Bali travel guide: 5 best new places to eat and drink in Canggu, from restaurants and BBQ to a cafe-bakery specialising in croissants
- Canggu is one of the few parts of Bali where innovative new venues are opening, and right now it’s the destination of choice for free-spending domestic tourists
- Whether you like to dress up and dance or enjoy authentic international food, there’s something for you
When Indonesia shut its borders to international travellers on April 2, 2020, in the early days of the Covid-19 pandemic, Kuta, Ubud and most of Bali’s other once-thronging tourism hotspots became ghost towns overnight.
But there’s one part of the island that has consistently defied the trend. The west coast surfing hub of Canggu has been the residence of choice for tens of thousands of foreigners who have ridden out the pandemic in Bali, and is now the destination of choice for spendthrift Indonesian tourists from the main island of Java who have returned in droves.
Canggu is also one of the few parts of Bali where investors are opening innovative new venues. Holywings Bali, for example, a tropical amusement park with a Colosseum-style water show, will stake a claim as the biggest beach club in the world when it opens next year.
“Canggu is where everyone wants to be,” says Tony Smith, co-owner of Finns Beach Club, next door to the new attraction. “There are hundreds of restaurants and bars within a few blocks of our establishment and every week it seems a new one is opening.”
Here are five of the most exciting new places to eat and drink in Canggu.
Smoke
A short walk from Echo Beach, one of Bali’s most popular surfing spots, Smoke is an experimental barbecue restaurant set in a green garden. Customers dine while seated on sofas or at communal tables under a large safari-style tent. The meat – and vegetarian alternatives – is cooked in an open kitchen equipped with custom-made racks, grills and barbecue pits where chefs visiting from around Indonesia hold court on Saturday afternoons.
