Some travellers looking for Bali ‘as it used to be’ (and continues to be advertised) might have the luxury of waiting for the arrival of time travel. But unless you count yourself among them, your best chance of an authentically Balinese experience is to base yourself beyond the island’s most popular destinations. Samsara Ubud, an LGBT-owned rainforest resort, is just 25 minutes from Bali’s spiritual centre – but it feels a world away.
At breakfast on the first morning of our stay at Samsara Ubud, we turned our head and looked out over the property’s grounds. We couldn’t help but notice just how elaborate the complex is. 17 villas (each with a dedicated, heated infinity pool) plunge into a forested valley, at the bottom of which a luxurious spa sits just steps from a natural stream.
From a construction point of view, the resort is ambitious enough that you could be forgiven for assuming it sits within one of the island’s more developed areas, where chain hotels rub shoulders with luxury condos. But nothing could be further from the truth. Here, in this special corner of the ‘Island of the Gods’, time has stood still and Balinese village life continues to play out at snail’s pace on all sides. Just off the resort grounds, local children ride bicycles down dirt paths that meander through a web of rice terraces, dogs guard their owners’ houses to varying degrees of virtue (many just doze in Indonesia’s high-octane sun), and raisin-skinned, elderly women lay down floral offerings to the Gods at a temple down the road.
The 30-degree decline of Samsara Ubud’s grounds means the highest-located of its villas sit some 45 metres above the lowest. “From concept to construction”, owner Bayu Sarwono told us during our stay, “some three years passed and blood, sweat and tears were shed”. Local architect Popo Danes is behind the show-stopping design, which is simultaneously modern and inspired by Balinese and Javanese traditions.
This harmonic blend has also found its way into the guest accommodations. Those in search of serene luxury hospitality won’t be disappointed: the villas, with their Makassar marble bathrooms, teak furnishings, king-size beds and 24-hour butler service offer all the mod-cons you might expect, while gated off walkways leading down to each accommodation’s entrance add an extra level of privacy. Samsara Ubud is home to 14 one-bedroom villas (122 sqm/1,313 sqft), two two-bedroom villas (198 sqm/2,132 sqft) and one three-bedroom villa (245 sqm/2,637 sqft) that comes with a fully equipped kitchen, lending itself to longer, multi-generational family holidays. Meanwhile, all accommodations feature spacious decks and outdoor showers perfect for a waterfall-style shower in the Balinese jungle.
| Perfect for | Fly into | Right on time |
| The Escapist | DPS | GMT +8 |
| While you’re Out There |
| You could easily visit the island’s famous rice terraces and some of its most sacred sites while staying at Samsara Ubud, but to get a sense of authentic Balinese village life, nothing beats a leisurely walk around the neighbourhood. And those looking for a bit of adventure would be well advised to go river rafting on the nearby Ayung River – the resort can arrange this for guests. |
If this is all sounding a bit like every other resort on the island, rest assured that the personal touch of owner Bayu has also informed the villas, and a few unexpected surprises make them markedly different from the five-star offering you might encounter elsewhere. For instance, after he’d finished a collection of poems, Bayu instructed his interior designer to include a traditional writer’s desk in some accommodations. The idea was for Samsara to be a “paradise for writers”, he told us, and we found ourselves thinking that the untamed rainforest views and a property-wide, restrained use of music that allows birdsong to be the hotel’s acoustic backdrop attest to a take on hospitality that invites rest, relaxation and even meditation (so do the rather special, blue dressing gowns guests will find on their villas, if you ask us).
On the culinary front, the resort’s open-air Kelusa restaurant serves a seductive blend of Indonesian and Mediterranean favourites backed by a soundtrack of international classics from La Vie en Rose to It’s a Wonderful World. We much preferred the Balinese flute music played at breakfast, which, in our case, consisted of fragrant local rice with fried vegetables and seriously addictive, protein-packed Indonesian tempeh. Though while Kelusa Restaurant is a treat, it’s the traditional Balinese high-tea – a multi-tiered feast of show-stopping proportions – that’s not to be missed. We ordered ours straight to our villa and had it poolside. Pure bliss.
The Chakra Spa at Samsara Ubud offers bliss of another kind, and escapists like ourselves will find everything from classic massages to infrared saunas and ice baths here (this is Bali, after all). There are three double treatment rooms alongside a gym with a dedicated yoga deck, should you be looking to burn off some of the treats. During our visit, this part of the hotel was partially under construction and felt a little deserted as a result. Not wanting to miss out on a workout, we instead swam a few laps in the cantilevered rainforest pool. Its waters were amazingly soft and, to us, felt exactly how the word Bali sounds. To further emphasise the sense of tranquility, birds and black butterflies conveniently flew from tree to tree in the canopy high above our heads.
Like any resort, Samsara Ubud also has a few things it can improve on. Sound insulation in the villas isn’t the best, and we’d rather not have heard a fellow guest’s TV late at night. And for a hotel so ambitious and fairly new, you might expect to find wall-mounted reading lights rather than bedside table lamps that illuminate the entire room. But we were more than willing to forgive the occasional mishap, not least because this isn’t another big-brand corporate hotel but a genuine passion project of a local with a vision. That vision is rather magical and it becomes most apparent in activations like Samsara Ubud’s open-air ‘Moonlight Cinema’, where guests come together over feel-good films and generous portions of popcorn while the stars twinkle in the sky above. Just divine.
Photography courtesy of Samsara Ubud
