Kimberley Trip, Day 3: Nusa Dua

Saturday, May 25, 2024

We decided to stay close to the hotel for our next day. The Grand Hyatt has several pools of different styles that we had walked around but had yet to experience. After breakfast, we pulled on our swimsuits and checked out the “main pool,” which was refreshing. However, we’re not people who sit by the pool for long.

After getting dressed again, we remembered that we had been advised to get a small amount of Indonesian cash, known as rupiah, for the trip. There are about 16,000 rupiah per US dollar, so it’s easy to feel like a millionaire! We tried the ATM at the hotel, and despite being able to operate it in “English,” we couldn’t figure out how to operate it. Part of the problem was that the on-screen labels were offset from the buttons, but also, there wasn’t something that said, “get cash from checking” or something to that effect. We gave up and decided to pursue this elsewhere.

We then walked across the street to the Bali Collection, an open-air shopping mall. We were disappointed—there were many spas and more restaurants than necessary. We had lunch there at a place that was fine but didn’t deserve its high Google rating. We purchased some chocolate bars and decided to exchange a few US dollars for rupiah rather than fight with another ATM.

Our friends Dave and Jan showed up at the hotel in the afternoon and told us that a cruise desk had been set up. We checked in at the desk and found out about the group dinner in the evening that was mentioned on the tour schedule. We also found out, to our surprise, that we should have our bags packed to be picked up by 7 am (!), have breakfast at 7, and prepare for a bus tour to Ubud (!!) on Sunday.

We returned to our rooms, dressed, and walked out to the beach for dinner to meet some of our fellow cruise passengers and some staff. We quickly found Dave and Jan at a relatively empty table and were joined by a few other couples. The buffet-style dinner was entirely in keeping with Lindblad’s high standards.

This article is part of a series about our recent trip to Indonesia and Australia. To see the introductory article in the series, click here.