Bali, for the traveller who swaps the whole south for three bases in the north and east.

This plan is not for someone after nightlife, chef-driven restaurants or a white-sand beach with a sunlounger. It is for someone who comes for the landscape, the water and the price, and is willing to pay the island's real toll, which is road time.

Green rice fields on broad, gently stepped terraces, a tall palm at the centre, wooded hills behind and a blue sky with white clouds. — The Sidemen valley, at the foot of Agung. The same terraces as at Ubud, without the queue of cars to see them.Paul Arps / CC BY 2.0·CC BY 2.0

01 Why the south is full and the rest is not

This is not a matter of fashion. The airport sits at the southern tip, on the island's only broad flat surface, and all the infrastructure grew around it. Tourism accounts for roughly 80 per cent of the Balinese economy and it concentrated where there were already roads, running water and level ground.

The practical consequence is that the crowding is a geographic phenomenon, not a cultural one: it piles up within a short radius. Leaving that radius is enough to cut visitors per square kilometre drastically, without giving up anything essential about the landscape.

How this trip fits

Escaping the crowds The nearly seven million annual visitors concentrate in eight southern places

Shore diving The Liberty wreck lies about 30 metres off the beach and starts at 5 metres down

Price Lodging and food cost a fraction of Seminyak or Nusa Dua

Terraces without a queue Sidemen has the same rice fields as Ubud and a tiny fraction of the visitors

Ease of getting around There is no ring motorway: single-lane roads and long transfers

Pale-sand beach The east and north coast is dark volcanic sand and shingle

02 Munduk: the high base

Munduk sits at 1,163 metres in the northern highlands, among coffee and cocoa plantations and above the crater-lake district. At that altitude the sticky coastal heat disappears and the nights are cool — which, after a few days at thirty degrees and 80 per cent humidity, is worth more than it sounds.

A narrow waterfall dropping down a dark rock wall covered in ferns and moss, dense tropical vegetation on both sides and a pool at its foot. — One of the Munduk waterfalls. The village sits at 1,163 metres, and at that height the coastal heat disappears.Stefan Fussan / CC BY-SA 3.0·CC BY-SA 3.0

What you do here is walk. The area concentrates waterfalls, paths through coffee plantations and viewpoints over the caldera lakes. It is also the place to understand where the island's water comes from: the headwater forest and the reservoir are up here.

The price is meteorological. It rains considerably more at altitude than in Denpasar and cloud builds almost daily, even in August. If you have come for guaranteed clear skies, Munduk is not your place; if you have come for green and a bearable temperature, it is.

03 Sidemen: the terraces without the queue of cars

Sidemen is a valley at the foot of Agung with terraced rice fields. The honest comparison is with Ubud: the landscape belongs to the same family, and the difference is how many people are looking at it. Here the terraces are still a working field rather than a viewing platform with an entrance fee.

The valley also keeps workshops weaving songket and endek, highly laborious cloths made in the area. Visiting a workshop is one of the few chances in Bali to see a craft running at its own pace, without being staged.

04 Amed and Tulamben: diving from the beach

The north-east coast is the part of the island where the sea makes up for the beach not being pretty. The sand is volcanic, dark and shingly, but the reef starts a few metres offshore and the water is sheltered.

A dark-sand beach with several outrigger fishing boats drawn up under palms, very clear turquoise water to the right and small distant figures near the shore. — Amed: black volcanic sand, outrigger boats and the reef a few metres from shore. It is not a postcard beach, which is why it is quiet.Marklchaves / CC BY-SA 4.0·CC BY-SA 4.0

The main reason is at Tulamben: the USAT Liberty, a 120-metre American cargo ship lying about 30 metres off the beach, in the village itself. You walk in from the black sand; the shallowest part is around five metres down and the deepest about thirty, so it can be dived on a basic certification and snorkelled from the surface as well. It is rare to have a wreck of that size so accessible.

A submerged metal structure completely overgrown with hard coral and sponges, reef fish swimming around it in hazy blue water. — The hull of the USAT Liberty at Tulamben, overgrown with coral. The wreck is 120 metres long and starts at about five metres down.Tilonaut / CC BY 3.0·CC BY 3.0

Amed, a few kilometres south, is where you stay: a single road with the houses and dive centres along it, outrigger boats on the sand and not much else. That «not much else» is precisely the argument.

A narrow asphalt road between palms and low houses, a white dive-centre sign to the left and cables crossing overhead. — The main street of Amed. The whole village sits on a single road, and half the businesses are dive centres.Alexey Komarov / CC BY 3.0·CC BY 3.0

05 What doing it this way costs

The toll is the road. The airport is at the southern tip, there is no ring motorway, and the network is single-lane in each direction, shared with motorbikes, lorries and villages the road runs straight through. Any transfer between these three bases is measured in hours rather than kilometres, and hiring a driver beats driving yourself.

That is why the usual mistake is trying to see it all from one base. With three nights in each place and half-day transfers between them the trip works; with daily round trips it becomes a driving holiday.

And there is one concession worth accepting up front: there is no white sand here, no wide choice of restaurants and no nightlife. What there is: clear water ten metres from the room, unfenced terraces, cool mountain air and a cost that looks nothing like the south's. If that trade works for you, the rest of the island is surplus.