Padang Padang: Labuan Sait and the stairs
Compiled by Surf Haunts · Updated 2026-10-20
Padang Padang is a small beach below the limestone cliffs of Pecatu, on the Bukit peninsula at the southern tip of Bali. Everyone who has been there remembers the same thing: the way in.
Two names for one beach
The village's name for the beach is Labuan Sait. The Bali provincial tourism listing gives both – Pantai Labuan Sait, also known as Padang Padang, on Jalan Labuan Sait in Pecatu Village, South Kuta – and describes the approach as a road that resembles a cave followed by dozens of narrow stairs that fit one person at a time. Indonesia's national tourism site tells the same story: a beach below the cliffs, reached through a narrow opening in the rock and a descending stairway, listed among Bali's white-sand beaches at Labuan Sait, Pecatu.
The older use was practical. Rip Curl, which runs the contest here, writes that fishermen anchored their paddle boats in the deep-water channel at Labuan Sait for as long as anyone can remember – the beach was the Bukit's natural anchorage before it was anything else.
A contest since 2004
Surfing arrived on the Bukit decades ago, but the dated record at this beach begins with the contest. The Rip Curl Cup was first held at Padang Padang in 2004; international surfers were invited from 2007, and in 2016 the Bukit surfer Mega Semadhi won it for the second time, with the village gathered on the sand and the cliffs. The same account notes that the event hires local lifeguards and crews and works with the village on beach cleanups.
We do not say when the wave was first ridden or by whom; the sources we trust do not say either.
What the print leaves out
No wave size, no season, no crowd, no fee. The limestone arrangement – rock walls drawing together, steps dropping through light and shadow, a narrow strip of sand and the open water beyond – does not change with the conditions, and that is what we painted.
Do you know the beach?
If your family fished from Labuan Sait, or you have dated photographs of the stairs before the contest years, email us. We'll ask before publishing anything and agree how to credit you.
Our Padang Padang print
Our Padang Padang print starts inside the passage: ochre walls on both sides, steps descending through sun and gray shadow, and a band of yellow sand and turquoise water opening near the centre.
Compiled from public historical sources and fact-checked against them at the time of writing – not a first-hand or local account. Corrections and memories are welcome; we verify before publishing anything sent in.