sLOVEnians travel

There are many things to see and do on Nusa Penida – from cliffs, beaches, underground temples to the amazing underwater world. Here is a sample itinerary for everyone who’s not in a rush but would like to make the most of their time here.

Day 1: Arrive and enjoy the beach, your bungalow or your pool. Have some nice food and shop around for diving or snorkeling tours.

Day 2: Rent a motorbike and drive to Kelingkin beach, hike down if you’re fit, but please have proper shoes. The path can get really steep, you have to be physically fit to manage it it the burning sun. In some parts you have to climb a little bit and because it is so narrow it gets jammed a lot. Next to the parking lot there are many bars and warungs popping up with drinks and food. Down on the beach be careful with the waves – they can be very big.

After seeing the most famous beach of the island drive to Broken beach and Angels Billabong. If you want to swim here, check the tidal times and plan your day around that. By now it should be late afternoon. Depending on where you’re staying, go to see the sunset to a beach in the west.

Day 3: Today you’ll need your motorbike again. Let’s explore the east, shall we? Drive to Atuh Beach, park your motorbike and take your bathing suits. Atuh beach, Diamond beach and the Insta famous treehouse are all connected by a path where you can walk from one to another. With swim and photo stops and a lunch break we needed around 5 hours.

Then we drove back the coastal road and stopped at Goa Giri Putri temple, which is right next to the main road. Bring a sarong, otherwise you can rent one for 5000IDR. The temple is hidden in a cave, where the entrance is a small hole in a rock. Enjoy the sunset on the beach.

Day 4: Today is Manta time – either way if you decide for snorkeling or diving, you’ll see mantas in 99%. There are usually 2 snorkeling or diving stops with beautiful and plenty marine life. Another plus is seeing the island from another perspective. Our diving took a bit longer because of very low tide in the morning. In the afternoon have a relaxing time at Criystal bay, where you can snorkel by yourself and you can wait here for the sunset.

Day 5: Say goodbye to Nusa Penida and proceed to the next desired island. We decided to go to the Gilis.

A few prices, which might help you (all August 2019):

Boat Penida-Sanur 150.000
Boat Penida-Gili 350.000
Motorbike 70.000 per day
Parking fees 5000
Food: Ice tea 15.000; shakes 20-25.000; curries 30.000-40.000; fried rice/noodles with vegetable 25.-30.000;
Diving aprox.60€ for 2 dives with all equipment

Good to know:

-You can arrive only by boat. There are boats from Bali (different Ports from Denpasar to Sanur), boats from the neighboring islands Nusa Lembogan and Nusa Ceningan and there are boats from the Gilis. A “normal” price for a speed boat from the Bali beach area (around Kuta) is aprox.200-250.000 IDR including transfer from your hotel. From Nusa Penida to the Gilis the speed boats are around 350.000 IDR.

-The roads are pretty narrow, and some are REALLY bad. The main road is OK (the northern beach road, the western port road and the road going inland), but the road towards the famous Kelingking beach and Broken beach are really broken.

– We got picked up from our accommodation, which was kind of in the middle of the island for 100.000 IDR from the port, we paid the same price when leaving.

-For us the best transportation was a scooter. It was 70.000 IDR per day and for 2,5 days of driving around we needed for around 30.000 worth of gasoline. If you’re not an experienced driver, please take care as some roads are really bad and there are more and more cars on the road.

-Accommodation is already plenty, also many restaurants with a wide variety of food (our fav was Steakhouse, although they had a lot of vegetarian food – the tomato soup was excelent and the pizzas were really good).

If you are tight on time, you can visit Nusa Penida just for 2 days and skip the diving, but I could imagine that would be really stressful.

We visited the places according to location on the island – one day for the west and one day for the east. We had to skip a few things due to a longer diving day, but we’ll be back some day for sure. 2 neighbor islands are still unexplored for us 😉

Welcome to watch our Vlog from Nusa Penida and until next time ❤

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