From the headland at Nihiwatu, a view both spectacular and serene reveals itself. In the foreground, clean barrelling waves break with a calming rhythm. A pristine beach of soft white sand gently curves into the distance, framed by hills covered in groves of coconut trees.

Farmers tend to buffaloes in small fields and smoke drifts from the tops of the towering grass roofs from a traditional hillside village.

”You know, man, Bali used to look like this,” says Claude Graves, a lanky American and one of the pioneers of surfing on the Island of Gods.

He lets the words hang, but no further explanation is needed.

While Bali is now choking on development, its roads gridlocked by cars, waves packed with surfers and landscape littered with rubbish, Sumba, a remarkable Indonesian island some 350 kilometres further east, remains relatively untouched. …click here to read more

Popularity: 6% [?]

AT A TIME when Bali’s economy is booming, one of its businessmen, Kadek Wiranatha, is more hopeful than ever for the island’s fortunes, describing Bali as being in its “taking off” phase.

Having long been involved in the tourism sector, with a string of fashionable entertainment ventures in popular areas such as Seminyak and Legian, Kadek says he is confident of good times ahead.

“It’s good. The economy is dependent on tourism,” he said.

Kadek, however, is nothing if not a humble man, and refuses to accept accolades for his, or Bali’s, successes. “There are many other people who have built up Bali,” he said.

Others involved in Bali’s tourism industry point to Kadek as facilitating investment in the island and driving its tourism industry. …click here to read more

Popularity: 16% [?]

IN a last-ditch attempt to overturn the death penalty, Scott Rush’s lawyers will call on three witnesses to give evidence in the Bali Nine inmate’s final appeal in the Indonesian Supreme Court late next month.

Rush’s Indonesian lawyer, Robert Khuana, would not disclose the identities of the witnesses for security reasons, but he has not ruled out calling courier Renae Lawrence, who is serving 20 years with Rush in Bali’s Kerobokan prison. Mr Khuana said on Tuesday he was afraid that Rush, who is facing the death penalty for drug smuggling, would be moved from Kerobokan to a prison island off central Java, as the Bali bombers were in preparation for their execution.

Rush, 24, will be the first to lodge his appeal, ahead of fellow Australians Andrew Chan and Myuran Sukumaran, also facing death for their part in a plot to smuggle 8.3kg of heroin from Indonesia to Australia in 2005.

Mr Khuana outlined the arguments he would use to try to save Rush from execution, saying Rush was a courier, not an organiser, did not technically export the drugs, and that the judges failed to read all the facts and did not differentiate between the cases.

Leading a six-member legal team, Mr Khuana will present Rush’s case in the PK, or Reconsideration, a review of the prisoner’s last failed appeal to the Supreme Court in 2007, before different judges. …click here to read more

Popularity: 24% [?]