Last days in Indonesia

Hello again from Indonesia, this time from the wonderful and everso crowded Kuta…the hustling and bustling area where its cool to surf, have numerous tattoos and bleached blonde hair!!! As you can imagine, yours truly has opted to not be part of any of these characteristics, and just been stopping off here in between visits around the rest of the country!

So last time I wrote, we were in Yogyakarta about to venture off and see some of the temples, when yours truly was struck with another case of food poisoning…but do not fret, was not as severe as last time as was cracking jokes with the nurses and doctors confusing them on whether I was Indonesian or not…but none the less, not exactly something I wanted to deal with just before I go home…ho hum.

The first temple we saw was Prambanan, which very much reminded me of Angkor Wat, only disappointing thing was that the whole temple was enclosed in a themepark type setting, with mini trains moving from section to section, and kids playing areas, etc. The ballet was quite entertaining, even if I didn’t necessarily have a clue as to what was going on, but the dancing and costumes were great! Seemed to fit in quite well as a local…was sporting the lovely fisherman pants I’d picked up in Thailand, and some random tshirt, and was a bit worried as to whether there was a dress code, but after my flip flops fell apart 5 minutes before the show, well…I just had to play along with it…although I never imagined I’d be attending my first ballet in bare foot!

In front of Prambanan temples
(Me and the cheesiest grin outside Prambanan temple)

Getting up at 5am to watch the sunrise over Borobudur was beautiful. Luckily, was told that there hadn’t been a nice sunrise for weeks due to clouds, so guess we were lucky in that respect, and got a chance to take some very clear photos. Got a bit Bhudda happy in taking photo after photo, but was worth it, especially before the hoards of school kids arrived to pester tourists for photos and lessons in English (which again I was lucky to get out of, although Jhon wasn’t…haha!)

Borobudur, Indonesia
(View from the top of the stupa at Borobudur)

Moving on from the temples, the highlight of our stay in Indonesia so far has to be visiting Mount Bromo. After a 10 hour drive arrived at the guesthouse to find out that the temperature at Bromo would be 0, so was so happy to realise I had nothing but tshirts and one long sleeved top to keep me warm after I conveniently shipped my jacket home last month!!! Luckily got to rent one of the beauties that was an 80s style fleece jacket, which would have made me the envy of anyone in the Top Gun movie!!! Despite the 3am start (yes I did say 3am!!!), we hopped in a jeep to drive up to the viewing point with the rest of the early risers to see the sun rise and take some great photos of the volcanoes…got quite dizzy due to the altitude (around 2770m high), and lost all feeling in my hands, but was definitely worth it all. After this, got a chance to walk to the crater of the volcano, although packed in the walking because the altitude again was affecting me, so decided to hop on a horse for what I thought was quite a distance, but later realised was only for like 2 seconds!!!

Mount bromo, Indonesia
(Me freezing my arse off at the viewing point of Mount Bromo)

Going back to Kuta, did some white water rafting which was fab…and thankfully nobody fell in the water. After that, got fed up again with the area and headed off to the glorious Gili Trawangan island, just near Lombok. Rented a few bikes to take a look around the place, and actually rode round the entire island in around 30 minutes. The beaches were deserted in parts, and the snorkelling was 1m away from the sun worshippers on the beach, which was excellent. What also made it pleasant was the chilled out quiet nature of the people, and the simple modes of transport (either bike or horse drawn carriages)…so it really was just simplicity at its best!

Now we’re back AGAIN in Kuta where we’ve just done a day of water activities…snorkelling (couldn’t see many fish, although the bits of seaweed and sand were fantastic!), jet skiing…brilliant!!! And parasailing (felt like I wasn’t strapped in properly, but was fun either way!!!). Then tomorrow is our last day in Indonesia before I head off to the motherland for some last minute family time…but as our flight is quite late in the day, booked myself onto a bungee jump in the morning…crazy I know, but well I bottled out of the surfing, coz the waves looked too scary so there you go!!!

Think this will probably be the last remotely interesting email you’ll get from me as tomorrow is our last official day “travelling”, so yes guys, I will look forward to seeing you all soon!!!

Lots of love and kisses

Caroline
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