The delightful little beach town of Amed, Bali

Andy Hill

I clumsily wandered into the village of Amed on the eastern tip of Bali, shocked to find a place on the Earth in which I wanted to grow old.

I never really get too jazzed your typical ‘tropical island paradise beach’-type places. Sure, Koh Tao in southern Thailand is absolutely, untouchably gorgeous. The Gili islands off of Lombok are pristinely laid-back, see through water, coconuts-lying-around-everywhere, bastions of bucolic beauty.

I just never felt at home in those places. As much as I tried to soak up the vibes, creak from side to side in a hammock, drink fruity cocktails and feign interest in bizarre-looking pieces of coral to be found in the sand, I still just couldn’t get it.

Then, on a little solo jaunt around Bali, hitchhiking and hopping on and off creaking, rusted public buses packed with chickens and ancient women, I made it all the way around the coast from Singaraja to a little town I’d heard about, Amed.

After getting booted from a bus on a small road about fifty meters from the sea, I began walking down the road in the direction the old ladies had pointed me towards. I was going adjacent to the beach, which was on my left, and on my right, flat, forested plains quickly ended with mountains that jutted out of the ground perhaps one or two kilometers away.

They were wild and verdant, green. There were little plumes of smoke rising from some parts of the mountainsides, which seemed to go straight up.

Behind me, the biggest and most sacred volcano in Bali, Gunung Agung, rose from the shoreline with ponderous slopes and a commanding yet gentle summit.

It was stunning.  

Something strange happened: I felt right at home. For the first time in my life, I longed to see myself as an old man in Amed, with a little shack up in the mountains, wrapped in a sarong and tending to my drying sea salt while chickens and goats wandered about.

I wanted to wake up every morning and see that coast, with the volcano framing it to the left and endless beach to the right, always held from behind by wall-like mountains that seem to protect the tiny village from the encroaching demons of KFC and night clubs.

I found a tiny little room on the beach for $6, a ‘secret price,’ according to the young kid who gave me the key. I was able to locate a small, reused plastic water bottle full of homemade rice whiskey, which I sipped with lemon juice while sitting on the beach cross-legged, watching the sun descend into the sea, until the equatorial constellations rose up over me.

The next morning, I rose early and creeped out onto the little road along the beach. There were little roadside stands here and guesthouses there. To my right, mist hung in the trees along the slopes of the richly green mountains, occasional roosters saluted the morning, and the smell of the ocean and small coconut fires wafted in and out of my sensorium.

I felt completely at home, and I long to go back.