Bali in August- where to go and where to stay

[Liberty01]

Thank you for your replies.

Should I bring USD or Euro? And better change money at the airport or in Lembongan?
By the way, any recommendations on where to stay for an early-morning flight from the airport?

Cheers,
Liberty

 

[Cali_diver]

Thank you for your replies.

Should I bring USD or Euro? And better change money at the airport or in Lembongan?
By the way, any recommendations on where to stay for an early-morning flight from the airport?

Cheers,
Liberty

I would do it at the airport for sure.

 

[billt4sf]

Thank you for your replies.

Should I bring USD or Euro? And better change money at the airport or in Lembongan?
By the way, any recommendations on where to stay for an early-morning flight from the airport?

Cheers,
Liberty

Liberty, most Lembongan websites say you need cash there because there are no reliable ATMs.

Wherever you use an ATM, look carefully to see that there is no device attached to that ATM card slot that could scan your card as you put it in, then they get your card info and can make withdrawals. My driver says they are particularly prevalent at the airport.

- Bill

 

[Luko]

Thank you for your replies.

Should I bring USD or Euro? And better change money at the airport or in Lembongan?
By the way, any recommendations on where to stay for an early-morning flight from the airport?

You'll probably need to take a car/driver from the airport to the Lembongan speedboat.
What I usually do is that I ask my driver to change money on the way (either Kuta or Sanur) where the exchange rate is usually better than at the airport for instance if you take the frst money changer on the way close to the surf outlets, 5min away from the aiport you would already get anything from 300 to 500IDR better rate than at the airport, .

 

[Lorenzoid]

When we passed through the area a couple of weeks ago (including taking the Sanur-Lembongan boat with Rocky Fast Cruise), the difference in exchange rate between the best and worst moneychangers (as far as we could find) was no more than 500 IDR per US dollar, which is somewhere around four or five cents per dollar. The rate at the airport kiosks is really not that bad--some hotels offer a worse rate. After the first time we spent an hour combing the sweltering hot streets looking for the "best" rate, we changed our thinking and started using ATMs purely for convenience. I am generally thrifty, but a few cents per dollar/euro is not worth an hour of my time. On the way to the boat, we had our driver stop at an ATM.

 

[Lorenzoid]

Liberty, most Lembongan websites say you need cash there because there are no reliable ATMs.

We saw only one ATM on Lembongan, though there may be another somewhere on the island. It happened to be on the route between our lodging and a place we liked to go for a sunset drink, so we passed by several times. Each time we saw people having difficulty--either it wasn't working or was out of bills. Yes, as all the travel web sites advise, bring cash to Lembongan.

Ah, one more thought: For some reason we expected food prices to be lower on Lembongan--we figured that the food options would be limited to rustic warungs and therefore cheaper. Not so. There are plenty of warungs geared toward well-heeled Western vacationers. Even the rustic ones charged about the same prices for the usual suspects--nasi goreng, mee goreng, gado gado, sate, etc.--as on Bali.