Tours in Nusa Penida Island

Nusa Penida is the largest of the three islands off Bali's southeast coast, across the Badung Strait. It is nothing like Bali. The interior is dry limestone plateau with few people on it, and the coastline is vertical cliff with beaches at the bottom.

What people come for is a short list of points on that coast.

• Kelingking (west). The one on every photograph — a headland shaped like a dinosaur's head, with a strip of sand two hundred metres below and a descent that is more climb than path.
• Angel's Billabong and Broken Beach (west). A natural rock pool at the water's edge, and a collapsed sea cave that has left an arch.
• Crystal Bay (west). The swimming and snorkelling beach.
• Diamond Beach and Atuh (east). The other coast, and the other standard day.
• Manta Point (south). A cleaning station off the cliffs where oceanic manta rays gather year-round.

Almost everyone comes as a day trip. Fast boats cross from Sanur in about forty minutes. The standard day does one coast or the other. The roads are too slow to do both.

Snorkelling trips run separately to Manta Point and the Lembongan mangroves. The diving here is the serious kind, with strong currents and a chance of a mola mola in the cooler months. Regulars say stay a night. The island empties after four.

Practical

• The crossing. This is the weak link. Fast boats are cancelled in rough weather, particularly in the wet season, and the swell decides rather than the schedule.
• Roads. Narrow, steep and in poor repair, so a car with a driver is safer than a scooter for anyone not confident.
• The Kelingking descent. Steep, unshaded, forty minutes each way, with a rope handrail in places. Plenty of people turn back.
• Shade. There is none anywhere on the cliffs.
• What to bring. Cash, water and reef shoes.
• Crowds. The viewpoints fill between eleven and two, when the day boats converge.