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Garrie McCreddin, wife Karen and daughters Isabella, 5, Charlotte, 3, and Mackenzie, 18 months, in Bali. Photo: Jason Childs

HOW'S this for a lurk? Garrie McCreddin dropped out of school at 16 and now, aged 33, he earns a salary of $190,000 in the hand. He gets six months holiday and spends his downtime surfing at Bali's secluded Echo Beach, where he lives with his wife and three kids - and their four servants.

Until a few years ago Mr McCreddin, who works as a driller on an exploratory oil and gas rig - currently drilling off China - based himself in Perth. But he, like hundreds of Australians who work in mines and on resource projects in WA, NT and in Asia, has decided to live in Bali, rather than Australia.

The itinerate nature of Bali suits the lifestyle of these fly-in, fly-out workers. There are now 16 or 17 flights every day from Perth to Bali, 11 each week from Darwin and two from Port Hedland, making it possible for miners to work in Australia and commute to Bali.

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Miners such as 25-year-old Dylan Coles, who is employed as an engineer in the remote Savannah nickel mine in the East Kimberley. At the end of his two-week shift, Coles flies back to Bali where he lives with his Javanese girlfriend. The cost of his commute, from Darwin to Bali, is less than $3000 a year. His annual rent is just $2000. Unsurprisingly, he saves half his $125,000 salary.

In Mr McCreddin's case, there were several reasons for his move. One was lifestyle - he can indulge his passion for surfing and still drop off and pick up the kids from school. Tax was another reason. His company pays tax in whichever country he is based. In 2009 a change in the tax law meant he would have to pay the difference between the Australian rate and the local rate. He decided to move and says there are hundreds of other Australians working in the mining and resource sector across Asia who have done the same.

''I can't see us going back to Perth,'' he says as he looks out from a cafe across Echo Beach. ''I just can't see it.''

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All work, all play: Bali expats