Tanjung Aan

Tanjung Aan is a wide double bay on Lombok's south coast, about fifteen minutes east of Kuta Lombok by road. A low headland splits it into two curved beaches that share one long arc of shallow turquoise water, backed by dry scrub-covered hills rather than a town. The bay sits inside the Mandalika tourism zone, so the access road and the strip behind the sand have been reworked in recent years, but the shoreline itself is still open coast, with a lot of space even on a busy day.

The unusual thing here is underfoot: across the eastern half of the bay the grains are coarse and almost perfectly round, which is why it is widely known as peppercorn sand. Walking on it feels closer to walking on tiny beads than on a normal beach, and it does not pack down or cling to skin the way fine sand does. The western half is finer and whiter, so the two ends of one bay feel noticeably different underfoot. Round grains are also unkind to bare feet on the steeper parts, so sandals are worth having.

Tanjung Aan is one of the better swimming beaches on Lombok's south coast, because the bay is shallow, sheltered and usually calm. The water shelves gently a long way out, which suits weaker swimmers and children better than the open beaches further west. Conditions still change with swell and tide: the outer edge of the bay picks up surf, current runs stronger near the headlands, and low tide exposes rock and coral in places. Wade in and look before you swim. There are no lifeguards, so treat it as an unsupervised beach.

Bukit Merese, the grassy headland closing the western end of the bay, is a ten to fifteen minute walk uphill and delivers the view most people come for. From the top you look back over both halves of Tanjung Aan on one side and out along the cliffs and bays of the south coast on the other. The path is a worn dirt track through dry grass with no shade and no railing, easy in dry weather and slippery after rain. It is at its best in the last hour before sunset, which is also when it is busiest.

You reach Tanjung Aan by road from Kuta Lombok, roughly fifteen minutes east on a paved coastal road, and there is no public transport worth waiting for. Most people ride a scooter or hire a driver for the day. Parking areas sit behind the sand at both ends of the bay and a small charge is usually collected on the spot; amounts are not posted, so carry small cash. The dry season, broadly May to September, brings the clearest water and the most reliable sunsets. Mornings are calm and quiet, afternoons bring wind and the Merese Hill crowd.

Coverage here is fine: 4G along the Kuta Lombok coast and at the bay itself, with no 5G as of July 2026. Goodbars runs on Telkomsel, which reaches further across Lombok than any other Indonesian network, so maps, messaging and calling a driver all work at the beach and on the road in from town. Signal is thinnest behind the headlands and in the dips inland from the sand, and the top of Merese Hill usually holds a better connection than the beach does. Save an offline map before you leave town anyway, because the turn-offs down to the parking areas are easy to miss.