22nd - 27th August 2012
We arrived late at night at the train station, after our 15 hour journey.
It is very hectic outside the station, so get a taxi. We have not booked a room, but have read in the loney planet, which is the best area to go to.
We find a room, after asking in 4 hotels, it's the end of ramadan, so locals are still holidaying.
The is a little more money than we usally pay, 450,000rps (30 pound), at the Duta Hotel on Prawirotaman Street, but after having been up since 4 am we really can not be bothered walking any further, we will find cheaper digs in the morning. The room is surprisingly quiet, with a sort of indoor-outdoor bathroom. They also do a really good buffet breakfast.
Thursday, and we go in search of cheaper digs, we find a 'homestay' called "De Pendopo", a nice, clean and reasonably new place with only 4 rooms and for 230,000rps (15) this is much better value, they even provide free tea, coffee, water and wi-fi!
We go off in search of the Sultans Palace. We walk, but in the heat is does seem a long way, it's a massive walled area, with several entrances. It costs 12,500rps to enter plus 1000 for the camera?! To be honest, it was a little disappointing, some of the china and things on display, really didn't look that old and I'm sure my parents had things older in their cupboards! The other thing that was annoying about it was, if there were any labels, they were not in english!
We try to organize our transport to Jakarta, we have a flight to Singapore on the 28th from there. We enquire at the train station. As it is the end of ramadan, they have almost doubled the price of tickets to Jakarta. We get flight prices instead and these are a simialar price. Ira, the lady at De Pendopo homestay, kindly offers to book it for us, as you need an Indonsian bank account, so the flight is now booked!
We arrange to go to a temple about 1 1/2 hour bus ride away, with a guy called Christian from Belgium, who is in the next room to us. He's 26, travelling alone and he seems like good company! (Fingers crossed, it turns out better than our last companion!!). We get the local bus (3,000rps 21p) to 'Prambanan Temple' at lunch-time, after a couple of bus changes we arrive, it is really hot and very busy. Christian is fair haired, tall and slim, between the 3 of us, once again, we are the center of attention, people asking if they can have their photo's taken with us etc, I find the whole thing very strange, but equally funny, (one girl thought Christian looked like Harry Potter, with his little round glasses, she was not wrong!).
The Temple (169,000rps 11.00p) is very large and impressive and well worth the trek.
We have decided we can not come to Java and not see the worlds largest Buddhist temple. We get a few prices, cheapest price 60,000 - 150,000 so definately worth shopping around, and decide to book with the 2 giggling girls at Kelan Travel on Pramirotaman II, they included breakfast and entrance fee for 230,000 each. This street runs pararell with our street, but we have not ventured down here before. We wish we had, it is a lot quieter and we find a bar/restaurant that sells BACARDI!! A first!!
We get picked up at 4.45 am and arrive at the temple at 6. Sunrise is not an option this morning, it's cloudy! but it is cool and a lot quieter. It really is quite something and very impressive. Unfortunately, it was rebuilt in early 1990's because it was ground underneath it was unstable, and whilst I appreciate it was probably the largest jigsaw puzzle in the world (4d at that) a lot of the pieces didn't seem to match up. That said, it was still pretty 'awesome'!
We have done the 'largest' tourist attraction in the area and are back at our digs having breakfast, by 10.30 am!
Java has actually been a lot nicer, and definately more friendly than we could have ever imagined. I love the fact that when you walk down the streets, most people will smile and say hello, especially the little kids, then when you say hello back, they run off down the road giggling!
Move onto Singapore tomorrow.
