Flights to Bali may not be cheap, but a long vacation there can be
When considering a destination for a vacation, it’s easy to become obsessed with the price of the flight itself, but if your trip is more than just a long weekend there’s a very good chance that expenses on the ground will make up the bulk of your budget. With that in mind, it’s worth looking into destinations that might have somewhat expensive flights to get there, yet very cheap expenses once you arrive.
Bali, which is a small island in Indonesia, is such a place. Flights to get there from the United States are never what you’d call cheap, but once you get there it’s possible to have a wonderful time on a tiny budget each day. At the moment flights from Los Angeles to Denpasar (the main airport in Bali) start at around $1,100 round-trip, and from New York it’s close to $1,400 round-trip. However, as long as you are staying at least a week, this will be a cheap vacation anyway.
Destination: Bali
The high season in Bali is from July through September, and during this period the place fills up with lots of Australians who are escaping their own winter. But it’s also the perfect time for American summer vacations, and the weather in Bali is nearly perfect, with almost no rain.
Hotels run the price gamut
The most important travel tip for those going to Bali is to not get too carried away with looking for hotels on the internet long before you arrive. Kuta Beach is the main tourist center, and worth a few days for sure, but on the internet it appears that hotels start close to US$50 per night. In reality you can get a room there for under US$10 per night if you just arrive and look around.
Generally a $50 room will be nicer than a $10 room, but maybe not that much better. If you are on a backpackers’ budget then it’s best to find a cheap flight to Bali and then find accommodation once you arrive. I did this for the second time just a few months ago, and I never paid more than $15 a night for very nice rooms, often including breakfast.
With dining and entertainment the situation in Bali is much the same. If you eat at a fancy hotel you’ll pay $10 per meal or higher, and if you go to a trendy cafe on the main strip in Kuta you’ll pay at least $5, but if you eat at a modest guest house you’ll often get the exact same meals for as little as $2. And the service at the small guesthouse will be more friendly and personable as well.
Bars in Bali are rare outside of one part of Kuta Beach, but there are thousands of small restaurants and almost all of them serve the local Bintang lager in big bottles. Fancy places will charge $5 or more for a bottle (still a good deal by most standards) while other places will charge a bit over $2 for the same thing. Once you look around you’ll find that Bali is extremely cheap, so just go and you’ll have a wonderful time on a minimal budget.