Nusa Lembongan

After Kuta, we decided that we'd had enough of the busy beach scene for a while and headed off to Nusa Lembongan. Nusa Lembongan is an island about 1 hour's boat ride from Sanur, on the southwest coast of Bali. The island is home to several thousand Balinese and a handful of tourists. Most visitors come here to surf, dive, relax and get away from the hustle and bustle of Southern Bali's resorts.

Most of the locals are involved in the seaweed industry, so every afternoon, when the tide goes out, people migrate to the beaches, where they harvest seaweed and set it out to dry on the sand. We were told that a kilo of seaweed can be sold for around 4,000 Rupiah, or $0.40 USD. From our observations, it looked like most people harvest about 2-3 kilos of seaweed per day. Most of this seaweed is eventually exported to Japan and the US (seaweed extract is used in some ice cream and other dairy products as a solidifying agent).

Aside from learning a little about seaweed agriculture and the local economy, we took advantage of some of the activities on this beautiful little island. We snorkeled the reef beyond one of the surf breaks, went on a push-bike adventure around the island, tried our hand at sea fishing and did two dives. Our snorkeling adventure was a bit a more involved than we anticipated. To get to the reef from shore, we had to maneuver our way through the seaweed farms, over sharp rocks and around ominous sea urchins for over 100 meters. Our efforts were rewarded with a beautiful reef and a good afternoon. We wanted to try more surfing, but took one look at the reef-inflicted war wounds on surfers as they returned each morning, and decided maybe we should stick to the gentle beach breaks in Kuta. We did surf Kuta for one day and it was a better location for beginners.

The dives were really cold, but worth the pain and suffering, because we both saw Manta Rays for the fist time. For those of you who aren't familiar with Manta Rays, they are huge black and white sting ray-like creatures who feed on plankton and love the cold water environment of Bali. It's difficult to describe what it was like to see them in the water, but they were a bit like graceful 10-meter flying saucers that appeared out of nowhere and glided right over us like we weren't even there.

Led by a local guy we called "Captain Mushroom", we went fishing one morning with some English and dutch friends. This "Sea fishing" was essentially skewering chopped up tuna onto a hook and weight attached to a roll of fishing line and lowering that down to the sea floor. Not super-technical, but actually tons of fun. Billy caught a grouper, our friends caught several more groupers and a snapper. Julia didn't catch anything, but the boys were nice enough to share some of the cooked fish with her later that evening. The freshly caught fish was a great meal and the snapper was the tastiest.

As always, our visit to this island was made special by all of the amazing people we met. Our English and dutch surfing friends provided tons of laughs and hours of musical entertainment. Billy thoroughly enjoyed the jam sessions and learning new songs. The Australian family, with their kids in tow, ensured that we kept the potty-mouth to a minimum and shared some great insight into the Balinese life and culture. The family was great fun and made us miss our family at home...love you mom and dad.

We absolutely loved Nusa Lembongan and would strongly recommend it to anyone planning a trip to Bali.

-Julia and Billy


Nusa Lembongan


Julia, overlooking Dream beach


One of the bays we saw on our push-bike adventure around the island


Billy, lamenting the tiny bike seat


Seaweed harvesting


Footbridge to Nusa Ceningan, Billy met several local boys here who looked up at him and simply said, 'Money'


Kieran, Jules, Kris, Jack and Foreno preparing their bait


The fishing boat


Billy with his dinner


Sunset on Nusa Lembongan


The fish was thiiiiiiiiiiiiis big


Julia, Kieran and Jack


Billy serenades the crowd at Agung Bungalows