ABOUT
Mega & Toine
During the pandemic we decided to leave the south of Bali and find ourselves a new place to live, away from the crowds and immerse ourselves in nature and authentic Bali. We fell in love with the area around Pupuan and eventually bought ourselves a little productive plantation in Sanda, a small village on the slopes of Mount Batukaru. We love our new lifestyle; slowly learning to develop and manage the plantation and blending into the local traditional Balinese community.
We decided to open our home to those seeking an escape from the crowds, or those who want to experience authentic rural Bali.
We hope to welcome you soon!
Toine & Mega
Mega
I was born and raised in Jakarta, while my parents are from Pekalongan, in Central Java, famous for its batik and textile industry. After finishing high school I worked 8 years for a film production agency and mining company, before joining a luxury lifestyle magazine. After meeting Toine I joint his digital marketing agency, taking care of administration, finance and legal matters. We initially lived in Legian, focusing on our digital marketing agency. During the pandemic we decided to change our lifestyle and bought a plantation here in Sanda. Initially we spent every weekend here in the mountains, but soon did not really feel home anymore in he busy south and decided to move here permanently.
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Toine
I was born in The Netherlands and have a Masters degree in Biology. As part of my study I spent a year in the rainforests of Sumatra, during which I fell in love with the country. After graduating I joint a Dutch tour operator developing expeditions and nature-oriented tours to southeast Asia, before moving into the hospitality industry. I worked in different sales and marketing roles in hotel chains, and eventually in online travel. At the end of 2016 I left the corporate world and established my own digital marketing agency. Nowadays I still do some freelance work in this space, but mostly enjoy our life in the plantation. I love photography, particularly wildlife and culture. Here is my photography website:
Our Plantation
Our plantation was mainly a coffee plantation when we bought it, but also had a large variety of other fruit trees, such as different durian varieties, local avocado, coconut, papaya, pineapple, some sugar palms (aren), and lots of different bananas. We also have a lot of different varieties of bamboo, which we don’t only use for building, but young bamboo shoots are also a very taste vegetable!
We have replaced some of the coffee with vanilla, and planted a lot more avocados, particularly Hass, Miki, and Red Vietnam varieties. We have also planted a lot of different berries and other smaller fruit trees, for more variety.
We use our own natural compost, which we make ourselves from the manure and urine of our cows. We do not use any pesticides, and we have found out we don’t need. As long as we keep the variety, mature will look after our plantation.
Coffee
Pupuan is famous for its excellent quality Robusta coffee. Harvest usually starts around July, although our coffee trees flower throughout the year as well.
We harvest and process our own coffee and roast the beans over a wood fire, in a nearby coffee roaster.
The coffee beans provided in our tent and wooden house are our own. We now sell our own coffee. If you're interested let us know.
Vanilla
Did you know vanilla is an orchid? Until the 80s Pupuan was a major raw vanilla producer, and since we started growing vanilla other farmers here have followed.
We currently have about 600 vanilla plants around our Wani Tent. We harvest our beans only when they are absolutely ripe, and cure them our selves.
If you're interested in buying some vanilla from us, let us know. Our quality is absolutely excellent, as is the price.
Avocado
We have quite a few avocado trees. Initially a local variety only, excellent for juice. Unfortunately they fruit only once a year and for a month or two we have too many to eat...! Why is that unfortunate? Because we don't have avocado the rest of the year..!
A few years ago we have planted 50 new avocado trees, mostly the famous Hass and Miki varieties, the large buttery ones, as well as a Vietnamese red variety. The first young trees now slowly start to flower and bear fruit!
Durian
Durian! Our favorite, by far...! You either hate it or love, for us the latter.
We have about a dozen durian trees, 3 different varieties. Most of them now produce fruit, while a few others have been planted recently.
We are still a bit confused about the seasonality, as it seems the trees fruit twice a year. Perhaps because of the changing weather..? We don't mind though!
Banana
Every plantation has bananas, as they are important in Balinese ceremonies and offerings. We have a couple of different varieties. Some are small and sweet, others more the type known in the West, and others are only good when cooked, steamed or fried.
I love the flowers of the banana tree. Not only because they are so fascinating and beautiful, but also because they attract some of the more spectacular birds during the day, and bats at night!
Papaya
Papaya trees grow very fast, and produce fruit within almost a year! We have plenty of papaya trees, but initially only half of them produce nice sweet papaya. Others produce fairly tasteless fruit, which we are happy to leave for the bats and birds.
We have recently planted California Papaya, famous for being so sweet! This variety does not grow very tall, and you can pick the ripe fruits just by hand.
Cacao
In Indonesian they call it coklat, chocolate! How appropriate. As that is what most cacao are used for.
Sanda is actually a bit too high for Cacao, and most trees suffer from fungus, causing so-called pod-rot. The trees produce plenty of cacao pods year round, but once the pods start to ripen a fungus takes over and makes the pod rot away. There's unfortunately not much you can do about this.
Pineapple
We love pineapple and we have a dozen or so pineapple plants. They don't receive enough sun to become really sweet though. Juiced they are pretty good!
What we didn't know before is that it takes about 2 years for a vanilla plant to produce a single mature pineapple! Given the space, sun and time you need to have a regular supply of pineapple makes it not really interesting for us to further develop.
Passion Fruit
Our passion fruit is something...! Another one of our favorite fruits. They have a very rich taste, a combination of sweet and sour. And all our guests love it too, as we include them with breakfast when it's the fruit season.
We pretty much have passionfruit year round now, and you'll see that already when you just arrive at our plantation, as you walk through a tunnel of passion fruit to your tent!
Our Dogs
We hope you love dogs, or at least don’t mind them. We currently have 4 Bali dogs and 1 mixed Bali dog / German Sheperd, from 11 a while ago..! We love them all. At least most of them, most of the time… It wasn’t really our choice to get dogs though, at least not completely…!
When we bought the plantation it came with an abandoned dog, named Malu. In Indonesian Malu means “shy”. And that’s what she is. Very shy…
She had a very traumatic past; she was chained, and most likely often beaten. She eventually found refuge in the plantation, where the previous farmer fed her regularly. So she stayed…
And from one came another… Here the full story.
Malu
When we moved into the plantation Malu couldn’t bark, was incredibly scared. She didn’t want to be touched, and would always keep a distance. So we just fed her, and accepted her presence. Slowly but sure she accepted us, but it took a few months before she would carefully take a treat out of our hand.
A few months later she started to slowly bark a bit, and effectively became a decent guard.
We did not really want more dogs, so we wanted to sterilize her. The problem was that she was so scared of other people that she’d hide immediately when a vet came. He tried a blow pipe and tablets to tranquilize her, but the highest dose would not bring her down…
And then she became pregnant, and gave birth to 2 male puppies. She left them out in the bush though, in the cold, in the rain. She didn’t care for them at all…
So we did. We took them in and bottle-fed them for the first few days, until slowly but sure Malu showed more interest and eventually started to feed them. Nothing more, nothing less. She didn’t keep them warm, she didn’t sleep with them… This is when we learnt that puppies are a lot stronger than what we were made to believe! They survived the cold and wet nights, alone in an empty drum we used as nest for them.
Pokat
"Pokat" is the local name for avocado. We have plenty of those as well.
He is one the 4 dogs of Malu's second litter, and the underdog in the pack. He's doing his best to change that position, his own way. As a puppy he had a weird but serious illness, which somehow affected his mouth and ability to eat. He has recovered well and has slowly gained self-confidence.
Pokat today is totally chill, and does his own thing. He never ever listens to us...
Boni
"Boni" is the local name for a fairly rare fruit, which is often used in Rujak.
He is also from Malu's second litter. As a puppy Boni probably suffered from Polyarthritis. His legs didn't grow properly. He had difficulties walking, couldn't run, or go up our stairs. He preferred to spend his time laying around the house.
We adjusted Boni's diet and gave supplements, and eventually he got much more mobile. Nowadays Boni can run very fast and is our most agile dog! As he spent so much time just on his own under our house he is still not used to other people, and loves barking at every "stranger"... You'll hear him!
Duren
"Duren" means Durian, a fruit we love very much. He is our youngest dog, and the only survivor of Malu's third litter. As her only puppy he had all her milk for himself, and he soon grew bigger than his older brothers. He slowly fought his way up the ranks. At the time Tangi, from Malu's first litter was leader of the pack, followed by his brother Wani. But Duren eventually dominated Wani and when Tangi passed away, effectively became the new leader of the pack. With his ever-puppy behavior he has never learnt to know how to be one though..!
Duren is a very strong and muscular boy, and slowly loves the attention from our guests!
Timmy
Timmy is the latest to have joint our pack. We adopted him when he was about 8 months old, when we learnt about his sad first few months of life. As a puppy he was thrown away on the street; he was eventually rescued and treated by a dog rescue foundation, and put in a temporary foster family in Canggu.
He is thriving here, truly enjoying the space, green and so many new experiences in the outdoors.
Timmy is what we call a "house dog", a people's dog. He loves to play with us and our guests, and has become a guests' favorite. He likes to join on walks through the fields, and loves to play with them.
We had more dogs… At some stage even 11 in total, amongst them 8 puppies! Here is to those who left us too soon; they are not forgotten!
Eco-Friendly
Eco-friendly. What does that actually mean…? It’s today’s buzz-word. Used a lot and… abused. What does it actually really mean…? “Eco” means “Home”; it comes from the Greek word “Oikos“, meaning “Home”. Eco-friendly therefore means “home-friendly”. For us it means OUR Home. To start with…
Are we perfect? No! We have a long way to go… And we will. We always do our best to protect our environment and be an example for our community. It’s a journey for us; we learn. And improve. Step by step. Our way. We hope our community follows. We are driven, but not obsessed. We also want to be practical. Here is where we are.
Our Climate
We are at an altitude of 650 meters above sea-level and there is no need for air-conditioning. During the day temperatures rarely get above 30 degrees Celsius and at night the temperature drops to around 18-22 degrees.
Being at higher altitude and close to the mountains means a much higher humidity. Rain showers are fairly common, even during the dry season (which is not very dry anymore anyway in Bali, due to climate change). They generally do not last very long though, and normally won’t spoil your stay in this area.
Some times during the year, often around March, strong winds pick up and if it then rains the weather becomes less pleasant. This is not very common though and only the really unlucky ones may then have a less pleasant stay.
For those unlucky (or lucky..?) ones we are happy to either extend your stay or welcome you back another time, free of charge!
Insects
Don't like insects and other critters?
We are an active plantation and care about nature and animals, big and small. We do not use any chemical pesticides to control insects and other critters. We do take precautions to keep accommodation and surroundings clean, but the Wani Tent and Wooden House have an open design and bugs and insects are a common sight.
If you get easily scared with insects, bugs and the likes, perhaps this is not the right place for you.
Mosquitoes
There are actually fewer mosquitoes in our area compared to many other parts of Bali, due to the cooler climate and because all water in the area is flowing and comes fresh from the mountain springs. Mosquitoes do not like to breed in this water. We do provide natural mosquito repellant. Inside the Wani Tent and in the bedroom of our Wooden House you’ll rarely see any mosquito.
During the rainy season there are sometimes mosquitoes where vegetation is thick, particularly early morning and late afternoon, but usually less than almost anywhere else in Bali.