Crystal Bay: The Swim, the Snorkel from the Beach, the Sunfish Season, and the Current

Crystal Bay is a horseshoe of white sand on Nusa Penida's west coast, framed by two headlands with a small rock island in the mouth, and it is the one beach on the island where you can simply walk in and swim. Coconut palms, a few warungs with loungers, and the sun setting straight out of the bay make it the natural end to a west-side day. It is the busiest beach on Penida by mid-afternoon, which on Penida still means a few hundred people.

Off the beach to the sides of the bay there is coral in two to six metres with the usual reef fish, and it is worth a mask for an hour at mid to high tide. The snorkelling boats that run the west coast use the outer bay as one of their three stops with Manta Point and Gamat Bay, where the coral is better and the water clearer. The current outside the headlands is strong and runs along the coast; snorkellers who drift out of the bay get into trouble, so stay inside the line of the headlands unless you are with a boat.

Crystal Bay is one of the few places in the world where the oceanic sunfish, mola mola, can be seen with some reliability. Between July and October, cold water wells up from the deep channel and the fish, which can be two metres across, rise to cleaning stations on the reef wall at 20 to 40 metres. It is a dive, not a snorkel, the water at depth can be 18 to 20°C, and the current on the wall is serious; it is for certified divers with an operator who knows the site. Dive days from Bali and Penida run to it through the season; see the manta and snorkelling guide for the boats.

Thirty minutes from the harbour and twenty from Kelingking, so it closes the west-side loop; the standard day arrives here at about 2:00 for a swim and lunch. There is a small parking fee and the warungs rent loungers. Sunset is at about 6:15 and the last boats from the harbour leave earlier, so day-trippers see the afternoon, not the sunset; that is one of the arguments in the day trip or overnight guide.