Riding to Central Java with Love Part IV

Leave the bunny alone....

We headed back to Jogja going down through a different route but the road ended in Jl. Kaliurang -Jogja where I previously said along that road you can see a lot cafes and internet shops. Before we got to that road we passed Mirota Batik, the souvenir shop I've been mentioning a couple of times before, and it was open, yuhuuuuuu. We made a stop there after getting some stuff I wanted we took off.

It is said that you have not yet been to Jogja if you have not yet taken a picture at the Jogja monument a.k.a Tugu Jogja, it is located right in the middle of Jogja city, Rigen said that it used to be used to mark the border. So we took a picture there, after a couple of shots we then headed back to the hotel.


Time flies so fast, we were nearly at the end of our journey...sad? you bet!

So we got back to the hotel, filled with satisfaction with our first trip together, now it is about going back home.

Off to sleep we went.

Day 4:


I thought we were going to go early but we did not, Yufi and I woke up at 7 or 8 and got ourselves ready, Rigen and Ghesy came over at around 9 am so we cruissed off after saying thank you and all to Mbak Shanti and her brother.
We stopped over at Rigen's grandmother's house, you see we younger people have to pay our respect to our elderly even just to say "see you later granny" hehehhe

We finally took off from Rigen's grandmother's house at 10.30 am made a stop at ATM machine first.

Home here we come. We gone through Jogja - Purworejo - Banyumas -Majenang - Banjar route a little bit different from the route we came in, last time we made a turn in Banyumas through Purwokerto.

The road was kinda crowded, holiday has ended, people were going back home at the same time we did. We didn't take picture at all on the way back because rain was acompanying us along the way to Banjar even Ciamis, at one point it was bright and the next kilometer it was raining, so we practically glued to our rain coat. I even managed to change my pants because eventhough it was covered by the raincoat, I was still managed to get wet.

City after city we passed, the road was sensibly crowded, we even passed an accident, we had to queue for sometimes, but since we were not in a car we could swiveled through the traffic jam, the cause of the traffic was this truck filled with LPG tanks (I hope it wasn't loaded) tipped over because of the slippery road.

We got to Bandung at 9 PM, had our supper then headed home through Bandung Purwakarta Karawang - Bekasi route. Purwakarta was a very quite road after the Cipularang highway officially open, people would rather go to Bandung via Cipularang than the old Purwakarta route. Poor old those Tapai seller (Tapai is food made out of fermented casava, which is a Sundanese snack) well I guess not all change are good, some have to willingly lose their income...

After passing industrial estate and a couple of factories in Karawang we arrived safely in Bekasi at 3 am, in front of a familiar mall which I do not visit very often, but it was the landmark which stated we were finally home! We splitted with Rigen and Ghesy in front of this mall

We arrived at home at 3.15 am. I Miss my daughter very much!!! I was finally home.

So the trip is officially ended, but it does not mean the trip is going to be my only trip on the back of a motorcycle. I plan to go toBromo in July, if everything was going smoothly, the trip is definitely on, I have even marked my work calendar as a leave and have asked my boss's permission, amazingly she said Yes yippeeeee.

There are a lot of places that I want to visit in the future where of course we could bring along our motorcycle such as...Sumatra Island, Bangka Island, Bali, Lombok, West Java, East Java, Madura Island, NTT such as Kupang, Larantuka, Lewoleba (my brother went to Lewoleba 2 years ago to find a sea cucumber he said the view was great!) kalimantan and others because this is not just about taking a beautiful pictures but also a lifetime experience that is of course if our annual leave permitted hehehehe

well everything always starts from a dream..

Riding to Central Java with Love part III

Still Day 2:

We went up to our room finally to get some beauty sleep, we made a plan for tomorrow, such as where to go since tomorrow is going to be our last day in Jogja. Off to bed!.


Day 3:

We woke up later than we supposed to, so we got ourselves ready in a flash (okay I did not as I had to iron my hair hehehe), had some breakfast and headed to our first destination, Prambanan Temple. Mbak Shanti (the hotel owner) told us not to be in a rush because Prambanan Temple is so close by "it is only 15 minutes away from here" she said, I was like "no kidding" because based on my experience, 15 minutes in other cities in Indonesia is an equivalent of hours of Jakarta people standard time, as you might have heard from the news that Jakarta is one of the city with worst traffic in the world, so everywhere you go is measured in hour even if it was only 100 m away (especially if you are in the SCBD district of Jakarta) and the ride was supposed to take 5 minutes to get there but in Jakarta standard time it would take 30 minutes or more if you are not lucky. Since the traffic is way looser in Jogja so 15 minutes means that the distance to go is at least 5 km hehehehe Okay back to the Prambanan temple topic, I was dumbfounded by the distance to Prambanan, disbelief to be exact, but then slowly I put on my jacket and my helmet and hopped on to the bike, Yippeee off to Prambanan we went.

Dear God, it was actually took us around 15 minutes from our hotel to Prambanan Temple (if we hadn't made any stop to buy some munchies and water) I was amazed and wished that this state of traffic would happen in Jakarta as well (that would be such a utopia people!!)

The Prambanan Temple wasn't as crowded as Borobudur was, since I guess a lot of visitors were heading back home since the New Year has passed, but I did not say that it was empty either. Unlike Borobudur, Prambanan Temple can easily be seen from the ticket booth and you did not have to walk for a couple of hundred meters to see the Temple. And I forgot to mention that even though the entry ticket was merely cheap but you are also charged for bringing a camera in to the site, the charge was not expensive at all Rp.1000, but I just couldn't get why do they have this bizzare rule. It was quite annoying as I saw some people had to count how many of their family members bringing in camera.

Prambanan Temple was still under going re-construction and from the look of it, it was nearly completed and she was kinda back into her magnificent shape. Prambanan Temple was badly damaged because of the earthquake in 2006 in Central Java (Jogja to be precised) which also killed hundreds of people in Jogja and its surrounding cities. UNESCO and Indonesian government have been re-constructing the Prambanan Temple ever since. A lot of important pieces missing and imagine how hard all these archeologist to glue the temple back in one piece.

The main temple was still partly covered with scaffolding and the whole complex was fenced so we could not look inside the temple, but fine by me, we just took a couple of pictures there and I also told a story as Yufi wasn't quite get on the temple history so I was yapping like a professional tour guide (which is now I wasn't quite sure either, whether I gave out the right information hehehe Sorry Yuf it wasn't Joko Tingkir who forced Roro Jonggrang a.k.a Shiva to marry him but it was Bandung Bondowoso, this poor guy had to built a 1000 temple in one night as a condition to marry Roro Jonggrang, as Roro Jonggrang herself requested, he almost made it as he was on his 999 temple but Roro Jonggrang was freaked out as it means that he only short of one temple to marry her, so she asked all villagers to hit on every mortar they have to deceive Bandung that it was dusk already, whe he found out he was being deceived he was furious and turned her into stone, that stone then placed in the main temple of Prambanan) This is the legend passed for decades, I was wondering whether or not Bandung Bondowoso was a handsome guy..heheheheh as Roro Jonggrang did not say that he was ugly but the reason she did not want to marry him was because he killed her father, like Hello who wanted to sleep with the enemy? Fair enough.

We left the temple complex after spending almost an hour and a half. There are a couple of small temples around the area, Candi Boko was one of them but we did not go there as we had to meet Rigen and Ghesy as we want to explore Kaliurang area.

First we went to Malioboro Street, where you can find all sort of souvenirs ala Jogja (read Batik) and the street was packed with cars and people, I wanted to go to Mirota Batik as the shop has everything in but it was closed, I was quite dissapointed, the lady on parking lot told us that the one in Kaliurang was open so I said to Yufi we have to go there later. We then went to Kraton (Jogjakarta's King's Palace) area, it was not at all like what I had always imagined and I wasn't that interested in exploring Kraton so we only stayed there for half an hour later I found out from Rigen that the one I had in mind was Tamansari is the other part of the Kraton (Shoot!) but what the heck we have to go to Kaliurang, the weather was unusually hot (meaning that rain was on its way) so we headed to kaliurang.

I told Rigen and Ghesy whether they mind or not if we made a quick stop at Mirota shop on the way up, they didn't, great! but eventually we made a stop at the wrong Mirota, it was a supermarket while the one I wanted is a souvenir and batik shop, well, what the heck so we had a traditional "Carabikang" cake instead.

Kaliurang is located on the slope of the famous mount Merapi which is still an active volcano (the last time it was errupted was in 2006), on the way there we passed a long line of shops, cafes and internet cafes, no wonder because one of the famous state universities, Gajah Mada is located around the area. I liked the ambience of the Jl. Kaliurang - Jogja it was different from Malioboro street. It was more laid back I guess.

We went up and down the hill, the air was cooler than Jogjakarta city (yes it sure is, we were on the Merapi slope) since the lunch time had long overdue and the rain was sheepisly showed its existence, Rigen took us to Moro Lejar restaurant, it was Javanese - Sundanese style restaurant where you can have clear water fish like Koi like fish (well it is slightly different from Japanese Koi) and Gurame fish. The restaurant was consisted of ten or more hut and guests can enjoy their lunch in the hut accompanied by the paddy field view. The food was nice and the price was okay, medium price I might say, the only hassle was our hut lcoated so faraway thus it was hard to call the waitress.

We continued our ride up to the Merapi Slope, Rigen told us on an intersection that one of them is leading to Mbah Marijan's house, he is the caretaker of Merapi Mountain which is inherited from one generation to another generation of his family. The kind of Jogja himself appointed Mbah Marijan to be the caretaker. After the 2006 Merapi Erruption, Mbah Marijan became famous he even became a TV star as he endorsed an energy drink hehehehe.

Unfortunately it was raining heavily and our view was blocked so we made a stop at this small "warung kopi' to my horror the warung also sell "satay kelinci" a.k.a bunny satay, I could see the bunny (it was only the bones left) being hunged but the furry feet was still there....crazy.

Some people said Satay kelinci was nice but Man I wouldn't eat it at all, Helloooo... Bunny? Come on!

After the rain was only dripping we went down.

to be continued

Riding to Central Java with Love Part II

Still Day 2:

After feeding our eyes with beautiful views, we took off from Borobudur, on the way out we were "greeted" by the street vendors , they were all selling all sort of stuffs ranging from a Borobudur miniature, Borobudur Ashtray, key rings and all sort of cute things even a back scratcher made from wood and bone (mm my mom would love it..) and a wooden spoon and etc etc but I had to keep my sanity and tried hard not to fall into all these sellers circle otherwise I would easily dig deep into my lovely backpack and stashing away my money until the last Rupiah I have. Hooray finally I arrived at the parking lot safe (well my wallet was safe indeed). The day was crazily hot, and while I was putting on all the necessary gear before riding back on Yufi's motorcycle, I was sort of drifted away a little bit..I was like "God I can't believe that I am here at last in the amazing Borobudur even yesterday I was at Dieng Plateau and the most craziest thing was we are here riding a motorbike after 12 hours of riding from Jakarta (that was to Dieng Plateau though, it took us another 2 hours to get to Borobudur) which was never ever crossed my mind before especially if my Dad was still alive he would definitely lock the gate and not letting me out at all, as you know how crazy Indonesian riders can be sometimes, because we are famous of being ignorant to traffic rules, but there I was, happily and enthralled by the views and of course the ride itself.

Okay I am comfortably geared up and ready to continue our ride to Jogja. Time was pointing at 2 something and we believed that we would get to Jogja around 4 PM so we cruised off.

We arrived at Jogja around 4.45 PM well almost 5 actually, we headed straight to the TIGER Hotel, a nice brand new hotel operated by a nice lady, Mbak Shanti and her family. The hotel was only 10 days old and she was still fixing and fitting stuff here and there but Yufi and I liked it, even Rigen put his in laws at the hotel as well. The hotel is located near Quality Hotel which is on Jl. Adisucipto (Jl, Raya Solo - Jogja). We went to the reception and got another good news, because the hotel was new so was her way of keeping the guest reservation which actually kind of prone to children's curious little hands, so anyway she lost our reservation because her daughter twinked it off and gave up our room to other guest, so in order to keep our reservation she gave a deluxe room with the price of a standard room hehehehe lucky eh?

We found that the room was huge and nice in overall, but I like the owner and her family more you felt just like home. So we cleaned up ourself, called Rigen and go around Jogja to get some dinner, as it was New Years eve, Jogja was drowned by human flood, people flocked here and there most of them ride their motorbike ranging from "Bebek" type both automatic and non- automatic to "male" bike not too mention cars hundreds of them with mostly "B" plates (B means that the car comes from Jakarta) and other plates but Jogja plates. We finally squeezed our motorcycle out of the crowd and found "Lombok Ijo" restaurant for dinner.

As we can not stand the crowded Jogja city center, we decided to head back to our hotel and spent our New Year there.

HAPPY NEW YEAR 2009!!!

We then felt hungry again, Rigen suggested that we try "Angkringan" a street stall which sells all sort of "finger food" which consists of chicken feet, eggs satay, chicken liver satay, chicken giblet satay and "Nasi Kucing" or "cat's portion rice" (why do they called the rice like that because the portion is so small you need to eat more than 2 serving) and some "gorengan" (fried assortment like tofu and corn fritter). Rigen munched on chicken feet, Ghesy, Yufi and I opted for ginger milk tea and I also ordered chicken liver and giblets satay, Yummy!!!. One thing unique about the Angkringan is it was kinda dark...the light setting was minimum, I bet it was only 3 watts or something.

After chit chatting and set plan for tomorrow we headed back to the hotel and saying night night to Rigen and Ghesy.

To be continued

Riding to Central Java with Love

Okay, this is a spontaneous travel I might say, we didn't have plan to go actually it took us 4 days to actually decide. Yufi said "let's cruise to Jogja just the two of us riding the bike" and I said "it's on beibeh"!

This trip might not be that incredible for most people especially yous who have been in a motorcycle touring and maybe when you read this you will think "what's the big fuss about this trip" but to me the trip was memorable not just because this was my first trip riding a motorbike but it was lots of fun, meeting nice people and I guess it makes me love my husband more hehehehehe and makes me feel grateful of what I have at the moment. This is like a pre-celebration that Yufi and I have almost made it to 5th year of marriage.

Here's the story:

Day 1:

Raining, We looked at each other grinning with question mark on our head "shall we cruise or shall we go back to bed?", mm decision decision especially Cica was having cough after we took her swimming to Waterboom for her birthday, but what the heck we decided to go.

We left at 2.30 am and went through Jatiasih - Narogong - Jonggol - Cianjur - Citatah - Padalarang - Bandung, I'm telling you aye the route was quite a horror, it was dark, the road was up and down lots of sharp turns and added to the horror was the rain it was raining cats and dogs since Narogong we have to put on our rain coats, along the route yufi just didn't dare to look at the side mirror that how creepy the situation was hihihi and he was scared that I might have turned into some creepy creature or something.

We were kinda relieved when we saw glimpses of lights down the road, yipeee Cianjur was on sight. Went through Cianjur, Citatah then Padalarang we cruise down to Soekarno Hatta, supposedly making a stop at Ratih and Riko's house but we made a stop at Circle K Soekarno Hatta instead,

after a cup of coffee and some bread we cruise off to Banjar through Nagrek - Tasik - Cikoneng - Ciamis - Banjar.

Arrived at Tasik around 10 am, we stopped a few times just to straighten our legs and butts and to have one two puffs of ciggy along the route

Finally hitting on Banjar asphalt, bye bye West Java welcome Central Java, felt closer to our destination. Made a stop at Pringsewu restaurant, yes pricey restaurant as we found out after paying the bill, blame it on Yufi as he was brainwashed along Banjar - Majenang route by the restaurant ad. The restaurant ad was placed every kilometer huhuhu shoot, but the food was nice though, if money is not an object this is the place.

Cruise off and made another stop at Lumbir, Central Java, had a cup of coffee then continue to Dieng our first destination. Gone through Purwokerto - Purbalingga - Banjarnegara - Wonosobo route to Dieng Plateau, well it is like a habit as we made a couple of stops along the route as well couldn't ignore the nature call.

Cool wind caressed my face as we were riding off Wonosobo road to Dieng, finally embracing the cold wind I missed so much, yuhuuuu super fresh air!!!!

Arrived at our humble hotel or homestay as people at Tambi Tea Plantation called it, the room was small for the price (which is now I think kinda pricey) but it paid off by the weather and the serene surrounding. Dozed off right away after a hot bath and a nice homey dinner plus the inviting weather, it was raining like crazy but I loved it a lot!!

Tambi Tea Plantation itself located at the west slope of mount Sindoro, and I guess it was 1000 over above sea level, did not matter to me as I love cold wind!!

Day 2:

Woke up kinda late at six supposedly wanted to see the sunrise but weather was kinda gloomy because of the rain last night, but what the heck we cruised off to Dieng Plateau 1370 m above sea level, and located in between Mount Sumbing and Mount Sindoro, we took a couple of pictures at the gate, then headed off to Candi Arjuna, had some breakfast and met a nice family, Tante Melissa and Om Haji Deden with their daughters and granddaughter, I was very impressed how humble they are! very rare nowadays don't you think? after a quite long chit chat and our breakfast was paid by Tante Melissa (thank you so much tante!!) we walked off to Candi Arjuna complex which consisted of a couple of small temples and a big one in the middle the place was neatly refurbished still there were a couple of temples rocks waiting to be placed on its proper site, we took a couple of pictures at the site.

Then we headed off to Kawah Sikidang, it was a sulphur crater. The place was kinda abandoned very dirty, which I thought quite a pity as the surrounding view was quite spectacular. Yufi's Pulsar was having its own time, getting a nice bath and voila it was all shiny and ready to rock the asphalt again. Meet a couple of touringers, I like to call them a bunch of "Bro's" huhuhuhu as you know the salutation is famous among motorbike club members, which I dunno why they like to call themselves and others "Bro" anyway...headed to Telaga Warna, The coloured lake was calmly green coloured, it supposedly reflects so many colours if the sun was up but unfortunately the sun was hiding somewhere, we bumped into Tante Melissa and Om Deden's family again, we walked the path along the telaga warna together to have a peep at "Goa Semar" where our famous "husband stealer" Mayangsari, is widely known for getting the ancient water from here for whatever (I did not say this, the guide told us), the water itself is believed to have a supranatural power to heal any diseases and makes you pretty/ handsome Tante Melissa was intrigued to get a bottle of the water, so did I heheheheh

Apart from the water, the goa (or cave in English) was famous along people who want to get a certain power or simply to meditate and the place has its own Kuncen or caretaker which to my opinion he did smell like an incense hehhehe so I guess people know that he was a caretaker hehehehe

Anyway we headed back to the hotel (after saying goodbye to Tante Melissa's family and exchanging phone numbers and facebook ID) to get some brunch and packed up for Jogja.

We went through different route this time, the road was kinda steep and small but the view was spectacular with fog all over the mountain slopes, Loved it a lot.

We finally cruised on Magelang's asphalt heading to Borobudur, made a stop at Magelang city to had a lunch, Padang food which was not Padang at all heheheh but at least we stuffed our stomach with food and keep our stamina fit.

Finally Borobudur, I missed my father then, the last trip I had to Borobudur was with him and my family. The weather sucked though, the sun was happily shining above my head, which made me not happy at all, I missed Dieng Plateau hehehehehehe.

Borobudur was packed with tourists as yes Holiday was on going people were crowding the place. The view was still breathtaking, I wonder why it is not the world 7th wonder anymore, what was missing is that our people love to violate the rules, some were taken pictures inside the "Stupa" unbelievable! and yes rubbish was everywhere in sight.

After feeding our eyes with beautiful views and reminiscing last trips I had with my dad, we then headed off to Jogja our final destination. The weather was unbelievably hot and Yufi agreed that Dieng Plateau was a cool place to be!

To be continued as I have to prepare for work tomorrow heheheh

Pictures can be viewed at http://www.new.facebook.com/wall.php?id=541727966&banter_id=632734403&show_all#/album.php?aid=2009703&id=1508132422&ref=mf