Bali, Indonesia

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Quick tips:

If you're tired of drinking Bintang, try the following:

- Two Islands wine - 2012

- Ultimino's Cabernet Merlot

- Tequila but you have to try it with an orange slice covered in cinnamon instead of lemon & salt as recommended by the locals



Semenyak

Uber cool - on the first night we ate at Ultimato - a trendy Italian restaurant complete with live opera (bit odd) but the ambience was great in this place. A slightly older crowd making us feel quite at home. We waited for a table at the back, in the garden but if you have an option get a street table - there was a longer wait for this and man mountain was too hungry to wait!!

Food - 7/10

Wine - 6/10

Ambience - 8/10

We were heading back to the hotel when we stumbled upon Champagne Bar. This place was completely out of place - from the outside it looked more like the kind of establishment you'd find on King's Road, Chelsea with it's red carpet and glitzy entrance so naturally we had to check it out. On the inside however, we found a lot of people dressed up for a night out but it had a relaxed and easy vibe. They played cheesy music from the 80's and 90's - with the original music videos aired on the various TV's scattered around the bar. Time seemed to pass rather quickly, 14 cocktails and 14 tequila down we were ushered out of the bar and onto a club but my memory gets a little hazy so we'll move on...

We stayed in Umalah, just north of Semenyak - a short taxi/moped trip away. The hotel was good but I recommend you find somewhere on or near the main strip in Semenyak to avoid the commute into town.

On our last night in Semenyak we decided to up a little more up-market and we went to Ku de ta - a beach restaurant/bar with good music and nice but expensive food. In hindsight we wouldn't have eaten here. We would have had some early evening drinks, watched the sunset - this place is worth a visit though. The owners did a great job at decking it out - it really is lush with some seriously cool looking people kicking about. Just seen a woman in a gold, sequenced catsuit! I sh!t you not!

Onto the shopping - there's a lot of nice shops. From fashion to furniture - which seems to be big in this town. We found the prices reasonable and the cost of shipping wasn't bad either. All in all, this place of Sean's favourite - it ranks a little lower for me simply because it was perhaps just a little too polished and refined for the traveller in me.

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Photos

Champagne bar
With our lovely waitress...

Champagne bar
Group of Argentinians we met at Champagne bar