Bali unquestionably has Indonesia’s swankiest international-class hotels. A “star system” (berbintang) is used whereby hotels are assigned a certain number of stars to denote their class. Five-star is the highest rating, one-star is the lowest. Prices range from US$120 to US$170; suites are US$200-2500. About half the guests are European, about 15% Indonesian, 12% Australian, 12% North American, and the remainder Japanese, Singaporean, and Taiwanese.

All of these luxury hotels have the capacity and facilities to cater to all nationalities and tastes. They have huge vaulted lobbies, closed-circuit color TV in the rooms, in-house video programming, fridges and minibars, round-the-clock room service, International Direct Dialing (IDD), business centers, fax machines, laundry and dry-cleaning services, safe deposit boxes.

On their extensive grounds are Chinese, Italian, Asian, and Indonesian restaurants, pizzerias, piano lounges, discos, 24-hour coffee shops, shopping arcades, house clinics. Also offered are floodlit tennis courts staffed by professional coaches, fully equipped aerobics and fitness rooms, jogging tracks, game and video rooms, and children’s playgrounds.

On their private beaches you can enjoy a smorgasbord of water activities: surfing, parasailing, sailing, windsurfing, outrigger sailing, and water-skiing. There are free-form swimming pools with sunken bars, poolside cafes, Jacuzzis, and saunas. Their poolside areas transform into open-air theaters, restaurants, and ‘pasar malam’ at night. In spite of their central location, these huge hotel properties offer tranquility because they’re huge and have extensive grounds, and guarded gateways keep the public out.

In this class of hotel you may arrange guided tours and sporting adventures (scuba diving, snorkeling). They’ll order you transport, post your letters, reconfirm your flights (Rp5000), and charge it all to whatever credit card you carry. Baggage may be carried to your room on a battery-powered cart along the winding garden walkways. Shuttle service into the nearest shopping center is frequent, and transfers to and from the airport are often free. In any “starred” establishment, you can count on a 21% government tax and service charge being added to your lodging and food bill.

Most of the major international-class hotels are concentrated in Denpasar, Nusa Dua, Kuta, and Sanur-the tourist triangle of Bali. First-class hotels are also starting to appear in Ubud, the upland art center of Bali. Some call the unbelievably posh hotels of Nusa Dua, with their extravagant, groomed lawns and artificial Bali-style facades, the ultimate vacation getaway. Others call Nusa Dua a tourist ghetto where pampered tourists reside and where the Balinese not employed there are not even allowed to enter.

Though Nusa Dua is scarcely Bali, its greatest value is that it offers an escape from the cacophony of Kuta and Sanur. However, the negative of Nusa Dua’s-and Bali’s-luxury hotels is that they have a pervasive atmosphere of administrative overkill and often feel sterile, soulless, and cut off from Bali.