Profile
Blog
Photos
Videos
Our month in Indonesia began in Java on Monday 16th June. We flew into Jakarta, where we fortunately bumped into an american guy called John, (who was living and working in Singapore). He suggested we share a taxi to our hostel/(hotel in his case!), and then offered to pay for the trip - remarking that it was 'on his boss'. Great luck! We spent just a brief day in Jakarta (at a great hostel called six degrees) before catching an 8hour train east to the city of Yogyakarta - the hub of Javanese culture. As soon as we arrived in Yogyakarta we really liked the feel of the place, despite being a big city it had alot of character and charm, and a distinct arty vibe. With lots of small colourful alley ways, trendy cafes and tasty street food stalls.
Early the next morning we went to visit Borobudur - the largest buddhist temple in the world, arriving in time to catch a rather misty sunrise. Which actually we found added to the almost ethereal feel of the place. The temple itself is very impressive, with numerous layers and stairways, all of which are covered in small statues of the Buddha. At our hostel in Yogyakarta we made friends with two dutch backpackers, Ilsa and Alex. With them we went exploring around the city and whilst eating Gado-Gado (traditional dish of vegetables, boiled egg and the infamous peanut sauce) at a street stall, we chatted to a local man who suggested we should go to the Yogyakarta Arts Center and Batik School. The Center is only open twice a week, so we were lucky to be able to go and see students making the amazingly intricate and incredibly beautiful Batik material. We were talked through the process of creating Batik by one of the head masters. We quickly discovered that depending on size, pieces of Batik were pretty cheap to buy - so we all spent a good hour eagerly choosing what to buy. Sof and I both went for pieces in vibrant red with dancing ladies! (We already regret not buying more!)
We had another early start the next morning, taking a 12 hour bus ride to the village of Cemoro Lawang in the northeast Java - the base for climbing the active volcano, Mount Bromo. In order to have time to see sunrise from the top of Mount Bromo we began walking at 3.30am. Along with a group of travellers we had met on our bus ride we set off with confidence (and no guide) into the dark, across a large desert like 'sand-sea'. After walking for about 40 minutes we were all abit unsure why we hadn't come accross the volcano yet (or even bagun going uphill!) Thankfully, just as we were feeling pretty disorientated a local man on a motorbike turned up out of nowhere - informing us we were walking in completely the wrong direction! Very kindly he offered to lead us back on to the right track. Once we started the ascent of the volcano, Sof and I were quickly overcome by the intense and rather suffocating smell of sulphur - Sof felt very sick and I felt like I couldn't breathe! Once we reached the top though it all proved so worth it - the view was incredible. The sunrise from the top of the volcano was the best we have seen our whole trip. Briliantly bright and rising slowly over the volcanic hills and layer of cloud that hung below us. In a giddy mood we all made our way back to the guest house for a breakfast of hard boiled eggs and banana.
On the same day, along with our new danish friends, Melina and Heidi, we caught another bus to the far east side of Java to another volcano - Ijen. We reached the village we would stay in for the evening and went out to find some food. There seemed to be few places to eat and after asking at a snack shop a small boy told us to follow him - we presumed to a cafe/restaurant. Instead he led us down a narrow side street to a covered alleyway of houses - one of which we were showed into and told to take a seat on the mattress in the small front room (where Indonesia were playing Pakistan in a football match on the tv!) Some of the women cooked us a really tasty nasi goreng whilst we chatted with different members of the extended family/community - a few children who spoke a bit of english and an elderly man who spoke no english but whom we managed to swap names with and gesture about the football game. An unexpected and really enjoyable evening! We had just a few hours sleep that night as we had to get up at 1.30am to begin our climb to the crater of Ijen. It was pretty chilly and the climb up proved alot steeper and harder than we had anticipated. It took us around 3 hours to reach the rim of the crater. Once there we climbed down some very rocky steep steps to the lake below. From here we were able to see the Sulpher Miners setting fire to the rock, which created a brilliant bright blue flame. We were also shocked by the extremity of the work carried out by the miners. Once the sun had risen we had a great view of the greeny-blue crater lake and the dry rocky landscape around us - I thought it looked like a scene from a sci fi film! We were back at the bottom by 8am to enjoy another breakfast of hard-boiled eggs...!
Ijen was our last stop in Java. From here Sof, Melina, Heidi and I caught the ferry over to Bali. We stayed in a place called Lovina in the north of Bali, it was nice and quiet here and gave us a few days to recover and relax after all the walking! We ate at an incredbile local fish restaurant where we chose our fresh fish from two huge buckets- so tasty that we came back the next night! We enjoyed a few drinks and a sing-along to a guitar with our new indonesian friend Zebra and his pals. On the morning before we left Lovina, we got up early to go dolphin watching - which was fun but proved to be rather a popular thing to do - so there was a lot of boats around doing the same thing. After Lovina we caught the bus to Ubud, in the hills in the center of Bali. There were some amazing rice paddies here which we enjoyed exploring. It was also a very cheap place to get a massage - so we both treated ourselves! Ubud had a wealth of cafe's and shops, with an extensive market open everyday - we had to restrain ourselves from buying to much! On one of our final evenings in Ubud, along with Melina and Heidi we went to visit the monkey forrest, - which was very entertaining. We had monkeys flying above us and occaisionaly right on to us. We stayed in Bali just 5 days before catching a ferry east to the island of Lombok.
Kat x
- comments