The Uma Ubud was the third stop on our 3 week honeymoon to Bali last July. Of all the hotels in Bali, the Uma Ubud left me the most centered and satisfied with my vacation. If I had left for the airport right after this hotel, I would have felt completely fulfilled. The surroundings are completely zen. The way everything smelled, the way the food tasted, practicing yoga in a studio perched over the river valley, the massages, the delicious drinks, the cool marble floors on your bare feet - it's all just perfect. There may be more posh resorts, or fancier restaurants, or better pools, but this place is just incredibly special. When i think back about our trip to Bali, it's this hotel that gives me the goose bumps.

The restaurant down at the bottom of the resort has just incredible food - everything is organic and extremely well prepared. It's the best mix of upscale resort food with the traditional simple Balinese food. One caveat, we only ate there for breakfast because Ubud has the absolute best restaurants in all of Bali. While in Ubud, you MUST visit a few restaurants - Ibu Oka is the most famous place on the island to eat babi gulung (pig roasted over coconut fire). Oh my god I still dream of it. It's spicy and crispy and completely delicious. Also, make sure you visit Dirty Duck, a Ubud staple in a fabolous rice paddy setting near the Monkey Forest. On the upscale end, we did the tasting menu at Mosaic which was probably the nicest dinner we had on the island - as good as the best French restaurants in Paris. Another highlight was Jazz Cafe, we just chilled listening to some great low key jazz music and eating some pleasant Italian food.

In the Ubud area, there is the best shopping in Bali especially for art and furniture. We purchased beautiful hand carved wood furniture from a store called Danoe Furniture near the neighborhood called Mas. We got an amazing deal on beautiful work, although our canopy bed was destroyed in transit. But that doesn't diminish his work! And we bought these two carved masks that would have costs thousands in New York for $100.

The bartenders at this hotel were top notch. Stiff drinks, great recommendations, very friendly and not one of them tried to sell us anything (which was very different than other hotels where the bartenders all tried to convince us to pay them for tour guide services).

The only negative thing I can say about the hotel is that the marble gets a little slick when it rains, and a few people slipped while I was there. I actually wiped out and sprained my wrist while furniture shopping, but that wasn't at the Uma (it rained a decent amount, but always got really nice and sunny afterwards). Also, a slight negative was that our private dipping pool was so cold that it was totally Polar Bear club. Of the 5 days we stayed, we pledged that we needed to swim in the pool at least once. So one day, we just jumped in and moved around as fast as possible to dull the pins and needles. They should probably put some heaters in the private pool to make it more usable, especially since it was that cold in July!

Overall, this place was incredible. I'll stay here every time I go back to Bali - it's that nice. Zen is the only way I can put it, it just was balanced perfectly in every single way. The gods were in agreement the day they created the Uma Ubud.