on the 'liberty wreck'. This wreck was a bit deep for snorkelling and my husband and I really wished we had organised to scuba dive on this one. We also went sailing , trekking early in the morning up the hiil behind the house to see the sunrise. Nengah also organised for us to go to Amalapura and buy pens and exercise books which we then took to the local school. This was a highlight and they were really happy to have us visit.
Eating in Amed was a pleasure. Breakfast was included and we negotiated with Nengah ( who is a chef ) to cook other meals. The green coconut pancakes, his indian food and the whole pig on a spit were highlights. The other fantastic thing about food in Amed is that it was so cheap to eat at the restaurants and really nice. We couldn't believe how much cheaper than Kuta it was to eat out.
This is a great part of Bali and a really different experience which I highly recommend. After 5 wonderful days we said a sad farewell to all the staff at the house - with promises to send photos and emails - and headed back to Tuban for the final days of our trip. Comments on our stay in an executive suite at the Dynasty in my next instalment.