Bali's Kuta experience

Why the Kuta scene in Bali is special
Some say Kuta is Bali's fun vacation spot, others go out of their way to avoid it. If you're young or young at heart and love being where the action is, you'll agree with the first assessment.

If you're older and more sedate, it is probably not the place to stay. The town is commercialized and is neither attractive nor romantic. Its main arteries are traffic clogged. Still, it warrants at least a brief visit. It gives those staying in quieter places a change of pace. It has interesting shopping and dining.

Kuta Beach
Nice sand and surf
The town is blessed with a long, beautiful white sand beach along the warm Indian Ocean. Two decades ago this beach was a tranquil paradise for sun worshipers, but today it is packed with tourists and many pushy hawkers.

Swimmers take note that the ocean undertows and riptides along Kuta Beach can be dangerous, particularly to inexpert swimmers. (For safety advice, click Beaches and read the page's "Swimming" paragraph.)

Kuta's nightlife
World famous
The most exciting time for a "check it out" visit to Kuta is after the sun goes down. Its streets, sidewalks, bars and clubs teem with energy. While the nightlife in the rest of Bali generally snoozes by 9 p.m., it pulses into the wee hours.

More Kuta tips and insights
Dining
It's usually easier to find foreign food (Chinese, Thai, pizza, etc.) than local cuisine. Two good bets for Balinese and Indonesian food are Kepupat and Made Warung.

Surfing
It's popular. You can do it on the waves near the beach or on those that break well beyond the shoreline at Kuta Reef.

Shopping
True, most of the shops stock tacky goods. However, Kuta has most of Bali's chic upscale designer boutiques - and prices are half those found in Paris and New York for equivalent style and quality.

Hotel accommodations
Lodging ranges from home stays (very inexpensive) to full service hotels (moderately expensive). You have to go elsewhere in Bali to find the island's luxury resorts.

Legian
This town adjoins Kuta. Like the latter, it's an overly developed beach resort town. The two have effectively (but not politically) merged into a single community. It's now difficult to tell where one town ends and the other begins

Though Legian is less known and slightly quieter of the two, much of what is said in the above paragraphs applies to both towns.

Tourism
The blasts in Kuta of October 2002 and 2005 put a heavy burden on the local and the overall island economies, which deeply depend on tourism money. Because the island has so much to offer travelers, I am confident that tourism will eventually bounce back to its former level.