Golden Hour at Tanah Lot

Located in the south of Bali, Kuta is the island’s largest city and, as such, is overcrowded with both tourists and locals. After five blissful days in quiet Lovina, it’s unpleasant to hear constant horns and encounter crowds at every turn.

Once again I show up without hotel reservations but manage to find an okay deal. There are two narrow and winding tourist streets in Kuta (Poppies I and Poppies II) that are lined with hotels and guesthouses. My room is both pricier and not as nice as the little paradise hotel I found in Lovina, but it’ll do. I arrive just before sunset and admire the view from the third floor:

Kuta’s main beach is busy nearly 24/7. I walk around twice to take photos — once at sunset and again mid-day — and then leave the crowds to themselves.

It’s a popular surfer’s beach:

For the first time in awhile, I find a Starbucks — and they have an unusual item on the menu: iced caramel coffee jelly latte.

Spoiler alert: it’s gross.

But this lunch is delicious:

As are these meals:

Okay, back on track — I’ve come to Kuta primarily to visit the iconic Tanah Lot temple, which is about 45 minutes away by car.

Note: you can also visit Tanah Lot as a day trip from Ubud and skip Kuta entirely (save for the airport, which you’ll likely fly in or out of)… I’d recommend this.

I inquire everywhere — both in person and on-line — for the cheapest way to get to Tanah Lot. I can’t find a public bus route. There aren’t even organized tours for sunset (actually I do find one but no one else had signed up and they understandably won’t operate with only one passenger). So I resort to a taxi ride there and back.

After haggling with travel desks up and down Poppies II, I end up paying around $16 USD (or 175,000 IDR) for the taxi. My driver is great and even stops at a Target-like store on the way back so I can pick up some items.

He drops me off about 90 minutes before sunset with advice to return the second sunset is over… otherwise we’ll be sitting in traffic with hundreds of other people on the way back to Kuta.

I begin just north of Tanah Lot temple and stroll along the beachside path, admiring other (smaller) temples and scenic lookouts along the way.

There she is! Tanah Lot in all her glory:

The temple was built on this rock island in the 1400s. Over centuries, water has chipped away at the base of the rock, and in 1980 the Japanese government gave the Balinese the equivalent of $130 million USD to preserve the island’s structure. Some of the “rock” closest to the sea is actually artificial for stabilization purpose — although you’d never know it just by looking.