Demos have started at Bingin Beach, targeting over 45 illegal villas, restaurants and businesses along the cliff.
You might’ve already heard that all those rickety lil cliffside warungs at Bingin, the world’s easiest tube which you can find just north of Uluwatu, were about to be pulled down after an edict from the local administrative authority the Badung Regency government.
Badung Regency’s got Kuta, Nusa Dua and Ulus, which includes Bingin, on its remit.
Earlier today, demolitions started, targeting over 45 illegal villas, restaurants and businesses along the cliffside.
The Badung Regency government issued eviction notices in June for violations including unpermitted constructions in protected coastal zones, nominee schemes by foreigners, and zoning breaches. Officials cite environmental preservation and legal compliance, amid Bali’s crackdown on overtourism-driven encroachments.
Local villagers, some of ‘em who’d been operating their joints since the eighties have protested fiercely, see the Instagram post below, claiming the actions disrupt livelihoods for 48 families and ignore cultural sites.
A Balinese ceremony was reportedly interrupted by demolitions today, sparking accusations of corruption favoring wealthy foreign investors. Some owners filed legal challenges to halt proceedings, but authorities proceeded after court validations.
Critics argue it’s selective enforcement, while supporters see it as reclaiming public land. The full operation may reshape Bingin’s bohemian vibe, shifting investments elsewhere like Sumba.
My favourite memory of Bingin is being seventeen years old and getting shook down for cash in the carpark by the local heavies.
Least favourite was twenty years back when I vowed never to surf the joint again.
View this post on Instagram
I remember everything at Balangan got flattened one year. Susys warung etc my favorite. Then everything just popped back up again or moved further down the beach? This behavior from authorities is not unprecedented.
No social media back then though.
Man everywhere was fun 40 years ago
I was able to catch a selfie a last visit. ill hold these memories dear. https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
Favourite Bingin moment was 2009, 4ft, packed, mid arvo. For about an hour the local elder (not sure his name) paddled out and turned the absolute shit show into a completely organised takeoff zone.
He sat out the back on his own a good 10m further than anyone, when sets approached he’d turn around to the next in line, pointed at them and just said “you”. Nobody needed to be told twice. For the next hour everyone out there that could surf half decent got at least a set wave or 2, everyone was nice to each other, and nobody challenged his order. The elder got 2-3 waves, exactly the ones he wanted, all he needed, then went in.
Next set that approached after he left was semi organised, kinda “ok felllas we can keep this going”, but by the following set it returned to shit show chaos.
Was a great lesson in what could be if we all calm the fuck down.
Remind me again when was the lid first commercialy from a surfing perspective blown of Bali and by whom and what country ?
“Morning of the Earth” is a 1972 classic surf film by Alby Falzon and David Elfick –
The film portrays surfers living in spiritual harmony with nature, making their own boards (and homes) as they travelled in search of the perfect wave across Australia’s north-east coast, Bali and Hawaii. The movie is regarded as one of the finest of its genre and noted as recording the first surfers to ride the waves at Uluwatu on the very southern tip of Bali and so bringing Bali to the attention of surfers around the world, as well as contributing to Bali becoming a major tourist destination.
Australians blew it up!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Morning_of_the_Earth
There ya go more to the point 3 Australians that also owned tracks surfing magazine ie the surf media blew up Bali.
Exactly, just lay down and allow the fabric of your society to be ripped so some fuckwit can sell a book.
Xox
Also the basis for Rip Curl the Search.
The best place they found was Bawa and the plate lift ruined it so yeah not too bad.
Xox
Bawa wasn’t really any good before the quake and terrible after. Everyone just thinks it’s good because of 1 session from Curren. The playing field there was massive and it was almost impossible to be in the right spot. Even if you were, never knew what one of those peaks was going to do, might heave and breathe, might fizzle out. It was a swell magnet though.
I fucken loved the place with all I had.
Xox
First surfed it in 97 as a 13yo. Fun wave. Olds had taken me out to Ulu the year prior. Fortunate to have seen these places before they were destroyed. Remember being there and the Olds were reminiscing of the late 70’s / early 80’s and how much it had transformed even then.
I am so curious what makes you think any money will shift to Sumba Dez? Those billionaire cunts at Nihi are the only ones crazy enough to pour that kind of $$ into Sumba which bought private access to one of the best lefts in the world. Can’t repeat that as there are no other waves there that good. RIP Saggy’s/Witches Tit/God’s Left/Occy’s/Nihiwatu or whatever else you know that wave by. Beauty while it lasted.
P.S. Claude Graves is a fucking deplorable cunt of a human being.
So damn true. It was all but dead by about 1995. At that point you could hardly find a place to sit in that tiny take off zone. Nobody even surfed Impossibles, Dreamland, Balangan back then. If you were able to get that area before then, consider yourself extremely lucky.
I was there in 1995 and surfed small Bingin, overhead Ulu, Kuta beach and Medewi!
You could go there today and surf all those places. The waves have never left but the mellow vibe and lack of crowds (comparatively) left a long time ago. And let’s be honest here, Kuta, Medewi, and Ulu’s (and I will add G-land, minus Speedies, to that list) are pretty shitty waves compared to what Indo has to offer on the whole.
Agree…. Bingin and Ulu were crowded then
I was last there 2004 and it was fucked then. Crazy crowds and angry locals. The razor edged end section got the better of many a kook who didn’t kick out in time including me.
Nyoman’s warung on the shore was friendly though and I met some nice travellers. Hit a cow on my bike on the dirt road down there and the police gave chase, I managed to evade them but Mr Nyoman said I had to leave. My friend crashed his bike and fucked his ankle up and that was the end of our indo adventure.
Loved listening to the ice cream salesman “after surfing ice cream walls man” and the local families washing their kids in the rock pools in the evening. Dread to think what a shit show it must be now.
If you weren’t surfing there when you had to take a boat to Bingin because there was no road yet – you missed it, bro/bru/brah –
Condolences to all the local families and foreign funders/owners who had prosperous businesses at Bingin, legal or otherwise, providing paying jobs for the local community with accommodations, food, beverages and other services for visitors –
Bingin, before development –
https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
John Semen Cunt! How’s ya bum for grubs? Hopefully you can blow up some other region with your treasure map booklet and have the place irreversibly changed. Go fuck yerself.
Xox
Such a fucking douchebag. First off, Semen boy doesn’t even surf so he never took a boat to Bingin to surf. And the fucking wave still looks like that Cunty Semen, the development took place on land, not in the water dumbcunt.
Gotta hand it to the guy. He gets absolutely savaged on here daily and keeps coming back for more.
Its all for money (does the same shit on Swellnet) and the unlimited blowie’s he seems to give Dez. Fucking complete douchebag. Hopefully he goes back to the islands someday and gets the beatings he so deserves.
Damnn…Savaged again!
BeachGrit is much more pleasant once you use the block function – did I mention THE BOOK? https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
tell us about Dreamland?
He seems to be able to tell everyone about everywhere, unless you ask about actually surfing anywhere. Then Cunty Semen Cuntface goes silent since he can’t stand up.
On the floor here !
Three fast balls in a row. Hahahahar
What abut it?
Was scheduled for development by a company linked to the infamous Tommy Suharto, but got a reprieve because of the 1998 Asian financial crisis – there was a golden age of easy access, good surf, plentiful local warungs selling food and drink then all was reclaimed and wiped from the map, replaced by sterile concrete shops and other “developments”
wiped from the map , yep families were killed….so maybe Bingin not such a big deal at all if you subscribe to money and power rules!
Oh, by the way Maurice, since you did say “I have never heard of you” before Beach Grit, here is a seleção of published interviews and portfolio features in English, Français, Nihongo, Portuguese Brasileiro, Español, Deutsche and Italiano.
Lots of provocative opinions in there!
https://flic.kr/s/aHsjrQW7DL
Cheers, mate –
https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
as I said before…I don’t really pay much attention to surf media….all seems a vanilla to me!
When it was good at Bingin –
Image © John Seaton Callahan 1997
https://uploads.disquscdn.c…
Still plenty of spots in indo that are mellow. Bali though, Bali is fucked.
Yeah the power in corruption of the jarvos and foreign cunts with an agenda ( destroying the place for money) knows no bounds. But it was good back in the days
The New South Wales/ Orange County/Hawaii government issued eviction notices in June for violations including unpermitted constructions in protected coastal zones, nominee schemes by foreigners, and zoning breaches. Officials cite environmental preservation and legal compliance, amid Northern Beaches/Newport Becah/North Shore crackdown on overtourism-driven encroachments.
Local villagers, some of ‘em who’d been operating their joints since the eighties have protested fiercely, see the Instagram post below, claiming the actions disrupt livelihoods for 48 families and ignore cultural sites.
Obama guilty of all offenses for his Waimanalo Beach pad.
what’s the story?
So you like Obama? How many zoning and construction violations do you think your orange jebus has committed in his lifetime?
Carpet bomb the whole southern half of the island and start again, with the knowledge of hindsight…
Will never forget April 1995. First trip to Indo. Bingin with 3-5 people out most of the time. What a joy. Friendly environment with everyone sharing waves and hooting each other.
No excavators hanging off the cliffs yet?? Always impressed with how resourceful they can be over there!
They’re probably trucking that shit in on lowloaders as we speak
A donkey powered barge straight across the reef should do it.
Indonesian resourcefulness is only rivalled by the idiocy of how they do some things. Used to walk down Poppies II in the wet season and watch each accommodation pumping the flooded water out of their compound into the street, which then drained into the compound next door who were pumping the same water out of their compound into the street, which then drained into the compound next door who were pumping the same water out of their compound into the street, which then drained into the compound next door who were pumping the same water out of their compound into the street, which then drained into the compound next door who were pumping the same water …… and on and on and on.
Dunno if they still do it now but my first trip in 96 it blew me away to see the old massage ladies at Kuta beach collecting the rubbish, figging a hole about 2 ft deep in the sand and burying the rubbish in it.
Well it was most likely tourist rubbish to start with , where exactly would you like them to get rid of all the waste generated by tourism?? What about we get you take it home with you when you fuck of back to what ever crappy place you came from.
Been to Bali in the last 10 years or so? If you dare wade into the filth in the Kuta/Legian/Seminyak strip you will see the rubbish swirling around is residential. Yoghurt containers, children’s nappies, cling film, etc.
No way is that stuff from tourists sitting on the beach.
Somewhere, there’s a kampung where they are throwing their rubbish in the river.