Paradise Is Bali

Gianyar

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Demography
Demographic / Living Sum up resident(1999) as much 354.530 people, Men 180.760 people and woman 173.770 people. Sum up labor force 225.520 employees, living of dominant resident in industrial sector crafting / diligence, agriculture, commerce, and construction services.

Geography
Regency of Gianyar as the famous of artistic and high culture, has an interesting areas as a tourism areas, has nature view, mountain, beautiful coast, rest of ancient object and all kinds of product crafting / diligence yielded by skillful and creative hand motivated tourist / investors visit to Gianyar.

Astronomically located between 8º18’48” and 8º37’58 South latitude, 115º12’29” and 115º22’23” East longitude. Wide of continent 368km² or 36.800 ha (6.53% from wide of Bali Island) with Tropical climate, recognized by 2 season, that is the rains and dry. Average temperatures 26ºC with lowest temperature of 23ºC and highest 29ºC.

Home Industries
Gianyar As Crafting / Diligence center as center of development of design from solidarity between above matter and the science growth / technological expand design from classical / made contemporary until production made by raw material wood, servant, silver, palm leaf, bone with various animal type, human being with function as goods of decoration and article of furniture.

As Center Produce with existance of skilled man power and creative in number enough and supported by marketing center, entrepreneur / crafting able to produce various type of goods in number and complete in market local / global.

As Marketing Center predikat center aritsry, cultural, goods of crafting / diligence and others make famous Gianyar of the world and have multifier of very typical is inclusive of making Gianyar as center of marketing of crafting / diligence goods. Not merely local product, but also from outside the Bali area.

Girls on Lebih Beach, South of Gianyar, Play along the Fringe of Breaking Waves, Indonesia Styles Framed Art Poster Print by Adams Gregory, 31x25

Surfing in Bali

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Surfing in Bali video

Seminyak

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Just north of Kuta and Legian is the up-market area of Seminyak, a busy village offering a glimpse of the island's growing reputation as a stop on the international jet-set circuit and favoured by Europeans as well as the local "expat" community.

Seminyak, only a 15 minute drive from Bali's Ngurah Rai International Airport, runs from the trendy Blue Ocean Boulevard across Double Six Road to the restaurants and bars of Dhyana Pura Street. With the combined allure of being close to town and yet far enough away to maintain a semblance of serenity. The famous Oberoi plays host to luxury hotels and fabulous beachfront restaurants and bars, and properties with excellent views. There are plenty of car and motorbike rental places on Jalan Dhyana Pura, plus the usual omnipresent transport tours.

Seminyak is quiet and pleasant, attracting return visitors seeking more peace and seclusion second time around. Many expats with businesses in Bali choose to live here, so the shops and restaurants tend to cater for these more discerning tastes. The further north you go the classier the hotels get, with a particularly exclusive enclave now occupying the fine stretch of shoreline near Pura Petitenget, off Jalan Laksamana. A combination of beautiful beaches, sunsets and rice fields make Seminyak area a perfect place for relaxation. Lifestyle here is peaceful.

Seminyak features some of the most beautiful new resorts, villas and highly rated restaurants in this area (e.g. The Living Room, KuDeTa, Made's Warung, Gado Gado, La Lucciola & Warisan). Hotels and Villas in the Seminyak area are set in lush tropical gardens with the luxuriously comfortable rooms and excellent service. Most hotels and villas in this area are designed for privacy with the tropical touch of Bali Architecture all suited for a relaxing island vacation. The extravagant private villas, spacious restaurants and up-market hotels, attract and inspire function organizers

Along the Seminyak stretch of surf beach, Bali's fashionable crowd lives, shops, eats and parties. The shopping in Seminyak is also much better than Legian and Kuta with a variety of crafts, hand made and fashionable items to be found. It has some of the best boutique shopping and restaurants in Bali, offering a diverse range of products that range from artifacts and clothing to gourmet foods. If you enjoy shopping, dining and nightlife then Seminyak is now the place to go.

The Seminyak beach is also popular amongst surfers looking for a less crowded area to surf and to enjoy the sun drenched beach. A quieter more relaxed area, Seminyak is charming and quite chic.

Bars and Clubs
The Gay Scene is becoming more developed, with dedicated gay bars such as Q Bar and Kudos on Jalan Dhyana Pura in Seminyak, and a strong gay presence at other venues on the same road and in the nearby late-night disco Double Six. Most of the other Seminyak clubs attract a good mixed crowd of Indonesians, expats and tourists.

Sanur

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The peaceful village of Sanur was Bali's first tourist resort and the nearest beach to the capital of Denpasar. Stretching along a wide stretch of coastline facing eastward, Sanur is protected by a shallow reef. Hotels, bungalows and landscaped gardens face the ocean and the picturesque beach boulevard stretches the entire length of Sanur village. Water sports are very popular in this area, both within and beyond the reef. Sanur is a centrally located resort and close to other tourist resort areas.

The beach is very quiet and it is the best for relaxing for visitors who want a quiet and peaceful holiday. On the far northern beaches have volcanic black sand, a remnant of the large volcano eruptions of the past, but the southern beaches are white sandy as are all beaches on the southern part of Bali.

Sanur offers many good hotels, villas, restaurants, shops and other tourist facilities. Sanur is also the ideal place for quiet family holidays.

The Sanur Paradise Plaza Hotel and Suites islocated in the tranquil coastal village of Sanur. Bali. has it all and Sanur is a great place to begin your discovery of Bali. The Sanur Paradise Plaza Hotel commands an ideal location just minutes from good shopping, entertainment and the cultural and natural attractions of Bali. With all rooms located around the lush tropical poolside gardens, the resort provides to all the needs of both the business and leisure traveler.

The Bali Hyatt is a resort hotel that is well loved for its timeless appeal which blends perfectly into the serene village life of Sanur, with its distinctive architecture, lush tropical gardens, exotic foliage and secluded lily ponds. The resort hotel features alang-alang thatched roofs, natural wood finishes and local fabric of Bali integrating traditions of Balinese hospitality. Savour the best of international cuisine in a relaxed tropical atmosphere here at the resort. Bali Hyatt's five restaurants provide a tempting array of cuisines from around the world.

The Sanur Beach Market restaurant at the end of Jalan Segara operates from noon to 10.00pm and serves a choice of Indonesian, Chinese and Balinese dishes with an emphasis on seafood. Great location, good food in an unpretentious setting at reasonable prices.

For real local flavor, visit Babi Guling Gianyar on the By-Pass near Splash Bakery between 5:00 and 7:00 p.m. This very simple restaurant serves the most delicious "Babi Guling" (roasted suckling pig, a famous specialty of the town of Gianyar). By 7:00pm they are usually sold out!

Call in to the local Sports Arena restaurant, on the By Pass just near McDonalds, and experience great hospitality and food from the well known restaurant identity, Olaf. Here you will no only enjoy fabulous food (many of them German dishes) but can join in the Quiz Nights, watch sports from around the world on the Bar TV's or enjoy the band depending on what night it is. The restaurant is a great favorite with the ex-pat population as well as the locals.

Le Mayeur Museum

The history of Bali is dotted with foreigners who spent time here and somehow made a difference.

One of those people was Belgian artist Adrien Jean Le Mayeur de Merpres (1880-1958). He arrived in Bali in 1932 and lived in the village of Klandis close to Denpasar. While living there he met a local Balinese dancer named Ni Pollok who was a famous legong dancer and considered the best in Bali.

Ni Pollok was very beautiful and Le Mayeur offered a her a job as his model. Though she was still a teenager they were married in 1935 and both moved to a house in Sanur where he painted portraits of her. This house is now the Le Mayeur Museum and it is a memorial museum that immortalizes the memory of the painter Le Mayeur and Ni Polok.

From the By Pass in Sanur take the Jl. Hang Tuah (Sanur Plaza Hotel) turn off to the right and park near the beach. This part of Bali is popular with German and Dutch tourists and is more of a low key place compared with the hectic pace of life in Kuta.

The house of Le Mayeur and Ni Pollok is now a museum featuring some of his paintings of her as well as European pieces. It is located about 30 meters to the right of the parking area at the end of Jl. Hang Tuah. The museum is open from Mon-Fri 8am-4pm and Sunday is 8am-3pm.

The house faces the beach and would have been very quiet and a great place to relax back in the 1930’s. The grounds contained many shrines and small statues, many of which are decorated with flowers. On the front of the central entrance are some lovely carved decorations.

During WWII Le Mayeur continued living in the house and, although the place was ransacked, still managed to keep the paintings. Wartime shortages meant he had to use sack cloth instead of canvas for paintings during this period.

The collection doesn’t include as many paintings of Ni Pollok as you might expect, although there are paintings of other Balinese ladies. Charcoal and crayon sketches are also included.

When Le Mayeur died he left the house and his art collection to Ni Pollok with an agreement that she would eventually pass it on to the Indonesian government. Ni Pollok passed away in 1985 and the house became the Museum Le Mayeur.

The museum really feels like a house and as you wander through the grounds you can see locals cleaning their pots and doing chores in much the same way as they would have done during Le Mayeur's day.

For an experience of another small part of Bali expat history you might like to include a visit to the Museum Le Mayeur on your next visit to Sanur.

Taken from: http://www.baliholiday.com/about_sanur.htm

Bali Map

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Here is the Bali map! in this island Julia Robert take a shoot for her newest movie Eat, Love, Pray.

View Larger Map

Tanah Lot

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Tanah Lot is a rock formation off the Indonesian island of Bali. It is home of a pilgrimage temple, the Pura Tanah Lot (literally "Tanah Lot temple") and a popular tourist and cultural icon for photography and general exoticism.

History

Tanah Lot means "Land [sic: in the] Sea" in Balinese language Located in Tabanan, about 20 km from Denpasar, the temple sits on a large offshore rock which has been shaped continuously over the years by the ocean tide.

Tanah Lot is claimed to be the work of the 15th century priest Nirartha. During his travels along the south coast he saw the rock-island's beautiful setting and rested there. Some fishermen saw him, and bought him gifts. Nirartha then spent the night on the little island. Later he spoke to the fishermen and told them to build a shrine on the rock for he felt it to be a holy place to worship the Balinese sea gods.

The Tanah Lot temple was built and has been a part of Balinese mythology for centuries. The temple is one of seven sea temples around the Balinese coast. Each of the sea temples were established within eyesight of the next to form a chain along the south-western coast.

At the base of the rocky island, poisonous sea snakes are believed to guard the temple from evil spirits and intruders. A giant snake purportedly protects the temple, which was created from Nirata’s scarf when he established the island.

Restoration

In 1980 the temple’s rock face was starting to crumble and the area around and inside the temple started to become dangerous. The Japanese government then provided a loan to the Indonesia government of Rp 800 billion (approximately USD $130 million) to conserve the historic temple and other significant locations around Bali. As a result, over one third of Tanah Lot's "rock" is actually cunningly disguised artificial rock created during the Japanese-funded and supervised renovation and stabilization program.

Tourism

The area leading to Tanah Lot is highly commercialized and people are required to pay to enter the area. To reach the temple, visitors must walk through a carefully planned set of Balinese market-format souvenir shops which cover each side of the path down to the sea. On the mainland cliff tops, restaurants have also been provided for tourists.

Sunset in Tanah Lot, Bali World Culture Giclee Poster Print by Nouke Hansen, 8x10

Eat, Pray, Love take a shoot in Bali

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Elizabeth Gilbert's book titled "eat, pray, love" take a shoot in Bali for film. This Film are base on her true story. Julia Robert will became her in this movie.

Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia

Ngurah Rai Airport

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Bali Ngurah Rai International Airport, also known as Denpasar International Airport, is located in southern Bali, 13 km south of Denpasar. It is Indonesia's third-busiest international airport.

taken from http://www.baliairport.com/

Ubud

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Ubud is located 35 km northeast of Bali's International Airport. It is attractive to tourists for a variety of reasons. On a relatively small island with a horde of attractions, Ubud is centrally located, and even the closest beach is only 15 minutes away.

The Ubud area is around two- to three hundred meters above sea level and surrounded by rice fields, which makes it noticeably cooler than then other tourist destinations in Bali. Neighbouring villages are well known for unique bamboo crafts and furniture, wood- and stone carving and many other crafts.

Ubud is famous for it's regularly nightly traditional dance performances, which are part of the traditional culture and are arranged for tourists on a regular schedule. Hindu-Balinese ceremonies take place on a nearly daily basis, especially in the European summer, which is the driest and coolest season here.

Ubud is popular in part today because it is the best place in Bali to break out of the tourist mode and get off the beaten path, although far from undiscovered. Hotels are plentiful; home stays and Indonesian guesthouses (losmen) are easily available to the foreign tourist. Many tourists simply base their entire stay in the city and travel to other destinations from Ubud.

Accommodations in Ubud are also somewhat more reasonably priced than in the beach towns of Bali. But atmosphere is perhaps the major attractions. One visitor summed it up this way: Kuta is madness, Sanur is sterile, and Nusa Dua is culturally isolated; Ubud is the place to go.

Ubud

Jimbaran

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Jimbaran is a fishing village and tourist resort in Bali, Indonesia. Located just at the south of Ngurah Rai International Airport, the beach is cluttered with seafood restaurants and some of the finest luxury hotels in the world. Tourism in Jimbaran has increased rapidly that has boosted local economy, but it suffered by the 2005 Bali bombings where the bomb exploded in one of the restaurants in Jimbaran. It is administered under Kuta South District along with Nusa Dua peninsula.

Jimbaran lies on the 'neck' of the southern peninsula in Bali and is widely known for the fresh seafood kiosks that are scattered along the beach. Diners select the live seafood that they wish to eat, and it is immediately prepared, generally grilled over a fire of coconut husks rather than charcoal.

Jimbaran la nuit: Roman (Voix d'Europe) (French Edition)

Bali

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Bali has been the favorite destination for locals and international tourists for ages. Bali has been the favorite destination for locals and international tourists for ages. Full of magnificent beaches, breathtaking sceneries, marvellous trinkets and interesting culture, Bali is ideal for people wanting to escape from daily activities, enjoy a honeymoon, or even, have a great time with family and friends.

Bali is an Indonesian island located at 8°25′23″S 115°14′55″E, the westernmost of the Lesser Sunda Islands, lying between Java to the west and Lombok to the east. It is one of the country's 33 provinces with the provincial capital at Denpasar towards the south of the island.

With a population recorded as 3,151,000 in 2005, the island is home to the vast majority of Indonesia's small Hindu minority. 93.18% of Bali's population adheres to Balinese Hinduism, while most of the remainder follow Islam. It is also the largest tourist destination in the country and is renowned for its highly developed arts, including dance, sculpture, painting, leather, metalworking and music.

History

Though no artifacts or records exist that would date Bali as far back as the Stone Age, it is thought that the very first settlers to Bali emigrated from China in 2500 BC, having created quite the evolved culture by the Bronze era, in around 300BC. This culture included a complex, effective irrigation system, as well as agriculture of rice, which is still used to this day.

Bali’s history remained vague for the first few centuries, though many Hindu artifacts have been found, which lead back to the first century, indicating a tie with that religion. Though it is strongly held that the first primary religion of Bali, discovered as far back as 500 AD, was Buddhism. Additionally, Yi-Tsing, a Chinese scholar who visited Bali in the year 670 AD stated that he had visited this place and seen Buddhism there.

By the 11th century, Hindu and Javanese influences became very important to Bali. In fact, when the Balinese Prince Airlanggha’s father died in about 1011 AD, he moved to East Java, uniting it under one principality and appointing his brother, Anak Wungsu, the ruler of all of Bali. Following this time, there were many reciprocal political and artistic ideas that formed. Javanese language, called Kawi, became the aristocracy’s preference, among other Javanese traits and customs that were worked into Bali life.

When Airlanggha died in the mid-11th century, Bali remained quite autonomous until 1284, when East Javanese king Kertanegara conquered Bali and ruled over it from his home in Java. Kertanegara was assassinated in 1292, and Bali was once again liberated, until 1343 when it was brought back into Javanese control by Hindu-Javanese general Gajah Mada, of the Majapahit empire.

At this time, the 16th century, Islam was spreading throughout Sumatra and Java, and the Majapahit Empire started to fall, creating a large exodus of aristocracy, priests, artists and artisans to Bali. This brought Bali great prosperity, becoming Bali’s golden age of cultural history for the following centuries. Bali soon became the major power of the region, taking control of its neighboring country, Lombok, as well as pieces of East Java.

In 1597, Dutch seamen were the first Europeans to land in Bali, though they had no true interest in Bali until the 1800’s. In 1846 the Dutch returned with colonization on their minds, having already had vast expanses of Indonesia under their control since the 1700’s. The Dutch sent troops into northern Bali, and by 1894, they had sided with the Sasak people of Lombok to defeat the Balinese. By 1911, all Balinese principalities were under Dutch control.

After World War I, a sense of Indonesian Nationalism began to grow, leading to the declaration of the national language in 1928, as Bahasa Indonesia. World War II brought the Japanese, who expelled the Dutch and occupied Indonesia from 1942 until 1945.

The Japanese were later defeated, and the Dutch returned to attempt to regain control of Bali and Indonesia. However, in 1945, Indonesia was declared independent by its very first president, Sukarno. The Dutch government ceded, and Indonesia was officially recognized as an independent country in 1949.

Entry

Most international visitors will fly to Bali directly.

Flights
    * Numerous direct flights from Europe, America, Australia and most Asian Countries.
    * Domestic flights to and from major cities within Indonesia.
Sea
    * Regular passenger ferries from Java and Lombok.
    * Cruise ship stop-offs.
Overland
    * By car or bus from Java.

People & Culture

Bali's reputation as a tourist destination is already established in the minds of so many people around the world. It is known as a beautiful island with mountains, temples, palaces and visits of terraced rice fields.

It is known as a place where traditions of art and culture predominate, where the village way of life based on their strong religious beliefs is still in place.

But, it is also a place where modern sports such as diving, sailing, rafting and above all surfing have taken hold and are enjoyed by thousands of visitors every year. It is a place where the ultimate luxuries of life: fine dining, spas and massage have reached the peak of perfection.

Behind all of this is a single unseen premise; none of these practices, pursuits and pleasures are created as tourist industries in Bali, but are based on the talents, dedication and skills of the Balinese people in their normal course of life.

Cuisine

Like the food of other regions in Indonesia, Balinese food is rice as the central dish served with small portions of spicy, pungent vegetables, fish or meat and served almost always with sambal or chili paste. Bali is a few of the regions in Indonesia whose majority of its people are non Muslims, thus babi guling or roasted suckling pig is a specialty, as is bebek betutu, smoked stuffed duck wrapped in bamboo leaves.

In Jimbaran area, for instance, you can sample seafood dishes while sitting on the beach. Visit this place in the evening, the cool atmosphere and caressing breeze will make your dining experience remarkable.

Tourism Office

Jl. S. Parman No. 1, Niti Mandala, Denpasar 80235 Phone. (62-361) 235200, 7806200 Fax. (62-361) 235200 www.balitourismauthority.net E-mail : promotion@balitourismauthority.net

taken from: http://www.indonesia.travel/en/regions/bali/35

Bali and Lombok (Eyewitness Travel Guide)