We’re heading home tonight after a great 10 days in Bali. I’ll have a full trip report with reviews of the flights, lounges, hotels and activities from our trip in the next few weeks.

In the meantime, I wanted to share a few quick thoughts on Bali as a destination and whether it’s worth visiting. Obviously, there are a lot of places we all want to visit and only so many years to see them all.

Overtourism/Lack of Infrastructure

Bali just does not have the infrastructure to cope with the number of tourists that want to visit. We were here in the offseason and it was still very busy. Traffic can be brutal and I can only imagine how bad it gets in the peak season. You can’t drink the water here most places (although one of our hotels had their own well and filter system). Much of the economy is still cash-based which adds another level of hassle (and potentially makes it less safe carrying around cash).

Risks

You’ll see a lot of warnings if you research Bali on Facebook or blogs. Those range from warnings about petty crime (scooter phone thieves) to hygiene issues (Bali belly) to mosquitoes carrying Dengue fever. Don’t let these scare you. Obviously take reasonable precautions. Don’t wander around with your phone held out in one hand. Don’t eat random street food that’s been sitting out all day. Wear mosquito repellent and sunscreen – re-apply often as you’ll sweat it off. While we had a few mosquito bites, we didn’t have any other issues.

The Good Stuff

Ok now we’ve got the bad stuff out of the way, Bali has a lot to offer, starting with the people. All the Balinese we met were friendly and almost all spoke some English, even those not directly in the tourism industry.

Beaches are mostly very nice, although it depends what you want out of a beach. Some are more swimmable than others. Some are more easily accessible than others. Some are cleaner than others.

There were a couple of excursions I did here that were amazing. I went on a snorkeling tour where we got to swim with manta rays. I also hiked up a volcano at sunrise for some amazing views. While you can do similar things in Hawaii, these were still a highlight for me.

The hotels we stayed in were all top notch. We had our own pool in two of them and access to a semi-private lagoon in the other one. Breakfasts were amazing. The food we had both in the hotel restaurants and at local places was also very good and relatively cheap by Western standards.

So, is Bali worth a trip? I think so. I’m not sure we’ll be back but that’s only because we have many more places to see. I’ll have lots more Bali posts coming up in the next few weeks with tons of pictures.

If you have questions about this post, let me know in the comments or send me an email at emptynestermiles@gmail.com. If you are thinking about opening a new credit card, please use one of my links.