Firstly let me say this is the second year in a row I have spent a week here with my family (wife and kids aged 3,7,9). I would return to Balian and stay here again, but ONLY for the location. The hotel and service could be significantly improved, especially given the price you pay.
For Balian, the accommodation is massively overpriced, you can easily stay almost anywhere else for 20-60% of what you pay at Pondok Pitaya and as far as I can tell, you’re paying just for the location.
The buildings (aside from the ugly river suite out the back) are quaint Javanese inspired, but are dark inside with little airflow and they feel dirty. The bathrooms are very rudimentary with industrial valves for taps, no plugs for the basin etc.
I noticed that since last year they have installed much better mosquito nets over all the beds, perhaps due to the increased incidence of dengue fever in the area.
The place is overrun with dogs. Personally I love dogs and the ones here are lovely, healthy and friendly so it’s a plus for me, but if you don’t like dogs, be warned.
The surf break averages 1 shark attack per year so that helps keep the crowds down :). Don’t swim or surf after rain as the rivermouth empties lots of disgusting detritus into the ocean and you’re likely to end up with hep-a, an ear infection or something worse.
GOOD
The location is amazing. The complex is literally on the beach with the restaurant and pool being just steps from the sand. While not great for swimming or lying around, the black sand beach has a certain beauty to it. The wave is super fun but can get reasonably heavy when it’s bigger. The included breakfast is pretty good. The ‘Healthy’ option has a fruit bowl with yoghurt and a sprinkling of granola with eggs any style a green juice has been my regular. Its a great place for kids, very safe, very open and our kids just ganged up with other kids also on holiday and roamed around in tribes from room to pool. If you can tolerate the heat, walks up and down the beach are great, sunsets from the headland by secret cove are also worth the walk. Watch the cloud of bats escape the cave at ~620-630 pm every night. Most of the rooms have a large covered balcony area you can sit on lounge style furniture and watch the surf. This is the main attraction of this place.
There is a large yoga studio which you can use when the classes are not on. I travel with my own matt and prefer my own schedule so didn’t attend a class (quite expensive at 125,000Rps), but the space is very nice.
BAD
Wifi is awful. It’s almost like they have only one access point for the entire resort. In order to access it you have to be sitting in the restaurant and even then it only seems to be reliable when you sit right by the reception side of the restaurant. Forget about getting wifi in your room. As well as being unreliable, it’s also very slow. The staff seem to know this, but the don’t really care.
They provide 4x 250ml water bottles per day and charge for refills. I personally travel with my own water bottles and try not to put more plastic into the ocean, but once again, they don’t seem to care here. Yes I know that it’s standard in Bali to pay for bottled water, but at the price you pay to stay here, they should have a 19l water dispenser bottle in each room. A 19l water tank costs 15,000Rps at the local store. Filling a 1l bottle at Pondok Pitaya costs 10,000Rps. Just leaves a bad taste in your mouth. I went and bought my own dispenser and put it in my room for 75,000Rps.
Aside from the included breakfast, don’t bother with the restaurant. There is no soul, care or love in the food and once again, it’s more expensive than anywhere else in Balian. Eat anywhere else. My pick is Deckies Warung a 2min stroll up the hill. Great view, great vibe, great food. Oh and it’s 1/2 the price.
The pool could be incredible but instead it’s poorly maintained, either overclorinated so it burns your eyes and turns your hair green, or under chlorinated so it gets filthy and slimy. Because the resort is so open, despite they signs saying ‘pool only for guests’ there are frequently many users of the pool who are not staying here.
They seem to run out of pool towels at about 11am, so don’t expect to get one if you’re late. Again the staff don’t seem to care…’maybe you try this afternoon’.
The beds are awful. If you’re a hot sleeper like me, it’s bad enough not having air conditioning and minimal airflow, but compounded with a cheap foam mattress it makes for some very hot sleeps. Again for what you are paying here, you should expect a decent mattress.
It’s not all bad. The staff are polite and friendly. Some of them do make an effort, but many are just going through the motions. Despite all the above, we have had a great week here for a second time and if there weren’t so many other places to explore, we would come back for a third year 🙂
