Indonesia – PalmTreeMusings

After Bali, we hopped on a flight to the Indonesian island of Java, next door. We landed in Yogyakarta, home to two UNESCO world heritage sites. Using public transportation, we made our way to Prambanan, a large Hindu temple complex, and to Borobudur, the largest Buddhist temple. Both were built in the 900’s and were amazing to see and also amazingly hot and humid. In Yogya, we also got to engage in one of my favorite travel past times: seeing a movie! We caught Mockingjay at a theater, which I loved.

We flew to Singapore, the island state at the very tip of SE Asia. For two days we did the Hop on, Hop off bus there. I have to say, there isn’t much to do in Singapore except shop and eat. Although, we did stay in the red light district, where prostitution is legal, so that made for some very interesting street-watching in the evenings. And the huge buildings and skyscrapers were fascinating. The Singapore Changi airport is also one of the best in the world, with a sunflower garden on the roof, a kinetic rain sculpture, free massages, and a pool.

Deah backpack Singapore airport Sunflower Garden — Changi Airport

Marina Bay Sands Skypark Singapore building with surf board on top — Marina Bay Sands Skypark

colorful buildings in Singapore — Marina Bay Sands Skypark

After Singapore, we took a bus into Malaysia, and stopped in Malacca. We stayed there for three days, and enjoyed their river walk area, a river cruise, the Jonker Street night market, and a very nicely done museum on the history of the area, beautifully housed in the shah’s old wooden palace.

river boat in Malacca Malaysia — River boat in Malacca

Jonkers Street big ship Malacca Malaysia — River boat in Malacca

Another bus, this time up to Kuala Lumpur. What a skyline! The twin Petronas towers are so cool to look at. We rode up to the top of the KL Tower to get a better view of the Petronas towers, also went up to the 33rd floor Skybar of a nearby hotel to get a great night shot. Like Singapore, KL is mainly about shopping and eating. We did also visit the orchid and hibiscus gardens, and took the metro out to Batu Caves, a huge limestone cave that houses some Hindu shrines and a giant gold statue of Lord Murugan, the Hindu God of war. And we saw another movie – the last Hobbit film (we don’t usually see this many movies on vacation, but it is seriously hot and humid here. Indoor activities are nice).

Giant gold statue in front of batu caves near Kuala Lumpur Lord Murugan — Batu Caves

twin petronas towers kuala lumpur — Batu Caves

From KL we found a flight to Brunei, a tiny country the size of Delaware on the island of Borneo. We spent four days there, including Christmas. We did a city tour and visited two huge mosques, the Royal Regalia museum, and the water village- a large portion of the city’s population live in houses built on stilts in the river. Brunei is interesting- they have sharia law there, but also a large number of multi-faith Indonesians and Malaysians living there. Christmas was a public holiday, although most shops and businesses stayed open. The Sultan of Brunei is supposedly the richest man in the world, and owns all the oil and gas there. Petrol costs 32 cents a liter.

stilt village river brunei — Chris, at a bar near the water village

mosque Brunei — Chris, at a bar near the water village

The coolest thing we did in Brunei was go on a river and rainforest tour. We rode up the river for about 45 minutes, then rode in a van another 25. Then we got in another boat, a very shallow draft, longboat, and rode another 45 minutes into the national forest. Then we hiked in and up the forest, until we came to four huge canopy towers. We climbed up the towers- 50 meters high- and walked across the top of the forest. It was very neat to see the top of the forest like that.

Brunei Cloud Rainforest — The Cloud Rainforest

canoe river cloud rainforest tour Brunei — The Cloud Rainforest

Some notes about things I’ve noticed this week while traveling. My t shirts are starting to get pretty stretched out from all the washing and wearing, especially the necklines. So I decided to replace one of them at a mall in KL. Do you know how hard it is to find a shirt without a super scooped neck or deeply v-necked shirt? I had to buy one from the boys department at H&M.

Also, every single hotel we have had in SE Asia has had free internet. Why do so many US hotels still charge for wifi?

Next up for us is Thailand, and getting a chance to visit our dear friend Chantel.

Bali is one of the 17,000 islands in the Indonesia archipelago, and is about half the size of the Big Island in Hawaii. While Indonesia is 90% Muslim, Bali is 90% Hindu. There are four million people living in Bali, and it has over 10,000 temples and over 4,000 hotels. It’s a very popular vacation spot for Australians- they’re everywhere.

Ten Beautiful Ways to Spend Your Days in Bali

1. Stay a few days in Kuta/Legian/Seminyak area. There’s tons of bars, restaurants, hotels, tour operators, taxis, scooters, and beaches crammed into this small area off Denpasar. There’s plenty to see and do to keep you busy anywhere from two days to two weeks.

A hotel on Poppies Lane cost: $28 — A hotel on Poppies Lane. Cost: $28

2. Take a surf lesson on the beaches of Kuta/Legian/Seminyak. We used Odyssey surf school, located next to the Hard Rock Cafe. Or, you can just rent a board from one of the local guys set up on the beach. Our lesson was two and a half hours and cost us about $35 each.

purple Hard Rock Hotel surfboard Bali Indonesia — Surf’s Up!

3. Take a tour to some temples around the island. You can do a big bus tour, or a private car tour. For the private car, you can get 2-6 people together and pay one price (about $60), so if you can organize together you can save some money. We did the Bedugul tour, which took us to a lakeside temple, a royal family temple, a monkey forest, lunch, coffee farm (which serves luwak, or civet coffee), and finally, the Tanah Lot temple, also called Temple by the Sea.

4. Visit Ubud. This “cultural capital” (featured in Eat, Pray, Love) is filled with shops, restaurants, temples, garden bungalows, and frangipani-covered alleys. Just enjoy taking slow walks through the little town, saying hi to the locals. Consider a cooking class, or walk over to the monkey forest at the edge of town. Sit in the garden of your bungalow and read, or take a dip in the pool.

5. Get a massage. They range from 60,000 rupiah to 120,000 ($4-12 USD), so feel free to get more than one. Add in a facial or a pedicure. Get another one tomorrow.

6. Watch the cremation ceremony (called a ngaben) in Ubud. We inadvertently showed up in town right smack in the middle of the procession, featuring towering floats carried on the shoulders of 20-30 men. The body of the deceased is actually inside the float and after winding through the town they are taken to the cremation cemetery and burned. (The floats vary and may be in the shape of a giant ox and/ or a golden tower). There is an annual mass cremation ceremony for poorer people (the bodies are interred in the ground while waiting for the mass cremation), or a private ceremony for richer or royal families (still with a public procession). You can find out when the ceremonies are happening in advance because they are planned for auspicious days according to the lunar calendar.

7. Visit a Balinese art museum. Two really nice ones are in Ubud, the Pura Lukisan museum and the ARMA (Agung Rai Museum of Art).

8. Take a bike tour from the volcano in the lake (Batur) to Ubud. They can pick you up from Kuta or from Ubud. You start with breakfast at the family compound of the owner, go to a coffee farm, and then see the volcano. Then you get on the bikes, and it’s 25 km downhill, stopping at various villages, temples, and rice paddies along the way to take in the view and listen to the guide explain his culture. A delicious lunch afterward and then you’re dropped off at your hotel or guesthouse or home stay. We used Bali Bike Baik and found them to be really excellent, informative and well organized.

9. See a traditional Balinese dance. We attended a women’s kecak in Ubud, which included a chorus of singers and chanters, while costumed dancers acted out a historic Balinese folk tale, the Ramayana Epic.

10. Visit the next island over. You can go east and visit Gili or Lombok by boat, or go west, and take an overnight bus (and ferry) to visit Java. We headed west to visit Java, then Sumatra. The buses are air conditioned and quite comfortable. Flights are also cheap. We are taking a flight to Yogyakarta for under $50 each on Lion Air.

Stay tuned for our next post about our adventures in Yogyakarta, and then we’ll head to the Asian mainland!