In Reply to: Novotel Benoa posted by richosbali on Tuesday, 12. January 2010 at 13:14 Bali Time:
today and it was lovely. we stayed on the non beach side of the road in a family room which was really nice- had a little room off the side of the main room with bunks- which might not be great if the toddler is a climber. our 3yo managed to fall off despite best efforts- luckily in a relatively gentle manner down the ladder on the quilt.
of course we would have preferred to be on the other side of the road but i think there are only 3 family suites there and they are effectively 2 interconnecting rooms with one being normal layout and other being same size but divided into a separate living room, bedroom with twin beds and bathroom- we never got to see one as they were always being used.
we did view the tropical deluxe (i think they were called) rooms on the beach side that can be interconnecting and the cabana rooms which are located right at the beach end of the resort near the pool and have a big day bed in the main bedroom that would make a fine toddler bed. they have an outdoor bathroom at the back and a porch and fenced (but possibly not gated) garden courtyard at the front that would be good to sit out on while the toddler gets to sleep if you went for that option.
there are numerous restaurants along the road - i don't know how they all survive, i worried for the livelihood of most of them, at least this last week! they are all appeared relatively cheap and traditional. and the lovely bumbu balinese not too far away, the hotel sent us to casa bella a bit further down the road one night when we couldn't get into where we wanted and they kindly picked us up and dropped us home- that was quite ok food and they were really great with our kids. bumbu also picked us up and dropped us home. it must be a common thing, we usually just turn up but getting the front desk to make a table reservation for us is how we came upon this service.
oh and the minimart across the road did a good job with the laundry and has a salon in the rear 50,000rp massage which was quite good for change from hotel.