Should you stay in Jimbaran or Nusa Dua?

Both sit on the calm eastern side of the southern peninsula, both have swimmable water, and both are close to the airport. That is where the similarity ends.

Jimbaran

A long curved bay with a working fish market at one end, a strip of seafood warungs along the sand, resorts at the northern end and a lot of ordinary Balinese life behind the beachfront.

The seafood dinner is the thing: tables on the sand at sunset, fish chosen from ice and grilled over coconut husks, feet in the water. It is touristic, it is enormously popular, and it is genuinely good if you pick a busy place and agree the price per kilo before they cook.

The beach is wide, flat and calm, with gentle water suitable for swimming and small children. The northern end near the resorts is cleaner; the southern end near the fish market is a working shore.

The area has no real centre. You will use a scooter or a driver.

Stay here if you want calm water, a short transfer and a mix of local life and resorts. Avoid if you want to walk to a nightlife scene.

Nusa Dua

A planned enclave built in the 1970s, gated, landscaped, with a security checkpoint at the entrance and international chain resorts along a manicured beach.

The beach is the calmest in southern Bali, protected by reef, shallow and clean, with a paved promenade running the length of it.

The area is entirely resort infrastructure: hotels, a convention centre, a shopping complex, a golf course, the water blow at the headland. Outside the gates, Bualu and Benoa are ordinary Balinese towns.

The toll road connects it to the airport in 25 to 40 minutes, which is quicker and more predictable than anywhere on the west coast.

Wet-season surf. The reef breaks off Nusa Dua and nearby Serangan work best from November to March, when the west coast is blown out. For surfers visiting in wet season this is the right side of the island.

Stay here if you want a resort holiday with no logistics, reliable calm water and short transfers. Avoid if you want to feel like you are in Bali rather than in a well-run enclave.

The comparison

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Benoa and Tanjung Benoa

North of Nusa Dua, the water-sports strip: jet skis, parasailing, banana boats, and boats out to Turtle Island. Busy, commercial, and the right place if you want an afternoon of that. The calm water makes it the safest place in Bali for those activities.

Getting to the rest of Bali

Both are on the wrong side of the traffic for Canggu and Seminyak, which are 45 to 75 minutes away. Uluwatu is 30 to 45 minutes. Ubud is 75 to 100. If your trip is mostly the south and you want to move around, these are less convenient bases than Seminyak.

The seafood dinner, properly

The warungs at Jimbaran sell by the kilo from ice. The routine that avoids the two common complaints: pick a place that is busy, choose your fish yourself, confirm the price per kilogram and the total weight before it goes on the grill, and check whether rice, sambal and vegetables are included or charged separately.

Sunset is the popular slot and tables on the sand fill from about 5.30pm in high season. The fish is grilled over coconut husk, which is what gives it the smell that carries down the beach.

The water blow and the headland

At the southern end of Nusa Dua, the limestone headland at the water blow funnels swell into a spout that fires spray over the cliff. It takes twenty minutes, it is free or nearly, and on a big swell day it is genuinely impressive.

Who should choose neither

If your trip is built around Canggu, Seminyak and the west-coast scene, both of these areas are on the wrong side of the island's traffic and you will spend an hour in a car each way. They make sense as a base for calm water and short transfers, or as the last two nights before an early flight.