16 Days in Bali

Sixteen nights in Indonesia in June and July 2025. Canggu, then Ubud, then Gili Trawangan, then two nights in Seminyak before flying home. Mostly mixed dorms.

This was a working trip as much as a travelling one. Coworking on weekdays, exploring around it, and the partying and the proper days off mostly at weekends. That rhythm is the reason sixteen nights was doable at all.

At a glance

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The route

Two hostels in Ubud because the first one was bad.

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Getting there

I flew AirAsia, booked on 10 June for a 23 June departure, so about two weeks out.

Out: Bengaluru 23:25, land Kuala Lumpur 06:20, sit there for just under three hours, then Kuala Lumpur to Denpasar, landing 12:20 on 24 June. Back on 9 July the same way, Denpasar to Kuala Lumpur, a four hour layover, then into Bengaluru at 22:45.

About ₹43,000 for the round trip. That includes 20 kg checked baggage, a seat and a meal on all four legs, so it isn't a bare promo fare.

For the visa I did the Limited Stay Permit, filled in and paid for before I flew rather than doing visa on arrival. It came through on the morning I landed.

I took an international roaming pack on my Indian number, and I also picked up a local SIM on a new number at the airport when I landed.

For getting around I used Gojek and Grab, and Bolt sometimes for certain things. A couple of days in I subscribed to Gojek PLUS.

Bali runs on UTC+8, and so do Lombok and the Gilis, so nothing shifts under you once you're there. It's an hour ahead of Jakarta, which is the bit that catches people out on domestic timings.

First afternoon, straight off the flight.

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Canggu

24 to 27 June. Stay: Lushy Hostel Canggu, 8 bed mixed dorm, about Rp 400k for three nights.

Lushy told me exactly what it was before I booked. From their own listing:

Lushy hostel throws a party every night of the week, so please be tolerant towards your drunk roommates, consider before booking.

There is a bar every night, it shuts at midnight and everyone gets pushed out into the Canggu bars after that, and they only take guests between 18 and 35.

Day one was drinking games, a prank, and some work in between.

I also met a guy from Pakistan at the hostel, and he ended up coming along to a lot of what followed.

Day two was the Chainsmokers at Savaya. Worth knowing that Savaya is not in Canggu, it's down in Uluwatu, which is a proper drive south. Strictly 21 and over.

The ticket came to about Rp 2.95M, around ₹15,500. Rp 2.5M of that was the ticket itself and the rest was government and service fees stacked on at checkout.

Easily one of the best nights of the trip. The club itself is amazing, it rained partway through, and I had a lot of fun with it.

Day three I went out to Tanah Lot, the sea temple on the coast west of Canggu, and spent the rest of it working from a coworking space in town.

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Ubud

27 June to 4 July. Seven nights, two hostels.

I stayed at Pillow Inn first, three nights in a 12 bed dorm. It was bad.

Then I moved to Gypsy Lust, about a hundred metres down the same street, and stayed four nights. It was fine, and I liked it enough to extend.

The extension is the useful bit. I booked the first two nights through Hostelworld, then walked up and booked two more directly with the hostel and got 40% off the rate I'd been paying through the platform, with breakfast included. About Rp 520k for the first two nights via the platform, Rp 460k for the next two direct.

I worked out of Outpost Ubud for most of that week.

I did a silver class, at a place called Ubud Monkey Forest Silver Class, and came out of it with a ring I'd made myself. I melted the silver down over a torch and worked it from there.

Melting it down, and what came out the other end.

The trip landed just after my 25th birthday, so the ring got XXV on the outside. Inside it says TUBI DAOR, High Valyrian for "not today". I'm a GOT head.

The rest of the week:

• Mt Batur, the sunrise trek
• The Campuhan Ridge Walk
• A Kecak dance in Ubud, Rp 100k
• Omma dayclub
• Temples, a waterfall, and a lot of sitting in cafes

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Gili Trawangan

4 to 7 July. Stay: Gili Castle, 3 bed mixed dorm, about Rp 670k for three nights.

I took the Eka Jaya ferry from Padang Bai at 08:00, into Gili Trawangan at 09:30, booked direct for about Rp 650k. Padang Bai is the port on the east coast, a couple of hours from Ubud by road. Some of the other Gili crossings go from Sanur or Serangan instead, further south. Check in is an hour before, and there's a small harbour tax in cash at the port.

Which boat you take matters. The one I was on is one of the bigger ferries, and it was much smoother and felt safer. The smaller fast boats on the same crossing get shaken around a lot more, and they're the ones I'd be wary of.

I left my suitcase on the mainland and took only a backpack across. A locker for the three days was Rp 150k. There are no cars or motorbikes on Gili Trawangan at all, just bicycles and horse carts.

Gili Castle has two locations about a hundred metres apart, and the confirmation makes a point of telling you which one you booked.

The day I arrived, I did a shroom shake. It was the craziest experience of the trip and I was pretty psyched on it.

Day two was scuba, with Gili Divers. There was a photographer on the dive and I bought the photos afterwards, which I'm glad about. That night was the hostel's jungle bar and then somewhere else nearby.

Day three was the hostel snorkelling trip, then a pool party, then more drinking games, then rain at night. Ring of fire, 21 rules, the usual. There was a lot of bar hopping across all three days.

Going back I booked through 12Go rather than direct, and it came to about Rp 645k, near enough the same as the outbound. Gili Trawangan at 15:00 on 7 July, into Padang Bai an hour and a half later.

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Seminyak

7 to 9 July. Stay: The Agung Residence, about Rp 580k for two nights.

I booked this the same morning I checked in. Most of the back half of the trip got booked a day or two out like that, and the ferry back was booked after I'd already arrived on Gili. It was also the first time on the trip I wasn't in a dorm.

The ferry landed late afternoon and I spent that evening at a beach resto bar.

The next day I went to a cafe and worked. That was almost the whole day.

Flew out at 13:35 on 9 July.

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The people

People were lovely, everywhere, the whole way through.

Bali being Hindu is the biggest thing about the place, and the thing that sets it apart from the rest of Indonesia.

A lot of the people I met turned out to be old Bollywood fans. Kishore Kumar, Udit Narayan and Alka Yagnik came up more than once.

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Food

Most mornings were mie goreng or nasi goreng, switching between the two for a change. I tried a duck dish somewhere along the way.

The rest of the time it was European food here and there. Pasta, pancakes, burgers.

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What it cost

Every number here comes off an actual booking or receipt. I'm not going to estimate the rest, because I didn't track food, drinks, scooters, Gojek rides, the dive, the coworking passes, Mt Batur or the dayclub, and guessing at them now would just be making things up.

All sixteen nights of beds came to about Rp 3.7M, roughly ₹19,000, averaging around ₹1,200 a night.

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A few things I noticed

Booking direct beat the platform. I only tested it once, at Gypsy Lust, and it was 40% off plus breakfast for one conversation at the front desk.

A lot of it was cash only. The Pillow Inn booking said so outright, no cards accepted, and most of what I spent day to day went the same way.

Have Google Translate installed. I used it for translations throughout.

I learned a few simple sayings in Balinese, mainly hello and thank you. Balinese is its own language, separate from Indonesian. The ones worth having:

• Om Swastiastu, hello. The standard Balinese greeting, said with your palms together at your chest.
• Suksma, thank you. Matur suksma is the more polite version.
• Rahajeng semeng, good morning.
• Ampura, sorry, or excuse me.
• Nggih, yes.

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Would I go back

Yes, and for longer next time.

The mainland alone holds more than sixteen nights can cover. The culture is genuinely different, and the neighbourhoods vary enough from one to the next that it's worth settling in somewhere and going slowly instead of moving on every few days.

Taking the ferry across to the Gilis put me somewhere else entirely. It's a bigger shift than the distance makes it sound.

Next time I'd add Gunung Rinjani National Park on Lombok, and the quieter Gili islands rather than just Trawangan. Gili Nanggu, Gili Sudak, Gili Kedis, Gili Asahan. I'm a big fan of the psilocybin mushroom shakes up there too.