Long weekend in Bintan

[akay]

Hi - I'm looking at a long weekend in Bintan. Looking at the google search results, it's a bit of a minefield. There are ferry or ferry + hotel packages. I like to chill on the beach but also close to local nightlife. As I'm going for only the weekend, not keen on spending a long time / money on transfers to hotel. and i dont want to stuck in Bates motel in the middle of nowhere. Does anyone have any advice on this?

[proxymoron]

As far as I know, there is no nightlife in Bintan apart from whatever they can offer you within the resort / motel which you are in. Which pretty much means you sitting lonely in a small dark room with disco lights and retro music, played specially for you by the in-house DJ cum waiter cum cleaner cum bartender.

Bintan is more for family holiday and simple watersports. May be it is Batam which would suit more for your kind of weekend getaway.

And if you really intent to go to Bintan, I would recommend taking Junior Suite in Bintan Agro Resort. It is an airconditioned wooden hut, bit far away from the resort, with a private beach. Worth every penny you pay for it. Hope this helps.

[v4jr4]

Hi - I'm looking at a long weekend in Bintan. Looking at the google search results, it's a bit of a minefield. There are ferry or ferry + hotel packages. I like to chill on the beach but also close to local nightlife. As I'm going for only the weekend, not keen on spending a long time / money on transfers to hotel. and i dont want to stuck in Bates motel in the middle of nowhere. Does anyone have any advice on this?

If you're expecting to see local nightlife around Bintan, you're gonna have a bad time.

No, seriously.

Back then, we (my Indonesian friends and I) got a good offer to stay at the resort. Still, we were craving for local foods (cheaper and suitable for us). It's around 1 hour trip to the nearest small town. Nothing much, except we're hunting for the foods and some stuffs (like instant noodle, crackers, snacks). If you want to experience local nightlife, I can say that Malacca is better.

Here's the main problem. Electricity between the city and the resort is "rare". If you drive from the city to resort around, say, 7 PM, you won't see any light source.