Munduk is a village in an area with lots a nature, waterfalls and ricefields. And after Canggu we were craving some nature, authenticity and peace and quiet. Which we certainly found around here. We did a lot in this area, so there will be multiple blogs about Munduk and it’s surroundings. This one is about the people.

Where we stayed

We stayed in Adhitya Dharma Guesthouse. A lovely small, family run place, in the middle of a lot of ricefields. It was actually not in Munduk, but in Banyuatis, which is close to Munduk. The views from the guesthouse were stunning.

We always love these family run places: you get to know a lot about the local culture, the hospitality is often incredible, and now that we have a child: there are play pals for our daughter.

Traveling with a child? Definitely sleep at some homestays and family run guesthouses!

The market in Tamansari

One morning we went to the biggest market in the area. We love local markets. Exotic food items, fruits unknown to us (like the delicious Salak fruit, aka snakeskin fruit), colorful characters. There’s always so much to see. In this case there even was some guy walking around the market with a speaker and a microphone, singing karaoke. Good way to brighten the day.

Working on the ricefields

There were plenty of rice fields around where we stayed. And we learned a lot about cultivating and harvesting rice. Did you know one field around here yields about 40kg of rice? If you see everything that has to be done (plowing, planting the rice, harvesting, seperating the rice from the husk (by hand!)), and how little the rice will be worth, you’ll understand that it’s not an easy life.That’s one of the reasons you’ll see a lot of older people doing this work: the young generation doesn’t want to do this heavy work anymore.

Authentic Bali

After visiting the Munduk area we were able to conclude that lucky enough: there are still plenty of places you can experience the real life on Bali, without the hordes of tourists.

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