Anycase back to the empty drawing board....Sigh.
Rewrite...with half the humor and wit depleted.
This time round in our annual Oct trip, we headed for Bali. It has been a decade since our last visit and though we never did like Bali for its crowded expat volume as well as its touting and less than ideal sea conditions, we thought we will give it another go except my man decided to up the notch of pampering and booked us in AmanKila. We had really loved our Aman resort experience with 2 earlier resorts and this time round proved to be no exception.
Love it. Love it. Love it.
I guess if you are one of those like us who are just dying to get away from crowd especially loud noisy ones, want to feel like you own the compound with the sort of privacy and exclusivity and has the extra cash to pamper yourself, then you will love Aman resort for everything it lived up to.
It isnt cheap at about US1200++ anite but you get what you pay for, and practically the closest feeling of owning the whole resort without actually owning one. However, you get what you pay for. Excellent service. Privacy. Tranquil setting. No fuss, no hassle. Smooth logistics all the way especially at the airport where we were spared the horrendous long immigration Q that looks like a wait for hours with the masses, and we only had to wait for the Aman staff to clear the immigration for us under 5 mins. I was surprised that he even met us right where we step off the plane and guide us to another separate fast lane that lead us past the crowd and out off the airport when I was only expecting to see him after i stand in line through the immigration. I guess shelving out the dole at times has its benefits...
Apart from having a huge compound nestled in the midst of the coconut plantation and perched high up on the cliff facing the Lombok Straits, the resort has 35villas and frankly, at any one time, I felt like we are practically alone or have only one or two other couple sharing the place. Yet the truth is, I had counted at least 10 different couples at different times different days but I had never seen them all at one place at any one time.
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| Local gals are employed as flower gals, basically just to prepare flower rings to welcome guests and during eve time. Very sweet! |
For the whole week, I never have to share the pool once. My own pool by the beach. Nice!
There is another 45m single pool located at the foot of the cliff near the Beach club. We checked out the beach and it isnt as nice as Phuket though the sand was still fine and soft, it just wasnt as inviting with such strong pushy waves.
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| 45m pool length view |
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| 45m side view from beach club house |
We were told we had the best villa on the whole compound. We had the best uninterrupted ocean view from our patio and room, and at the highest vintage point. That is good too because I am furthest from the break waves and being light sleeper, that work out well.
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| View from our Villa 37 |
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| Fresh welcome flowers! |
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| Lunch time..restaurant all to ourselves almost everyday. |
The amazing and astounding feat is that we never quite figured out how all the staff at the dining area and enquires desk are able to address us by names and room without us saying a thing. We are always greeted by name before shown to our seat. They must have amazing guest description communication briefing every day since there is no photo for them to rely on!!! It's a well appreciated secret that did not gone unnoticed!
Room aspect it was nicely spacious and they kept changing the free flip flop to a point I felt i was very ungreen and had to stash the used one so that I can reuse it. The rooms are broken into 3 segments, first with the sleeping/ study desk/ lounging bed area, then the 2nd area with free refreshment bar area/ lounging bed/ shower/pee area and lastly the sink/changing area.
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| Poster bed with sea view |
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| Changing area at the back |
Repellent was provided but I had no encounters with any mozzies. I love their song collections in their ipod provided in the room. Tv can be requested. The only problem for me sleeping in a poster bed was that I walked right into the column on the first night after I wanted to crawl back to bed after peeing. Wham Bang! Hard enough to wake my husband up but being so tired, I just curled up back to sleep and nurse the bump the next morning!
Housekeeping is so discrete and timely. They dont ever knock on your door. Never. What they do is to wait at the foot of the stairs where the guests will pass, and once they see the couple out of the room, they dashed up to clean up the room like those magical domestic elves!!
During 4pm, there are refreshments by the poolside. I was too lazy to wait for staff on hand so I part time as tea lady. Lol!
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| Free Refreshment during the 4-5pm slot. |
At night, we had a Welcome Dance, which is a traditional ceremony dance of the Gods. It was lovely!
Realised that Fresh vegetables are really not a part of Balinese diet. Couldnt get much greens there. However, I love my Ayam Goreng, curry and Nasi Goreng. Yum! Their Passionfruit refilled daily was the best!!! My only gripe about the resort if I must is that menu variety could be wider. One page of western and one page of Balinese. I guess they didnt want to overstock.
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| My Balinese breakie. Fresh Egg porridge. |
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| Balinese Dinner with Steamed Fish and curry. |
One of the days in the week, we went on free sight seeing trip within East Bali. Nothing much quite frankly. saw a wedding procession.
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| Wedding procession |
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| The carps all flocked to me for no reason as I posed for my shot! |
By the end of the week, I was sad to leave after the week flashed by so quickly. I was so tired after every day sun lounging that I didnt even get any reading done. Terrible me.... I was alittle too brown before I left and the staff kindly went to their nursery and plucked a few stalk of FRESH aloe vera for me to apply on my tanned area. After that, it was free cookies on the way, listening to my fav music on their supplied ipod while surfing with the portable free wifi in the car.