Indonesia Family Travel Guide

The south is very busy now. Kuta, Seminyak, Canggu and the road to the airport. Traffic that does not move, beach clubs, and a scooter every three feet. If you have seen the reels about Bali being ruined, this is the strip they mean, and it is a small part of the island.

Ubud and inland is where we stayed and where I would send you. Rice fields, temples, art villages, a fifteen minute drive to town. It is busier than it was in 2009 and it is still calm compared to the coast.

The east and north are the quiet Bali. Amed, Sidemen, Lovina. Black sand, volcano views, almost nobody. This is the Bali people describe when they talk about how it used to be, and it still exists.

Pick one base, not three. Distances look small and take three times as long as the map says. Ten days is comfortably a week inland and three nights at the coast.

The hard sell is real and it is worse in the south. Firm, friendly, keep walking. It is a job, not an insult. Inland it is much lighter.

Borobudur is the largest Buddhist temple on earth. Ninth century, stone terraces, hundreds of Buddhas in bell shaped stupas. An hour from Yogyakarta. Go at opening, not at the marketed sunrise slot, which costs a lot more than it is worth.

Prambanan is thirty minutes the other way. A Hindu complex of tall stone spires, and pairing the two in one day is the most efficient culture day in the country.

Mount Bromo and Ijen are the volcanoes. Bromo at sunrise from the viewpoint is one of the great sights in Asia. It is a two in the morning start in the cold and children under about ten will hate it.

Java has trains and they are good. Jakarta to Yogyakarta by rail is comfortable, cheap and scenic, and it is the easiest overland travel in the country by a distance.

Bali to Labuan Bajo for Komodo is an hour and a half. That one is easy, and a two or three night boat trip out of Labuan Bajo to Padar and Komodo is the best add on in the country.

Bali to the Gilis is a fast boat, not a flight. Two to three hours, and it can be a rough crossing. Our five hour ferry to Lombok in 2009 was cheaper, slower and much less comfortable, and the Gilis are the calmer version of it.

Sumatra and Borneo are separate trips. Orangutans in Sumatra or Kalimantan means long flights and internal transfers. Do not staple it onto a Bali trip.

Two islands is the honest maximum for two weeks. Bali plus Java, or Bali plus Komodo, or Bali plus Lombok and the Gilis. Not three.

Hire a driver for the day and stop thinking about it. We paid fifty dollars in 2009 and the going rate is still modest. A car, a driver and as many stops as you want beats six separate taxi negotiations, and it is what almost every visiting family should do.

Grab and Gojek work in the cities. Fixed prices and no haggling. Some areas of Bali have local transport associations that block app pickups, so your hotel may quietly tell you to walk a block.

Do not put your family on scooters. Everybody does it, the traffic is chaotic, and I have read enough claims about foreign scooter accidents to be blunt about it. Helmets are often ignored and your travel insurance may not cover you without the right license.

Fast boats to the Gilis and Nusa Penida are weather dependent. Book the morning crossing, take the bigger operator, and build a spare day in case it gets cancelled.

Visa on arrival is straightforward. Most nationalities pay a modest fee for thirty days, extendable once. Expect a line at Denpasar. Ours took forty five minutes in 2009 and it has not got faster.

The villa is the reason to come. A private pool villa in Ubud for a family costs less than a mid range hotel room in Europe. This is the country where the accommodation is the experience.

Food is cheap unless you make it expensive. A warung meal is a couple of dollars. The beach clubs in the south charge western prices and are not better.

Bargaining is expected in markets. It never quite feels like you won and that is normal. Fixed price shops exist. Pay a fair price and move on.

Carry cash outside the tourist strips. Cards work in hotels and restaurants in the south. Warungs, drivers, markets and boats are cash.

Indonesia adores children. Staff will carry your toddler around the restaurant. It is warm and it is constant and it is one of the easiest countries in Asia to arrive in with small kids.

The pool is the itinerary. Two temples and a rice terrace walk is a full day in that heat. Book somewhere with water and plan around the middle of the day.

Be careful at the monkey forest. The macaques will take sunglasses, phones and snacks straight out of a child’s hands, and a bite means a rabies conversation. Nothing loose, nothing shiny, no food.

Street dogs are everywhere. They were in 2009 and they still are. Teach the kids not to approach them, for the same reason.

Choose the beach carefully. The south coast has serious surf and rips. For small children, the calm water is on the east coast, at Sanur, and on the Gilis.

Versus Thailand. Thailand is more organized, has better internal flights and easier islands. Bali has better value villas and a stronger sense of place. For a first Southeast Asia trip with kids I would still pick Thailand. For a second one, Bali.

Versus Malaysia. Malaysia is easier in every practical way. Better roads, more English, no hard sell. Bali is prettier and warmer in spirit. Malaysia is the sensible one, Bali is the one you fall for.

Versus Vietnam. Vietnam is a moving trip, north to south. Indonesia is a staying trip. If your family likes to unpack once, this is the one.

Versus Singapore. Two and a half hours apart and complete opposites. Singapore is the easiest place in Asia to land. Pairing them gives you order at one end and none at the other.

Nyepi shuts the entire island. Balinese new year is a full day of silence. No flights, no cars, no lights, nobody outside, including you, in your hotel. It is amazing and it is a disaster if you did not know.

There is no rubbish collection in a lot of places. In 2009 everything was burned in cement pits at the roadside and the smoke was constant. It has improved and it has not gone away.

Those enormous houses are not wealth. A Balinese family compound holds four generations, and every household has its own temple. Big walls, sparse rooms.

Sarongs at every temple, men included. They are lent at the gate. Shoulders covered. Nobody makes an exception for tourists and nobody should.

They drive on the left. It catches Americans out at every single junction, on foot as much as in a car.

Religion varies drastically by island. Bali is over 80 percent Hindu, a rarity in a country that is otherwise majority Muslim, and it shapes everything from the offerings on the sidewalk to the temple ceremonies down the street.

Wayang kulit shadow puppetry is centuries old. Performances can run all night, telling stories from the Ramayana with leather puppets, a gamelan orchestra, and a single narrator voicing every character.

Gamelan is the sound of the country. The bronze percussion orchestra shows up at temple ceremonies, weddings, and tourist shows alike, and it is worth hearing live at least once.

Balinese Hinduism runs on its own 210 day calendar. Temple ceremonies called odalan happen constantly, and stumbling into one, with its offerings and processions, is one of the best accidental experiences on the island.

Fly into Bali, not Jakarta, for a first trip. Denpasar has far better tourist infrastructure, and routing through Jakarta first adds a day of traffic most families do not need.

Yogyakarta is the add on that is worth the extra flight. A 90 minute hop from Bali gets you Borobudur, Prambanan, and Mount Bromo, none of which you can reach from the beach towns.

Komodo needs its own multi day block. It is a boat trip from Bali or Flores, not a day trip. Budget three or four days if you want the dragons and the pink beach both.

Do not try to cover more than two regions in ten days. Domestic flights are cheap, but the distances are real, and trying to island hop fast just burns the whole trip in airports.

A private villa in Ubud with its own pool. This is where Bali dollars go the furthest, and a family villa with a private pool and staff can cost less than a mid range hotel room back home.

A liveaboard boat to Komodo. A multi day liveaboard with a private cabin turns a rushed day trip into a real expedition, snorkeling and diving stops included.

A driver for the whole trip, not just airport transfers. Hiring a driver by the day removes the hardest part of traveling here, the traffic and the logistics, for less than a rental car costs at home.

A private batik or silver making class in Yogyakarta. A one on one lesson with a real artisan costs a fraction of what the same experience would run in a Western city.