Places to visit in Bali, Indonesia
40 places to visit in Bali, Indonesia, each with LOQAH's carefully crafted stamp of its own: Lake Batur, Pura Taman Ayun, Pura Ulun Danu Batur and more. Stand at any of them with the app open and the stamp is yours, confirmed on site, in your Bali volume.
3 UNESCO World Heritage sites · 11 Famous places to visit · 26 Hidden gems
UNESCO World Heritage sites in Bali (3)
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Lake Batur
A crescent-shaped crater lake inside the caldera of Mount Batur in the Kintamani highlands, the largest lake in Bali. Hot springs line parts of its shore, and the volcano rises straight up from the water's western side.
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Pura Taman Ayun
A temple and garden compound in Mengwi, ringed by a wide moat, with tiered meru shrines rising inside its walled courtyards. Its water features are part of the subak irrigation system that has fed Bali's rice fields for centuries.
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Pura Ulun Danu Batur
One of the most important temples in Bali, guarding the north and dedicated to Vishnu and Dewi Danu, goddess of Lake Batur. The temple was moved and rebuilt on its present site on the caldera rim in 1926.
Famous places to visit in Bali (11)
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Besakih Temple
The mother temple of Bali and the holiest site in Balinese Hinduism, sitting nearly 1,000 metres up the slopes of Mount Agung. It is not one building but a complex of 23 related temples on six terraced levels, the largest being Pura Penataran Agung.
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Kuta
A former fishing village in southern Bali that was one of the first places on the island to take up tourism, now a busy beach town close to the airport. Its long sandy beach and steady waves made it a favourite of surfers, many of them from Australia.
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Mount Agung
Bali's highest point, an almost perfectly conical stratovolcano that dominates the east of the island and shapes its rainfall. Balinese hold the mountain sacred, and on a clear morning the summit looks across the strait to Mount Rinjani on Lombok.
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Mount Batur
An active volcano at the centre of two nested calderas in the Kintamani highlands, with a crater lake along its south-east side. Climbers set off in the dark to reach the summit for sunrise over the lake and Mount Agung.
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Nusa Lembongan
The best known of the three Nusa Islands off Bali's south-east coast, alongside Nusa Penida and Nusa Ceningan. It is a small, low island of white sand coves, seaweed farms and surf breaks, joined to Ceningan by a yellow suspension bridge.
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Nusa Penida
A hilly island across the Badung Strait from Bali, drier than its neighbour and rising to 524 metres. Its tall cliffs drop to beaches such as Kelingking, and the waters off its coast are known for manta rays.
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Pura Ulun Danu Bratan
A Shaivite water temple on the shore of Lake Beratan, high in the mountains near Bedugul, its tiered shrines seeming to float on the water. The lake feeds the irrigation of the whole region, and smaller water temples downstream serve each farmers' association, or subak.
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Tanah Lot
A sea temple perched on a rock formation just off Bali's west coast, cut off from the shore when the tide comes in. The shrine on top is an ancient Hindu pilgrimage site, and its outline against the sunset is one of the most photographed views on the island.
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Tirta Empul
A water temple near Tampaksiring built around a holy spring that wells up from the ground, which is what its name means. Balinese Hindus come to bathe under its row of stone spouts in a ritual purification called melukat.
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Ubud Palace
The palace of Ubud's royal family, a historic compound at the main crossroads of the town, officially called Puri Saren Agung. Its carved gateways and courtyards are the setting for Balinese dance performances in the evenings.
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Uluwatu Temple
A Balinese Hindu temple on the south-western tip of the Bukit Peninsula, set on the edge of a cliff high above the Indian Ocean. It is the only sea temple that is also one of Bali's nine directional temples, and the clifftop is known for its evening kecak dance and its macaques.
Hidden gems in Bali (26)
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Agung Rai Museum of Art
An art museum in Ubud founded by the collector Agung Rai and opened in 1996, set among gardens and rice fields. It shows Balinese painting alongside work by foreign artists who lived on the island, and its grounds host dance and gamelan.
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Bajra Sandhi Monument
A monument to the struggles of the Balinese people through history, standing in a large square in front of the governor's office in Denpasar. Its shape recalls the bell a priest rings in prayer, and inside are dioramas of the island's past.
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Bali Museum
Denpasar's museum of art and history, founded in 1931 on the east side of Taman Puputan, the central square. Its pavilions are built in the styles of Bali's different regions and hold collections of Balinese art, culture and history.
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Bali Safari and Marine Park
A safari park in Gianyar run by the Taman Safari group, a conservation organisation that also runs two parks on Java. Visitors ride through large enclosures of animals from Indonesia, India and Africa.
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Garuda Wisnu Kencana
A cultural park on the Bukit Peninsula devoted to the Hindu god Vishnu and his mount Garuda, the mythical bird. At its centre stands a giant statue of Vishnu riding Garuda, completed in 2018 and among the tallest statues in the world.
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Gitgit Waterfall
A tall waterfall in the hills of north Bali, about 10 kilometres from the old island capital of Singaraja. A rocky path leads through thick greenery to the falls and the natural pools at their foot.
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Goa Gajah
The 'elephant cave' near Ubud, a 9th-century sanctuary entered through a mouth carved in the rock as a fearsome face. Inside is a small, dim chamber, and in the courtyard outside lie old bathing pools.
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Gunung Kawi
An 11th-century temple and funerary complex in a valley at Tampaksiring, split in two by the Pakerisan river. Ten shrines are carved into 7-metre niches in the cliff face, thought to honour King Anak Wungsu and his queens.
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Klungkung Palace
The historic palace complex of the old Klungkung kingdom in Semarapura, officially Puri Agung Semarapura. Its best known part is the Kertha Gosa, an open hall of justice whose ceiling is painted in the Kamasan style with scenes of heaven and hell.
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Lovina Beach
A string of black volcanic sand beaches on Bali's quiet north coast, west of Singaraja. Small boats head out at dawn to watch dolphins in the calm water offshore.
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Menjangan Island
A small island off Bali's north-west coast, named after the deer that local people saw swimming across to it each spring. It lies within West Bali National Park, and its coral walls draw divers and snorkellers.
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Neka Art Museum
An Ubud museum of Balinese painting, set up in 1982 by the art dealer Suteja Neka. He built the collection with advice from the painters Rudolf Bonnet and Arie Smit, and it traces how Balinese art changed through the 20th century.
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Nusa Dua
A resort enclave built in the 1970s on Bali's southern tip, where more than 20 large hotels share 350 hectares of calm beachfront. The name means 'two islands', after the pair in its bay, the smaller of which holds a temple.
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Padang Padang Beach
A small beach of fine white sand on the Bukit Peninsula, about 110 metres long and closed in by tall cliffs. It is reached through a narrow gap in the rock, and its reef break is well known among surfers.
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Penglipuran Village
A traditional village in Bangli whose people keep their customs in daily life, with matching family compounds lining a single stepped street. Its layout follows Tri Hita Karana, the Balinese idea of balance between God, people and nature.
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Pura Goa Lawah
A temple built around the mouth of a cave full of bats, which is what 'goa lawah' means. It is often counted among the Sad Kahyangan Jagad, the six holiest places of worship on Bali, and stands across the road from a black sand beach.
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Pura Kehen
The old royal temple of the Bangli kingdom, set at the foot of a wooded hill north of the town and dating back at least to the 13th century. Its terraced courtyards climb the slope to an eleven-tiered meru shrine, with a great banyan tree in the outer court.
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Pura Lempuyang Luhur
The seventh and highest of the temples on Mount Lempuyang in east Bali, reached by a long climb of steps through forest past the lower temples of the complex. It is counted among the six holiest sanctuaries on the island.
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Sanur Beach
A long stretch of beach east of Denpasar that has grown into a small town of its own, with a seafront path running beside calm, reef-sheltered water. It faces east, which makes it Bali's beach for sunrise rather than sunset.
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Tegallalang Rice Terraces
Rice paddies cut in steps down the sides of a valley north of Ubud, watered by Bali's old subak irrigation system. Paths lead down through the green terraces, and cafés along the road look across them.
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Tenganan
A walled village of the Bali Aga, the island's older inhabitants, in the east of Bali. It is known for geringsing, a double ikat cloth woven in only three places in the world, and for selonding music played on iron metallophones.
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Tirta Gangga
A former royal water palace of the Karangasem kings in eastern Bali, laid out with bathing pools, fountains and stepping stones. It is named after the Ganges, the sacred river of India, and has its own Patirthan temple.
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USAT Liberty Wreck
A United States Army cargo ship that was beached at Tulamben in 1942 and now lies in shallow water just off the stony shore. Its hull, covered in coral and fish, is a wreck that divers and snorkellers can reach straight from the beach.
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Ubud Monkey Forest
A forest sanctuary on the edge of Ubud, home to some 1,260 Balinese long-tailed macaques at the last count. Paths wind under tall trees past moss-covered temples, and the monkeys move freely among the visitors.
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Ujung Water Palace
A former palace of the Karangasem kings on Bali's east coast, laid out around large ornamental pools crossed by bridges. In Dutch colonial times it was simply called the Waterpaleis, and today it also goes by Ujung Park or Sukasada Park.
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West Bali National Park
A national park covering just over 190 square kilometres at Bali's western end, mostly land with the rest at sea. Its dry forests and mangroves are the last wild home of the Bali starling, and its reefs are among the island's best for diving.
Collecting in Bali
What are the best places to visit in Bali?
LOQAH lists 40 places in Bali. The best known include Lake Batur, Pura Taman Ayun, Pura Ulun Danu Batur, Besakih Temple and Kuta. Each has a stamp of its own to collect when you are there.
How many LOQAH stamps are there in Bali?
40, and more are added over time. Each place has LOQAH's carefully crafted stamp of its own.
How do I collect a stamp in Bali?
Open LOQAH at the place and get its stamp. LOQAH checks where you are once, at that moment; at the place itself the stamp is confirmed on site, with a gold badge.
I have been to places in Bali before. Can I add them?
Yes. In Earlier trips, choose Bali and swipe through its stamps, or import your Google Timeline. Each one goes into your volume with the date, if you know it.
More in Indonesia
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