Tropical Bliss at an affordable price in Ubud

Spending all of our Bali vacations in beach resort towns, we started thinking about making a change. Billed as the center of fine arts and cultural heritage, Ubud offers a different kind of tropical bliss. Instead of the main sea-sun-sand stream, it features a rice field, lush tropical forest, and river valley.

It was a bit disheartening to find that almost all travel agents reported that unlike other tourist areas in Bali, Ubud doesn’t have moderate vacation accommodations, they are cheap affordable backpacker motels or super luxurious like the Amandari with staffed guests. ratio of 7. Imagine, seven well-trained employees dedicated to serving each guest. I began to wonder what I want to order them to do if I am rich enough to try such a luxury. At a price ranging from $700 to $1,100 per room, I dared not imagine.

On the other hand, we are now addicted to the new style of vacation experience, private villas. The last time we spent our vacation in Sanur we learned that renting a private villa is not expensive at all. For less than $200 a night, we got a villa with two air-conditioned en-suite bathrooms, private pool, garden gazebo, spacious living room with large LCD screen, modern kitchen, and dedicated maids. We were wondering if we would find something similar up there in Ubud.

Thank goodness we live in the era where we have the wizard of unlimited resources: Google. Our research led us to talk to a few vacation rental agencies that offer wonderful options. It was a surprise to learn that renting through agents is not a penny more expensive than talking directly to landlords. Finally, through Ubud Villas Online, we found a huge private villa with a construction of 700 square meters located on a plot of 2200 square meters. In fact, since we didn’t see any neighbors, we actually had everyone alone.

Perched in a river valley, Villa Isabella offers unobstructed views of the river, valley, tropical forest, and rice paddy. With no further premises through the distance of our sight, we truly feel completely secluded to dissolve into nature. The two-story house was composed in such a way as to enjoy the view from almost every corner. For $250 a night we have three spacious bedrooms with terraces overlooking the valley, a lounge with a daybed that can also double as a bedroom, living and dining rooms, kitchen, private pool, and staff including a dedicated in-house cook.