Where should you go in Bali on honeymoon?

Bali does honeymoons better than almost anywhere, partly because a private villa with a pool costs what a hotel room costs in Europe. The mistakes are predictable: too many bases, the wrong area, and booking on a photograph.

The two-base structure

Nights 1 to 4: the hills. Ubud, Sidemen or Munduk. Cool at night, green, quiet, and where the spa-and-rice-field version of the trip lives.

Nights 5 to 9: the coast. Uluwatu for the cliffs, Seminyak for the restaurants and beach clubs, Sanur or Amed for calm water, Nusa Dua if you want a resort to do the thinking.

Two bases, one move, half a day in the car. Three or four bases is how people spend a honeymoon being driven around.

The areas, plainly

Ubud. Jungle valleys, river gorges, yoga, spas, the best restaurants outside the south, and rain. The classic honeymoon photograph with a pool hanging over a gorge is here. It is 90 minutes from a beach.

Uluwatu and the Bukit. The most dramatic scenery in Bali: white cliffs, limestone, turquoise water. Spectacular clifftop hotels and villas. The beaches are down staircases and the drives between things are longer than they look.

Seminyak and Petitenget. The best dinner scene on the island, walkable, good hotels, a dark-sand beach with sunsets and strong currents.

Sanur. Calm, shallow, protected water, sunrise instead of sunset, quieter and older. Underrated for couples who want to swim rather than photograph.

Sidemen. Rice terraces under Agung, almost no tourism, a handful of beautiful small properties. The place people fall in love with and cannot explain afterwards.

Amed and Menjangan. For a diving honeymoon, black sand, calm sea and no crowds.

Nusa Lembongan. A short boat from Sanur, with proper island pace and very good small resorts.

What it costs

• Boutique hotel, good area: 120 to 250 USD a night.
• Private one-bedroom pool villa: 150 to 350.
• Clifftop suite with the view you have seen online: 400 to 1,200.
• A good dinner for two with wine: 80 to 160, and wine is the expensive part because of import duty.
• Couples spa treatment, two hours: 60 to 150 at a good independent spa, three times that in a resort.

Prices drop 30 to 50 per cent in February, and peak from July to August and over Christmas.

Booking honestly

Check the pool photograph against the map. A wide-angle lens and a well-chosen crop hide the neighbouring construction site and the road. Look at recent guest photographs rather than the listing gallery, and check the satellite view for building work next door.

Read the reviews for noise and access. Uluwatu and Canggu both have active construction. A villa on a narrow lane may be 200 metres from the road and delivered to on foot.

Ask what is within walking distance. Nothing at all is normal in many villa areas, which is fine if you plan for a driver and unpleasant if you do not.

Check the season for view. A clifftop room in February may be facing grey water for three days.

Things worth doing

Sunset at Uluwatu temple with the kecak performance. A private boat to Nusa Penida or the Gilis for a day. Sunrise on Batur if you can face 3am. A cooking class. Dinner on the sand at Jimbaran, which is touristy and lovely anyway. A proper spa day, which here costs what a massage costs at home.

The one to skip if time is short: a full-day temple tour that covers four sites. Two is plenty.