I landed in Yogyakarta airport. Friday afternoon the 26th of December. Walked from the plane to the terminal with the sight of what looks like a volcano. Couldn’t verify it but it is not surprising since the region has one of the most active volcanos in the world.
I had no interest in seeing Yogyakarta. It is supposed to be beautiful and interesting but I had two clear targets in mind; the Borobudur temple and the merapi volcano nearby. Afterwards I would proceed to Bali to end my trip relaxing on the beach!
I took the bus fro. The airport to Magelang. 3 hours in the bus that costed around 3 euros. Indonesia is the cheapest out of the 3 countries I have visited. I arrived to Mageland around 9 with no place to sleep. Famega is actually in town but I felt too impolite if I call that late and request to stay the night. Wandered around hotels, they are all full. It is raining and I don’t the choice to sleep in the street. A policeman took me on the back of his motorbike to another hotel that I found to be also full. This is the high season is local tourism and all hotels are full of Indonesian families. I had no other option than to leave Magelang as well.. A taxi to Borobudour where I know that there are some hotels and guesthouses. The taxi costed 150,000 rupiah. Which is around 10 euros for a 20 minutes ride. I found a humble guesthouse where I met Jonny the manager. He was in Gothic cloths and I came to know later that he plays dark metal or heavy metal or whatever metal it was. I hate metal! lol. Jonny switched to speaking German when he saw my address in the form. A form that they have to give to the local authorities for each guest. Jonny told me that he lived in Mainz, got married there and has a daughter. He stayed there for two years only and did all that :D!
I went up to the room. Again, very basic. a one-star hotel. Everything looks like it is a century old. No hot water so I had to shower with cold water. This happened a few more times during this trip!
I slept well. In the morning it was raining cats and dogs so I had a relaxed breakfast. At some point, I decided to go to the temple which is 5 minutes walking.
It is impressive to see from far. Once you climb it, it is not really that impressive! I think the landmark is the design of the inverted bells. It started raining crazily when I was on top of the temple. Thanking God I listened to Valerio Raco’s advice. I have placed all my important books and documents inside a plastic bag inside my backpack. The rest of me was completely wet. I was dripping water like a melting ice cream. I stayed a bit wandering around the temple and then decided to leave.
Near the temple there is the volcano. Since the weather is bad, I had no hope to see the volcano neither to climb up and take a dive in its lava! In a more beautiful day, the volcano looks like this:
Then started the longest bus ride in the history. Since all the tickets were booked. Flight and trains.. I had to take the bus to Bali! Google says it is a 12 hours ride. But Adham didn’t take a decent bus. When I asked where is the bus, some locals took me to a bus stop. They said take the bus here to Surabaya. Then the ferry to Bali. The bus was also full. So another guy told me take the bus to Jembert, then another bus to Bali with the ferry. I was tired, so I took the bus to get the hell out of Yogya. And in the bus was a true experience!
It was a very local bus. 5 seats per row. People can smoke and they do a lot. No air conditioning and the condition of the bus itself is miserable. Space is very limited. I thought of all the luxuries I had in my life and then thought that it is just a bus ride. I should be fine. Nobody spoke English on the bus. So I couldn’t really talk to anyone. For some unknown reason, one passenger had a live chicken on board. So, over the night, with the traffic jam, it was me, the smoke of the cigarettes and the chicken! 14 long hours till I arrived to Jembert. As soon as I got off the bus, the next bus was leaving soon, so I jumped in. Almost the same bus, for another 12 hours. However, this time I had some immunity against all these bad conditions. But I couldn’t help with boredom. I read a bit, my phone was out of battery so I couldn’t listen to music or do bullshit on the internet.
I arrived to Denpasar in Bali on Sunday night. After my bus experience, I decided that I will try to enjoy Bali to the maximum. And it was the highlight of my trip.