Finally left the bike on the wharf after returning to the Woodlands border for my stamp. Getting there was fun. 8 lanes of bikes about 1kilometer long to cross through the border, and that was a quiet day.
So I flew to Jakarta. It took longer to get from the Airport to the Hotel than it did to fly there. I was so lucky to meet a couple of locals who took me under their wing, booked me into their Hotel, took me in their Taxi, and then to dinner. What a really nice couple. Jakarta is hellish big crowded and dirty, plus it floods.
I took the train to Bandung. It was great to be able to look out the window and watch the countryside pass by. It was lush, green, intensely farmed with paddy fields scrambling up the hillsides. People working, planting harvesting and busy getting on with life. It was a great trip. The warnings that abound about travel in Indonesia seem to be overdone. The railstations and public places are habitred by the usual "hustlers" taxis, hotels, etc but when I finally found the taxi company I wanted which was Blue Bird ( Having been told often "no Blue Bird here") I also then got to the Hotel I had identified in a travel book. The people at the Hotel were great. The Hotel was great. I stayed the night and the next day I paid for the petrol and was taken for a tour. We went to the volcano which was clouded in rain sadly but again the countryside was magnificent. The rain forest, the nurseries, (by the mile) the villages, the gandening, the fruit trees, just a most pleasant place. Sadly as I said it was very wet.
So I stayed another night and went for dinner with the two guys from the Ahadiat Hotel, such a pleasant place to stay, and we were entertained by a local band playing pretty good music. A good stay.
Next day away early for the 8 hour train ride to Yogyakarta. This is also a most pleasant city and the ride throught the mountains and plains of Java was just great. Lots of rice and just so many busy people planting harvesting weeding, and caring for their fields.
Yogya as it is called has a Palace which was closed for the public holiday but I went to the most significant historical site in the southern hemisphere the book says, the Temple of Borobudur.
Then it was away to the plane to Bali. Short flight and a short ride to the beach at Sunur. Not an "upmarket" place but pleasant. I managed to get some sand and sun and a trip to the local Volcano. Again I greatly enjoyed the countryside. The plantings, the tress, the almost manicured look of the hillsides that contrasted with the rubbish everywhere else sadly. So after 3 nights it was time to move on to Darwin.
I am having trouble deciding whether Indonesia is a place I would want to visit again. To be able to ride the bike through the islands would be great but it is a nature ride for the beauty of the countryside. I would like to have seen some of the wildlife and that may be a reason to return.
Why people come to sit on beaches is still a wonder to me.
nzl04
