Grand mirage…a piece of paradise. [bali]

Grand Mirage.

It lives up to it’s name. It’s a little chunk of heaven/bliss/all things good among everything else. All the food you can eat. All the drinks you can drink. All the watersports you can handle. Shows, live music, London Olympic coverage, and most importantly 24 hour room service. Derik and I opted to do this all-inclusive amazingness as the first few days of our trip…that way we’d have time to unwind before we headed out across Bali to explore and do fun things.

We were not bored in the least at the Grand Mirage, in fact, we were almost always up to doing something!

The first day we got up early ate a fantastic breakfast, went kayaking, ate a good lunch (which included swordfish and salmon), chilled on the beach, ate a second lunch, explored the entire resort, got ready for dinner, went to the lounge for drinks, and then went to dinner.

Yes. We ate a ton. Or as much as our shrunken-from-korea-and-kimchi stomachs could hold. It was quite pathetic really. Here I was staring at a great fist-sized, perfectly cooked, medium/well done, steak, and I couldnt even eat all of it. The guilt of leaving it on my plate as we stepped out of the restaurant was ridiculous.

Speaking of restaurants, there were three on the resort. The first one was an Italian grill, by far the best. You had to make reservations way in advance for it. The second was a Mediterranean grill, and it lived up to it’s name. Salmon, crab, lobster, prawns, whatever. The GOOD seafood which is hard to find here in Korea (we have sea cucumber, octopus, and eels to eat over here). The third restaurant was a buffet open 24/7. They had about anything you could possibly want. Fish, red meat, white meat, fruit, veggies, pasta, rice, and all sorts of desserts.

At the end of our all-inclusive stay, our stomachs were seriously messed up from all the rich food we weren’t used to. But I’d do it again in a heartbeat. No hesitation!

The second day was pretty eventful, started out with a late breakfast…of once again, awesome food.

We then walked over to the Seawalker booth and found out we could have a free excursion with our all-inclusive! Thirty minutes later we were headed out to sea. Honestly I was freaking out a bit. I did not grow up around the ocean, so it still, even to this day, is a little dark, dangerous, and looming to me. I know it’s silly, but it is. I’m getting better and better with each experience with the ocean, but I still am hesitant to dive right in. The Seawalking masters were pretty awesome-your typically balinese person. Fun, full of laughter, and they make you feel right at home. Before I knew it, I was walking down a ladder to my impending fate: the ocean. Without much explanation a 60kg (that’s like over 120 lbs folks) bubble/spaceman helmet thing is placed on my head and I go ‘plunk’ sinking to the bottom of the ocean. Didnt take long to control my breathing and get my surroundings. Actually, this was kind of cool. I could feel the weight of the helmet on my shoulders, I could actually reach my hand into my helmet if I wanted to. You know the cup in the bathtub effect that we all did as a child? Stick a cup upside down into water, and you form a little air bubble. Imagine my head in that air bubble, and you’re about where I was down there. I was very surprised at the strength of the current and lack of balance down there. I’m sure derik and I looked quite comedic, like we were trying to take our first steps in space, as we walked toward the fish. By this point I was thinking this whole thing was pretty darn cool. We got to feed the fish some bread, and before we knew it they were literally all around us. It was pretty neat! After about 30 minutes we were signaled to go back up. Honestly the Seawalker was one of the coolest experiences of the trip. AAND it was free. Here are a few photos…forgive the graininess…the water wasnt very clear the day we went.

That night we took advantage of the room service, and had quite the feast watching the sunset…then we went for a late night bbq at the mediterranean grill. So freaking good!

The next day, we did more water activities. Sailing, speedboating, Derik even tried wind surfing. We also went exploring outside our resort, really not much to see in comparison, so we headed back to enjoy our last day. We spent some more time in the sun, relaxed at the pool and it’s swim up bar, and cleaned up for our traditional balinese show/dinner.

The next morning was check out day. We left early due to our water sport adventure a little further down the beach. We were able to leave all our items in a storage closet at the hotel. We arrived back at the hotel sooner than we thought, so Grand Mirage actually let us eat there one more time without charge! It was pretty cool.

goodbye grand mirage

All in all, this resort was a terrific place to stay. I would highly recommend it to anyone, we’d love to go back again someday. The staff was more than friendly, the food (obviously) was amazing, and there were plenty of things to do. A great way to start our trip. Stay tuned for part 3 (water adventure)!