Bali Travel Guide

Written by baliassociates
Tuesday, 29 May 2007
Bali -where religion is the source of traditional customs in everyday life. A vibrant culture, unique arts and ceremonies, a gentle and friendly people and spectacular scenery make Bali one of the premier travel destinations in the world. Come to Bali to learn for yourself how beautiful it is. It needs more pages to describe the wonders and magic of Bali in words. Here is a glance info about Bali:

The Island, Where, Width and Population

Bali is one of the 17,000 Islands of Indonesia, located between 8 and 9 degree south of the Equator. It takes 3 hours flight from Singapore or 5 hours from Sydney or 4 hours from Hong Kong and 8 hours from Tokyo, those closest cities in the pacific. There are direct and some connects flights from Europe, North and South America as well as Africa. A very narrow strait, called the strait of Bali, joins the Indian (Indonesia) ocean and the Java sea, separating Bali from Java. Bali’s total area is slightly more than 2000 square miles. According to the latest census Bali’s population is three million five hundred thousand people.

Topography, rice fields, mountains and beaches

The mountain range is from Batukaru in the west and Gunung Agung in the East while in the center there are lakes which divides Bali into two plains, the Northern and the Southern plains. The Northern plain is much narrower, hilly and dry so that there is no much wet rice culture possible and yet the people here like in the rest of Bali live from agriculture. The mountain in some places comes right to the sea, the coast is swampy in the West, alternately sandy and full of pebbles in the center and rocky in the East. There are few beaches here good for swimming as well as snorkeling and diving.
The Gunung Batur is very active volcano. In this century it erupted in 1905, 1926 and 1963 when it kept erupting till 1974. One of its many craters once in a while emits smoke. The highest Volcano - Mt. Agung was quite for more that 150 years, but it was certainly not dead yet. It erupted suddenly in 18 February 1965 when Bali was about to have a big purification ceremony, called Eka Desa Rudra, which is to be held every 100 years. The previous eruption must be 1811, because this was mentioned in the book, the history of Java, written by Raffles, when he was Governor General of Indonesia.

The center part of Bali are most fertile and in these regions the tourists can see the most beautiful rice field terraces. This part of Bali is, no wonder, called the rice belt of the Island. The South part lies white sandy beaches where mostly hotels are located such as : Nusa Dua, Jimbaran, Kuta, Legian and Sanur area.
To the South-East of central Bali lies the arid island of Nusa Penida, Nusa Lembongan which used for snorkeling, beaching by most of Cruises company.

Flora and Fauna
Bali is though to be the last island of Wallace line that separates the flora and fauna of Mainland Asia and Australia, but in Bali there are no kakatoe birds, but one finds plenty of them in the islands East of Bali, e.g. in Sumba and Flores. A very few are found in Nusa Penida. There are more snakes and beautiful myna colored birds. The Australian flora and fauna are supposed to begin in Lombok, the island just East of Bali. In Nusa Penida one occasionally sees the white kakatoe and the Horned bill; a bird with very large beak, too big in proportion with the head, and the body.

Religion

Most population of Bali (90%) are Hindu and the others are Catholic, Protestant, Moslem and Buddhist. The Hinduism in Bali mixed with local tradition and culture, thus almost everyday you can find ceremony or festival.
The Balinese will be accompanied by rituals from birth to death. The birth is celebrated through the "penyambutan" ceremony, The three Month ceremony when the child is allowed to touch the ground an given the name. Every six month celebrate otonan (birth day), after the adulation they have 'tooth filling' ceremony then wedding ceremony.
As we are Hindu we have also Cremation ceremony, if some one died we will cremate the death body. Common people said that through cremation the soul can go the Heaven.
Temples, houses and other building are celebrated every 210 days (6 month) as the anniversary ceremony. You can easily find ceremony almost everyday. This is one of the main reason why travelers come to bali.

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