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It is a dream to be here. Come and visit the island of the gods - spend your holidays with us. Fill out the form and send us your request, we will get back to you as soon as possible. We can only promise you great moments and unforgettable holidays with us.
Bali's hot and humid monsoon climate and fertile volcanic soil are ideal for rice cultivation. They are particularly beautiful in the centre of the island and around Ubud: rice terraces that stretch up from the valleys into the mountainsides. The Balinese called them ladders to heaven, UNESCO considers them a unique world cultural heritage. About a quarter of the island's surface is covered by the pale green shining rice plants, which are even cultivated on the slopes of the volcanoes and along the coast.
No wonder that rice, which can be harvested three times a year on Bali, has many names on the island: Padi is what it is called in the field, Jijih when it is harvested, Beras when it is milled, and Nasi when it is cooked. Cultivation and harvesting of Bali's staple food is highly ritualised. On ancient lontar palm leaves it is already written in Sanskrit when and how to plant the seedlings, how to harvest. The irrigation of the fields is unique. The techniques used to channel the spring water that rises in the mountains to the plants ensure that rice is grown fairly. Water, revered by the Balinese as the epitome of the divine, floods in crystal-clear streams the rice fields that cover the slopes of the mountains and volcanoes in the interior of the island. Subak is the name given to the system that balances the irrigation of the rice fields and ensures that the water brought down from the mountains in elaborate canals and sluices finds its way to the smallest and most remote rice plots and not just to the rice fields of the rich stretching to the horizon.
Hard work
What is so enchanting to look at, however, also means a lot of effort. The earnings from the rice fields are extremely low, and the work sometimes barely feeds the families. The sale of rice fields to real estate speculators and the migration of families to urban areas are also a threatening development in Bali. You don't notice the problems when you walk through the countryside on small paths and encounter only ducks waddling through the fields next to farmers. The animals eat weeds sprouting between the rice plants as well as small snails and insects and are a biological and effortless way of pest control for the Balinese. You can recognise ripe rice fields by the fact that the colour of the helmets changes to yellow. Time to harvest!
A walk in the rice terraces
Small streams and waterfalls gurgle, lilies bloom along the way, ferns and bamboo grow metres high. The rice fields shimmer bright green. Above it all, Devi Sri watches over the fields: bamboo shrines with so-called "Cilis" dedicated to the goddess of fertility and rice cultivation. Devi Sri brings the monsoon and sometimes appears in the dreams of the Balinese who turn to her with trust. Bundles of rice stalks tied together in the middle, thus showing the narrow waist of the goddess, symbolise her in the shrine with a triangular face and suggested skirt.
