The Samara

It has nothing to do with the photos. The only people here are the two women who serve the 4 tables at what they call a restaurant. If you point anything out to them, they will tell you they will communicate it, we don't know to whom... it doesn't matter, they won't fix anything. I arrived last night and I can't wait to get out of here!!!

What a friendly people work here, they really do everything to make it as pleasant as possible, every day the beds are made fresh towels and everything cleaned up. You don't have to leave for dinner because it's delicious. If we had to leave on time day after day, a rich to go breakfast was given so that we certainly did not lack anything along the way. Everything was clean and tidy. Thank you very much for the nice holiday we had here on your behalf Wilbert and Linda

The Samara is definitely a little gem for people looking to have a quiet and tranquil stay. It's very small resort with a few villas. The best two are the ones right in the front of the somewhat small but adequate pool overlooking lush rice fields. The sound of quacking ducks having a swim and feed in the little creek nearby early in the morning was just divine. We stayed in the smaller villa which was good but would have preferred the villa in front of the pool if we had known about them when booking our stay. The staff were lovely and always ready to assist. The resort and rooms are clean and the outdoor shower was an interesting experience for us. Overall it's a lovely little place tucked away amongst rice fields but it's downfall is that it isn't accessible by car at all. The resort offers the scooter ride to the near shops or pickups if required. The problem could be if it rains as riding on the back of a scooter wouldn't be fun. The markets and shops are about 10 minutes away on foot if you are reasonably young and fit which we aren't . The walk down the steep hill is ok but coming back in the heat could be a challenge for an elderly person. The food is good and affordable but for short stays. The menu never changed during our 10 day stay. So the conclusion is if you are young and scooter friendly this could be the place for you. We certainly wouldn't stay there again unless the proper road was build so that the cars could reach this lovely position. I say this for one reason only. My husband fell of the scooter and got badly injured. Nevertheless he has recovered from his ordeal and put this incident behind him. This was our second visit to Ubud (the first one was decades ago). What a big disappointment this was. The Ubud charm was gone. Period! There are far too many tourists there. You want get anywhere fast, on foot or by car. The traffic is virtually on the stand still most of the times. Not to mention how expensive everything is for tourists. The sad fact is that not many restaurants cater traditional Indonesian food, food that we love. What a pity! I guess some people won't like or agree with what I've written but I've have stated the facts and what we've seen and experienced ourselves. I have given five stars to The Samara even though our overall time in Ubud wasn't that great. Ubud we visited decades ago was gone for ever...and that was a huge shock for us.