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Nusa Dua is located at the Bukit Peninsula, about half an hour drive
to Kuta.
Nusa Dua nowadays is plush with more than a dozen 5-star luxurious
resort hotels and golf clubs. But it was nothing like that in the past.
After the big success in Sanur in the 70s, the
government was thinking where else can they develop another resort area.
In fact, both Kuta and Sanur are getting too crowded. Then, they chose
Nusa Dua.
Nusa Dua was a small village and had nothing. I read that the beautiful
fine sand beach in Nusa Dua was man-made. I don't know how because there
were lots of coral outside the
Grand Hyatt hotel I
stayed in. You can't migrate corals or grow coral in 20 years, I think?!
Anyway, in 1980, the first hotel in Nusa Dua - Hotel Bualu started, but it
wasn't part of the resort complex plan. It's not until 4 years later, the
government, the World Bank plus developers got all the capital and resources to
start building this paradise.
Yes, I will call it paradise because once you pass the welcoming gate to Nusa
Dua, the world has changed. Good, clean roads with lawn pavements, bicycle
tracks, stone statues and neat coconut trees along the roadside.
Over a dozen 5-star luxurious resort hotels were built and they were all along
this long stretch man-made-or-not beautiful beach.
I call Nusa Dua paradise also because you have to be happy to stay in this
paradise - relax by the swimming pool or beach If you like to go out and
explore, then Nusa Dua is too far away from anything. It's 30 minutes
drive to Kuta, a bit more than an hour to Ubud, the centre of art, and it's 2.5
hours to the Kintamani volcano.
Just opposite to the Grand Hyatt, there is a complex called Galleria which
has restaurants, supermarket and shops. It was probably very busy once
because even in Easter 2003 (a few months after the bomb attack and the SARS
disease was everywhere), there were many restaurants, shops and big department
store in Galleria. It was quite quiet but the restaurants were trying.
This year (July 2004), middle of summer vacation, the Galleria was dead.
Most shops were closed down. There were about half dozen restaurants left
We went to a restaurant in Bualu village and found out why. The restaurant
owner told us that he used to run a restaurant in Galleria but the rent is too
high. High rent means more expensive dishes, which means not so
attractive. Not to mention there is a big decrease of tourists to Bali
after the bomb. Bualu village becomes a comparative cheaper option to
Galleria. See my Eating in Bali
section.
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