Day Trips from Canggu: The Highlands Loop, Ubud, Uluwatu, and Why Nusa Penida Starts at Sanur

Canggu is a good base for the west and centre of the island and a poor one for the far east. The limiting factor on every trip is the road out: the lanes that connect Canggu to the main roads are narrow and jammed from mid-morning, so the difference between leaving at 6:30 and leaving at 9 is often an hour on the day.

The most natural day from Canggu goes north into the hills. Jatiluwih's terraces, UNESCO-listed and vast, are about an hour and a half away and are best walked before the heat. From there it is forty minutes up to Ulun Danu Beratan, the lake temple with the pagodas that appear to float, which is cool, often misty, and busy from late morning.

Come back down to the coast for the end of the day at Tanah Lot, timed for the tide and the sunset. It is a long day and a complete one.

Ubud is an hour east and the standard day there from the coast covers the Tegallalang terraces, a temple or two along the Pakerisan river, the Monkey Forest, and a waterfall. It works. It is also a lot, and it means arriving at the popular sites in the same mid-morning window as everyone else.

If Ubud is a priority, one night there beats a day trip: you get the early hours at the terraces and the temples before the coaches, which is when they are best.

Uluwatu is an hour to an hour and a half south, longer through the airport bottleneck in the afternoon. The classic evening is the clifftop temple at golden hour and the Kecak fire dance as the sun goes down, with a cliff beach in the afternoon before it.

Because the payoff is at sunset, it makes sense to leave Canggu after lunch and come back after dark, when the roads have cleared.

Boats to Nusa Penida leave from Sanur on the east side of the south coast, which from Canggu is forty-five minutes to an hour before you have even left the mainland. Add the 45-minute boat and the day on the island's rough roads, and it is a twelve-hour outing with a 6am start.

It is worth doing. It is more worth doing with a night on the island, and the tours listed here for Penida include both day-trip and overnight versions for that reason.