Finding Quiet in Bali's Rice Country
Trade the beach clubs for the hills above Ubud, where the terraces glow impossible shades of green and the days slow right down.
Everyone arrives in Bali with an image in their head. For a lot of people it's a beach club in Canggu. For us, it was the rice terraces above Ubud — and it turned out the postcard was, for once, underselling it.
Beat the terraces crowd
Tegallalang is the famous one, and by ten in the morning it's a scrum of selfie sticks. So don't go at ten. Go at seven, when the light is low and gold and the only people about are the farmers already knee-deep in the paddies.
The terraces aren't a photo op to the people who tend them — they're a thousand-year-old irrigation system called subak, and they're still working exactly as designed.
Where to actually stay
Ubud town has grown busy, but you only need to go ten minutes out to find the Bali people fall in love with:
- Wake to the paddies. Plenty of guesthouses sit right on the edge of the fields; the sound of frogs and running water beats any alarm clock.
- Rent a scooter (and wear the helmet) to reach the quieter terraces at Jatiluwih, a UNESCO site with barely a soul around.
- Eat where the locals do — a simple warung plate of nasi campur is better than most of the fancy cafés, and a tenth of the price.
Ubud is great!
Bali's rice country isn't a place you "do." It's a place you sit in — over a slow coffee, on a temple step, watching the light move across the green. Give it a few unhurried days and it recalibrates something in you.
Then, if you must, go find your beach club. You'll appreciate it more.