Indonesia forum

Best way to see a lot in little time? Homebase Bali - boat trip to Lombak, Komodo etc? HELP!!!

suzih

newbie
Posts: 1

We have been to Bali many times and have an ex-pat brother who lives in Sanur. He now has a Balinese "family" and we are lucky to have experienced local family life in villages during ceremonials times. That being said, we have always left Bali and have traveled Asia - our brother has convinced us that we are missing out on the rest of Indonesia and I am ashamed to say after some research - he is right!!! The problem is there is so much to chose from and everything is amazing - what do you do? Well, as a typical American we have way tooooo little time so I want to maximize what we see and do. As I said, we have our home base in Bali and saw the Parama boat tour - it seems like we could leave from Bali and see quite a bit going East to West on their tour but honestly, their website confuses me. We only have about eight days - booooo : ( We also want to see Yogakarta (sp?) Anyone have any good advice how to do this without backtracking, seeing as much as possible, and without too many "tourist shopping" distractions. My husband and I have been lucky to experience a small part of Indonesia in Bali with the most amazing people in the world and we would like to continue to see more. Thank you in advance for any help!

#1 Posted: 2/8/2011 - 09:36
busylizzy

under-employed
Posts: 1470
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So how much time do you have to allocate to this excursion - you mention 8 days, is that in total, or just for the side trip after visiting Bali? This will impact our suggestions significantly as getting 'off the beaten' track can be slow. As I see it, there several options to consider:
- bus/fly into Yogyakarta (Borobudor and Prambanan temples, Mt Bromo, etc)
- visit Nusa Penida and Lembongan (an hour boat ride from Bali)
- visit Lombok (spend a few days driving around the island, climb Rinjani, beaches on southern end, villages, etc) - very different to Bali in that it is a Muslim island.
- visit Gili islands (if you are into beaches and snorkelling)
- fly to/from Flores and either travel overland from Maumere to Labuanbaju (and visiting Komodo or Rinca island). Alternatively, you can go by boat one-way which will include Komodo dragon visit, snorkelling,etc.
- any combination of above.

What is do-able really depends on how much time you have, and what your interests are. I have posted a bit in the past about Lombok, Flores, Lembongan and Penida so scout around on the Indo forum for those posts, and check out the Indo section of this website.

Happy to help out with more specifics one you can give us more info.

#2 Posted: 2/8/2011 - 09:57

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