It's been a while since we updated our friends and guests on what's been happening at Villa Abadi as it's been a very busy period, not only with the villa, but also our own relocation from China to Singapore. The activity behind the scenes however has continued and this update includes some that we believe will be of interest. We sincerely hope that you have had a great summer and that your vacations exceeded all of your expectations and then some! 

We've also launched our very own Bali Guide. It's a work in progress but already includes lots of information. It has sections for Restaurants, Attractions, Recreation & Sport, Shopping and Spa & Massage. We have personal reviews of nearly 20 restaurants already and are adding additional content on a regular basis. We will shortly be introducing our Practical Advice section, full of useful travel information, tips and guides. We hope that you like it!

With monthly occupancy rates as high as 85% in 2014 we've been very busy indeed keeping up with inquiries, bookings and the in-depth holiday planning assistance we routinely provide for every guest that requires it - all very enjoyable though and the large amount of research and feedback that this generates is providing an excellent source of updates and additions for Villa Abadi's Bali Guide. We've even arranged our first marriage, with less than 24 hours notice!

We have had to be very strategic with our continued villa enhancements and upgrades due to the relatively short time periods between guests departing and arriving but the latest include the addition of a colour printer/scanner/copier to accompany the laptop we added earlier in the year, a mini fridge in the master bedroom (no more long walks to the main fridge in the kitchen for cold beers on the balcony!), an additional sun lounger for larger guest groups, new artwork for the lounge and complete replacement of all internal lighting with great looking LED versions. 

Further enhancements over the next couple of months include some new furniture for the main living room, large size custom Villa Abadi toiletries (they have proved very popular!) and lots more updates and enhancements to villaabadi.com. 

Below, we've shared some of our activity since the last update. We've also continued to be active on our Twitter account @VillaAbadi_Bali sharing Bali centric travel/tourist info, news, events & updates. You can check out our Twitter or Facebook accounts or view our Contact Us page to see all of our recent posts.

Something to be aware of in Bali over the next few weeks is that Tumpek Wayang occurs on 13th September. It is a special day filled with blessings dedicated towards the traditional performing art form of shadow puppetry. Various offerings are made to the equipment and range of character puppets involved in the traditional theatrical art. Tumpek Wayang is one part in a series of Tumpek days for blessing different subjects. The others include Tumpek Kandang celebrated earlier in January, Tumpek Uduh for plants, Tumpek Landep for metal objects and tools, Tumpek Kuningan for ancestral spirits, and Tumpek Krulut for traditional gamelan music instruments – all which occur in a 210-day cycle on the Pawukon calendar.

2014 continues to be our best yet in terms of both inquiries and bookings, however we do currently have two weeks available in September and space from November onwards including the Xmas & New year period. Contact Us or check out our Flipkey or HomeAway listings for further details.

We look forward to hearing from you!

Villa Abadi is proud to announce that we have been awarded Top Vacation Rental 2013 by Flipkey in only our second year of offering villa rentals! 

A huge thank you to all of our friends and guests that have made Villa Abadi such a popular choice for a genuine Balinese village experience that still has ease of access to beaches, major tourist hubs and provides a perfect base for those wishing to explore more of the island.

We will be continuing to roll out further enhancements to Villa Abadi throughout the year. We will also shortly be carrying out our post rainy season external re-painting & staining as well as extensive redecoration throughout the main internal living areas of the villa to ensure that everything is fresh and clean for the rest of the season.

One of the online enhancements we have added are independent reviews of some of our favorite local restaurants, all based upon our own personal experience. All of the restaurants are well worth a visit as only those that we are happy to recommend are included. Each review has a comparative guide to cost, contact details, clickable links to the restaurants own website and location on Google maps and, of course, our recommendations for those dishes that we are particularly fond of. You can check out our restaurant reviews under the FAQ section of our website.

We've also been very active on our Twitter We've also been very active on our Twitter account @VillaAbadi_Bali sharing Bali centric travel/tourist info, news, events & updates and thought we'd share some of the pictures and links that we've tweeted over the last month or so. You can check out ur Twitter or Facebook accounts or view our Contact Us page to see all of our posts.

Something to be aware of in Bali over the next few weeks is that Nyepi, the Hindu day of silence at the start of the new Balinese lunar year, falls on Monday 31st March. From 6am on that day for 24 hours all modes of transport and most non-hotel restaurants and activities will be suspended, including the airport and taxis. Should you be in Bali at this time look out for one of the many Ogoh-Ogoh (or giant monster statue) processions on the evening of 30th March. On Nyepi itself it is mandatory tthat you stay in your accomodation for the day so take the opportunity to relax. 

2014 continues to be our best yet in terms of both inquiries and bookings, however we do currently have two 1 week peak season slots between 13th & 21st June and 19th & 25th July and are offering very special rates with up to 25% discount during these periods. Contact Us or check out our Flipkey listing for further details.

We've just returned from a fantastic few days at VIlla Abadi. We're glad to report that the wet season in Bali was mostly confined to showers and some incredible overnight thunderstorms, thereby allowing us to enjoy the pool, garden and surrounds to the maximum whilst still completing some of the enhancement work that we noted in our "Upcoming Enhancements to Villa Abadi" post back in December.

The positive side of the showers is the everything is so beautiful and green - the first picture below shows the rice terraces from the garden looking stunning. Another benefit is that it's the best time of year to get a good view of Batukeru, Bali's 2nd highest volcano, this time from Villa Abadi's balcony in the pictures below - a fantastic view which complimented our early evening drinks on the balcony perfectly.

On to the enhancements and again we've positve news to report. All of the enhancements that we previously noted as being in progress are now in place and, in fact, we currently have our first set of new guests in the villa enjoying the benefits that they provide. The pictures below show the new Bedroom 3 en-suite, completely replanned and laid out to include an open rain shower and a chunky wooden sink top of the type that we have come to love so much in Bali. We have also taken delivery of our first sets of custom made Villa Abadi tuberose and spiced vanilla toiletries which are presented in a hand made recycled board box lined with satin and include shampoo, conditioner, shower gel and body lotion, all with our compliments. The fragrance is unique as we selected and blended the aromas ourselves.   
We have also added a brand new Dell Windows 8 laptop for exclusive use of Villa Abadi guests (pictured below), a new iPod connected to the surround system in the lounge and almost 200 music CD's containing well over 3000 tracks from a wide selection of genres so there should never be an occasion where we don't have the music that's just right for the moment.

The New Year inquiry rush started a few weeks ago and we now have active inquiries or firm bookings in every month this year right up to October 2014! If you are potentially interested in staying at Villa Abadi, please contact us through our normal channels and follow our news and updates on Twitter by clicking on "Follow Us" on any of our website pages.

Firstly, we wish you a very Happy New Year and imminent Chinese New Year of the Horse. We sincerely hope that which ever New Year you follow that it starts and stays on a high for you, your family and friends.

It took a little longer than planned for us to finally settle on the layout, materials and pallet for the renovation of the ground floor en-suite noted in our last post, but we are very confident that it was well worth it as it will transform the space. Before we left Villa Abadi after our last visit we had commenced all of the major tasks we had planned plus a few others we hadn't and are pleased to note that they are all well underway. We're heading back to the villa for a few days at the end of the month to carry out final checks and will post a further update and include some new pictures shortly after we return.

We've had a great start to the 2014 season with a very healthy number of inquiries received, several new confirmed bookings and others likely to confirm over the next few weeks. The special offer we have running through our FlipKey listing of 1 free night for any stay of 5 nights or longer is prooving popular - not too surprising as it is worth up to US$370! We would note that our best prices are always through our FlipKey listing or directly through "Contact Us" on this site. 

We've added additional restaurant reviews to our FAQ's page - Prana and Warisan, both restaurants that we have been to a number of times, so we've now included reviews, maps and clickable links to their web pages.

In the last few days we have received our 16th FlipKey review which, as with all our reveiws, we are very proud of the kind comments that Adam from KL made. What makes this particular review a little more special is that in less than 2 years we now have had 2 seperate sets of repeat guests. The review can be viewed here or on our Flipkey listing.

Finally, Villa Abadi now has it's own Twitter, Facebook and Flickr accounts which can be accessed from the top right hand corner of all of our website pages. We will be using our Twitter account to distribute news, updates and special offers at Villa Abadi, but also to share a wide selection of Bali centric travel information from tourist info, destinations & news to restaurant and event updates. We're particularly pleased with the Flickr account as the villa photos look absolutely great in the much larger format - well worth taking a look.

We're busy preparing for the festive season and will be heading to Villa Abadi for a few days shortly. We have a number of projects underway to further enhance our guests experience at Villa Abadi which we thought we would share. These will be in place over the next few weeks and include:

• Completely remodeled ground floor en-suite bathroom including open plan rain shower
• New large fridge freezer with double width doors for both units 
• Laptop computer for guest use
• New custom made Villa Abadi toiletries
• Electronic media collection with over 3,000 music tracks  
• Further additions to our extensive DVD collection
  
• The addition of almost 200 music CD's   
• Enhanced restaurant reviews with maps and links in our website FAQ section (work in progress) and the gradual introduction of similar listings for shopping and tourist attractions - all based upon our own personal experiences.
  

Look out for our New Year post for a further update, additional news and, no doubt, a few other changes that we've incorporated whilst at the villa!

A very big thank you to all our guests for their support, positive reviews and constructive feedback in 2013. We wish you a very happy Christmas and New Year wherever you are.

We've just returned from spending a few days at Villa Abadi ourselves. The weather was absolutely beautiful and everything was looking very green and tropical. Our trip was first and foremost for some quality downtime from what has been a hectic year to date in China but, as always, we couldn't resist the temptation to carry out a few additional projects and improvements whilst we were there.          
                
We now have a collection of well over 150 DVD's at the villa ranging from a complete set of James Bond movies to kids movies and a large collection of popular UK drama series. We have also installed a new hotel style digital combination guest safe as the existing 400kg industrial dial safe was proving to be rather too secure for some of our guests! We kept Aji, our maintenance and odd-job man, very busy over the week with redecoration, painting and other routine maintenance work. Pitu, our gardener, continues to do an excellent job with the pool and garden and it was great to see some of the small climbers we planted less than a year ago flowering beautifully and looking very mature and well cared for indeed.

We've had a fantastic year to date having carried out many improvements in both amenities and services for our guests which, as you can see by our guest reviews, have been received very positively indeed, and since the end of March when we started to actively promote booking for Villa Abadi we've had an amazing occupancy rate of 65%. Our aim is, and always has been, to rent the villa on a selective basis to guests who we believe will appreciate the quality, very natural setting and relaxing atmosphere of Villa Abadi. We never expect to make a net profit from our rental bookings as we routinely spend far more on improvements to and upkeep of the villa than we generate in income.  We believe that this creates excellent value for our guests whilst allowing us to continue to improve Villa Abadi for the mutual enjoyment of all who stay.

We still have a few days available to rent in October and November and are offering an exceptional rate of US$160 per night for 2 guests right up until the end of the year.  Please contact us via this site or our FlipKey listing if this is of interest. 

During our summer visit to Villa Abadi we have been busy with a selection of new projects, routine maintenance and decoration tasks as well as making the most of the villas relaxing environment and gourmet chef! 

Improvements include an upgrade to a 1.5Mbps high speed internet connection and expansion of the WIFI coverage to include all internal and external areas. We now provide a complimentary mobile for local calls and with stored numbers for a variety of useful contacts such as restaurants, golf, local tourist attractions, emergency services etc. We have remodeled the study/relaxation area to include a large sofa bed and solid wood coffee table that can now also be used as additional sleeping accommodation for up to 2 guests. On the balcony we have added new spotlights to provide subtle lighting to the 2 tables without compromising on the cozy ambience of the space - definitely one of our favourite spaces to relax.

We have added a number of new pieces of artwork and new bedside cabinets and "Geisha" lamps to the downstairs bedroom. We have also added to our DVD and book libraries.

Externally, we have replaced the entrance pathway, repainted all external walls to the villa and added new decorative lighting around the perimeter.

Photos of the various improvements will be added to the website within the next couple of weeks. Our next visit is in October 2013 when we already have a number of additional projects planned and will post further updates nearer the time!

We have just stayed at the villa over the Christmas and 2013 New Year period and have loved the occasional rain showers as much as the sunshine as it cools everything down if only for a short time!  The benefit of the rain is that everything is lush and green making the views from the villa out across the rice terraces and jungle even more spectacular, especially after the skies clear and the mountains form a dramatic backdrop to the scenery.

We continue to add to and improve the villa with the new large family gas BBQ fully installed (with rotisserie, fully tested on our Christmas turkey!), several new peices of artwork on the walls and some additional antiques and trinkets from our own travels.

A highlight of our recent trip has been to let Buda, our villa chef "off of the leash", allowing him to cook his choice of menu for us on several occasions during our stay.  What a revelation!  His repertoire has included simple dishes such as seared tuna, delicious soups and butterfish pate to gastronomic delacacies such as lobster thermidor, pan fried foie gras and homemade panna cotta (Andy's favourite!).  Of course he is also very capable of cunjuring up a wide variety of Indonisian dishes. Buda is available to book directly through Raty, the villa manager, for a very reasonable set fee plus "at cost" ingredients. Villa Abadi add no surcharges to Buda's costs.

We have been spending some quality time in the villa overseeing renovations to the main bathroom and balcony areas. 

The main bathroom now includes a large Balinese style rain shower, stone floors and "his and hers" designer sinks. 

The balcony now has a new solid wood floor and hand rails, complimented by rattan sofa, chairs, tables and soft cushions - perfect for breakfast or a glass of wine watching the sun set over the rice terraces and jungle. 

We have upgraded the private lane that accesses the villa so that it's a lot smoother ride!

Upcoming projects and enhancements include a new large gas BBQ (Oct 2012), the addition of a small herb garden (harvests from Oct 2012!) and further ongoing internal decoration enhancements as we continue to discover the delights of Balinese handicrafts! Note, all works are carried out whilst the villa is un-let.

We finally bought Villa Abadi in September 2011 after spending over 5 years searching for the perfect holiday home in Asia.  As soon as we walked into the villa and saw the stunning views across the paddy fields and mountains we knew Villa Abadi was to be our new home.

Since buying the villa we have completely replaced the kitchen with a handmade wooden balinese style kitchen complete with gas oven and hob.  We have also created a beautiful day bed in the bale so you can relax by the pool and listen the the sounds of the jungle.  We have added some new pieces of furniture and beautiful accessories.

Outside bedroom 3 downstairs we have created a quiet seating area - a perfect place to read your book!  

This week we have begun the remodelling of the main bathroom.... watch this space for new photos once it is complete.