Getting from Ubud to Amed in a private car

You might have read in our blogpost about celebrating New Year’s Eve in Ubud that we won a tour with the lucky draw at the NYE dinner of our hotel. Quite the price, as normally these private car tours cost about 750,000 IDR ($55). When looking through the tours they offered, Brecht had the genius idea to combine this with a transfer to Amed. Apparently getting from Ubud to Amed is quite expensive, so this was the perfect opportunity to save some money.

It was not a problem for the driver to drop us off at our hotel in Amed, but that meant we couldn’t really choose what to visit. No worries however, as we were planning on doing a motorbike day trip around Ubud anyway. On our private car tour we would drive through Sidemen and visit Tirta Gangga before getting to Amed. We agreed to depart at 10h in the morning at Anumana Ubud Hotel and have lunch on the road.

After about one hour in the car, we arrived at  Sidemen. There are supposed to be lots of beautiful viewpoints, but our driver wasn’t really familiar with the area. We did stop a few times to take pictures of the surrounding rice terraces, but we’ve probably missed out on some really nice views. We also drove through  Sibetan, known for the snakeskin fruit (or salak), but we didn’t make any stops there.

Around noon we had lunch at  DM Kuliner, a very cheap open air restaurant across from our next stop: Tirta Gangga. We both ordered nasi goreng (37,400 IDR for two). The food was quite good, but I wasn’t feeling very well. Because of that and the scalding hot day, we didn’t spent a lot of time at Tirta Gangga, even though it was very beautiful.

Tirta Gangga is known for its water palace, and literally means “water from the Ganges”. There are plenty of pools, fountains and statues, all surrounded by beautiful gardens. For a small charge, additional to the 20,000 IDR entrance fee per person, you can even take a swim!

To be honest, Sidemen wasn’t that memorable, but that’s probably because the driver didn’t take us to the right places. Tirta Gangga on the other hand is definitely worth a visit and on the way from Ubud to Amed. It’s only about half an hour from Amed, so you could also rent a motorbike there for a visit.