Sabbatical 2025 | FindPenguins

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Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
Tam Coc
2.–8. toukok. 2025, Vietnam ⋅ ☁️ 32 °C
Tam Coc in Ninh Binh Province is quite a small town, still the region offers a lot of nature that can be explored, mostly by boat 🛶

Here, we explored two famous national parks: the Trang An Scenic Landscape Complex, which has been recognised as a UNESCO World Heritage Site since 2014 and Van Long Nature Reserve, where the Delacour’s Langur can be spotted 🐒 During our boat ride, we were so lucky that a group of langur monkeys showed up. It was so special and the best birthday present 😍

Hoa Lu, the ancient capital of Vietnam during the Dinh and Le dynasties, was only a short ride from Tac Coc so one afternoon/night, we went to explore the place. It turned out to be a super cute town and it reminded us a bit of Hoi An. Here, we visited the temples, explored the night market and took a boat ride on the river 🛕🏮

The other days, we rested to recover from the hand-foot-and-mouth disease that we caught, relaxed by the pool, enjoyed our last spring rolls and fruit juices 🍉

We were sad to leave Vietnam. We really liked our time here and we were amazed by how much the country has to offer. The people are so friendly and there is just so much to see and do 😊
It was time for our next adventure though and we were very excited and happy to start our Philippines trip by visiting Oli, Antoine's uncle, in Boracay 😍Lue lisää
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Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
Boracay
8.–15. toukok. 2025, Filippiinit ⋅ ☁️ 29 °C
Philippines, here we are to discover a tiny bit of you for the next 4 weeks! 😎
After two flights, two tricycle rides and a short boat trip, we finally reached our first stop Boracay and Oli’s lovely place 🥰

Boracay is a paradisiac island located in the Western Visayas region and worldwide known for its White Beach, which features powdery sand, crystal-clear waters, and breathtaking sunsets 🏝️
We had a wonderful time, biking around the island to discover the different beaches, eating delicious ice cream, drinking tasty smoothies and having great meals at home or at restaurants 🚴‍♀️🤤
Part of our daily routine was also to swim in the sea each evening while admiring how the sunset would surprise us 🌅😍

It was very interesting to hear lots of local stories from Oli, to help us better understand how the island developed (or regressed in some areas…) over the past years, and to gain first insights into Filipino culture.

Boracay has a lot to offer, from high-end luxury hotels and restaurants, to small eateries and local markets. Luckily for us, we were able to see all those varieties with our “local guide” 🤗

Our stay in Boracay was great, a BIG Thank You for everything Oli! 😍Lue lisää
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Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
Antique
15.–18. toukok. 2025, Filippiinit ⋅ ☁️ 30 °C
During our stay, we left Boracay for three days to explore some parts of Antique, a region on the main Land south of Boracay. We were able to borrow Oli's motorbike, so we started early in the morning to head south towards Tibiao 🏍️

The region is so beautiful with the sea on the one side and the mountain range on the other - a perfect combination!

After spending the night in Tibiao and trying some Lomi and Pancit Canton, we decided to visit Bugtong Baton Falls and the Calawag Mountain Resort 🏕️
Our tour guide to the waterfalls was a lady from the local village, always smiling and a badass woman hiking up the waterfalls in her slippers. We were kind of impressed 🫡 After swimming in the natural pools and hanging out with the local kids, we made our way back to the Calawag Mountain Resort.
Here, you're able to hang out by the river, have a picnic, go tubing or experience a kawa bath 🏞️

We were invited by a local group of friends to hang out with them. We had a picnic together, some rum and nice chats. In the evening, we were "cooked" in a beer and coffee bath. It was such a nice day 🥰

The next day, we followed the locals' recommendations and went to Malumpati, a cold natural spring in Pandan. We swam in the river, went tubing and enjoyed our day outside before heading back to Boracay 🏍️

Our short trip to Antique was so nice. It's not a typical tourist destination, so it was nice to see another side of the Philippines and explore that region for a bit 😊Lue lisää
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1 tykkäys
Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
Coron / Chindonan Island
18.–24. toukok. 2025, Filippiinit ⋅ ☁️ 30 °C
Our next stop was on Chindonan island, a very small island located close to Coron Island 🏝️
After spending a night in El Nido where we could enjoy a beautiful sunset, we took the ferry on the next day to reach Coron island. Our host was waiting for us on a speed boat to get to our final destination. After a 45 minutes drive, we finally reached our bungalow for the next 5 nights 🛖

It was really a cute place, entirely solar and wind-powered, and extremely quiet as there is no other place to stay on this side of the island besides the 5 bungalows 😍 Only one other guest was there at the same time, so we could definitely relax and enjoy the island life. We could snorkel and dive directly from the house reef, which was right outside our front door 🤗
Our host was organizing private island hopping tours as well as scuba diving sessions 🤿

We went snorkeling around the Lusong Gunboat, a Japanese shipwreck from WWII in a depth of 10 meters that is nicely covered with hard corals and offers a good variety of fish life. Then we drove to Coral Garden, the best preserved coral reef in the area and for us both the most beautiful corals we have ever seen so far. There were so many colors, it was magical ❤️ Our last stop for this tour was on Pass Island, a very beautiful island with white beach and palm trees to relax 😎

Our second excursion drove us to Black island, named after the steep black limestone cliffs it has. That small island offers many beautiful things to see: powdery white sand, limestones cliffs, caves, varans, a shipwreck right on the shore and few fish and corals 🐠 We spent a lovely day there, discovering the island, swimming and just resting.

On our last day, Vanessa had a discover dive with our host and saw a dugong few minutes before the end. This barely happens!! Even our host Dave was completely amazed as he’s only seen a dugong twice in all his years on the island 😍
(After chatting with Dave, we learnt that a lot of animals are coming back to the area now as fishing has been banned in this area to protect the marine life 💙)

In the evening we went together for a night dive with flashlights. This was a great experience, we could spot many shrimps, seahorses and crabs 🦐
We had a wonderful time on Chindonan Island, it was very relaxing and a really cool experience to live that isolated🏝️Lue lisää
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3 tykkäystä
Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
Balabac
25.–28. toukok. 2025, Filippiinit ⋅ ☁️ 29 °C
Balabac is called the Maldives of the Philippines. It's located in the south of Palawan and after visiting Omadhoo and Fulidhoo, we obviously had to check if Balabac can keep up with the beautiful beaches and crystal clear water 😄
After driving for 6 hours from Puerto Princesa to Buliluyan Port, we had to take a local ferry boat to Bancalan island where our tour guide was waiting for us ⛵
During our ferry ride we were stuck on the ocean due to engine problems. It took almost two hours to restart but meanwhile we were able to get to know our group. We were very lucky as our group was super nice and fun. Every evening, we watched the sunset together, chatted after dinner and enjoyed some beers 😊

During our 4-day trip, we were sleeping in our main camp on Bugsuk Island - Punta Sebaring. We were all sleeping in little huts, right in front of the beach. The huts, made out of wood, only had a mattress and a mosquito net. On our first day, we were welcomed by a huge and nasty spider🕷️ Our shared bathrooms contained a bucket of water to shower and flush the toilets. It was a basic and simple life for the next few days ✌️ But we made it 😅

We spent the days exploring different islands and sandbars with lots of starfish. Our highlight was Onok Island 🏝️ The water was so so beautiful and when we approached the island there were turtles swimming around, close to the beach 🐢 The place is gorgeous and can definitely keep up with the Maldives 🩵

Our days in Balabac were filled with island hopping, sunshine, snorkeling, good chats, adventure and living out of our comfort zone 🏕️ It was such a fun and unique experience, especially since it's not a very touristy place yet and we were almost always alone on the islands and sea 💛Lue lisää
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Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
1
Port Barton
29. toukok.–4. kesäk. 2025, Filippiinit ⋅ ☁️ 29 °C
After Balabac and one night in a nice room in Puerto Princesa, we took the bus to go to Port Barton - a small fishing village in western Palawan. While we were there a purple flag at the main beach gave warnings to swim in the water. It was jellyfish season and apparently there were box jellyfish as well, especially in shallow water 🪼

So, we still spent our days visiting different beaches, enjoyed a pool day with cocktails at a hotel and kayaked to Coconut Beach, where pigs were strolling around 🐷 There was one terror pig that went through all the backpacks in order to find food. One time, he found sunscreen, opened the bottle and licked the cream 😂 The other pigs were very cute though, they sunbathed and enjoyed being petted 😍

At some point we missed being on a boat so we decided to join a boat tour for a day. It was a super nice day during which we explored an island, did some snorkeling 🐢🪸 and visited a sandbar. We also had free pineapple rum and with four young Spanish girls on board, the boat trip turned into a mini Spanish party 💃

The time in Port Barton was super relaxing and nice. With only one main road and a couple of restaurants and canteens, life was easy and slow. There are a lot of stray dogs in Port Barton, but we grew fond of one in particular: Rodrigo. He was always close by and even after a day of exploring, he came to find us (or explored a portion with us). We were sad to leave him, he was the cutest dog 🥲Lue lisää
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Matkaaja Hey Robinson, is this your „Wilson“ now 🤣
7.7.2025VastaaKääntää
1 tykkäys
Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
Osaka
6.–12. kesäk. 2025, Japani ⋅ ☁️ 23 °C
Our next country is Japan 🇯🇵 We started our journey in Osaka, a large port city of approximately 2,6 million inhabitants located on the main island of Honshu.

We joined a Free Walking tour on our first day. The guide unfortunately wasn’t good. He did not share much information about the city, but we loved walking around the busiest streets of the town with all the people and lights. It was such a huge contrast to Port Barton 😅 In the afternoon we walked on our own towards Denden Town: the city's electronics, games, and anime shopping neighborhood, also famous for its maid cafes (a place where girls dress up as maids; it’s mostly a place where people go to have company). It was interesting to see the immense variety of figurines, cards, and toys one can collect, and we got a bit nostalgic when we entered some retro video game shops 🤓

We also had our first experience with Gachapon. These capsule toys vending machines are all over Japan. This day marked the beginning of a big love story with those machines… 😂 and the start of a delicious culinary journey. Okonomiyaki for lunch (a Japanese pancake made of wheat flour batter mixed with cabbage and in our case seafood) and ramen for dinner were our first highlights🥘🤤

The next day we had a look at Osaka castle (dated from the 16th-century that has undergone several restorations), and spent the afternoon in Nakazakinishi district, a great neighborhood with lots of vintage, 2nd hand shops and cozy cafes. It was less crowded than the city center and we could enjoy our first matcha latte 🍵 and Takoyaki (grilled balls of batter made with flour and eggs filled with octopus), yummy! 🤤

We then decided to spend a full day in Nara, actually at Nara park. Nara is located less than an hour away from Osaka and was Japan’s first permanent capital. The park is home to several historic temples and shrines, and thousands of “famous” deers 🦌
Deer crackers are for sale around the park, and some deer have learned to bow to visitors to ask to be fed 😅

Few of them were a bit insisting to get crackers but most of them were really cute 🥰
Since it was raining the day after, we enjoyed visiting some of the numerous malls, went to a retro gaming bar and a sake bar near our place. We were the only foreigners and had a sake tasting there. The bartender and the 3 other customers were super nice, trying their best to communicate with us with google translation 😃

On our last day, we went to Universal Studios 🎢 We were super lucky as we got lottery tickets in the morning to enter the Super Nintendo World part of the park, that has normally to be booked two months in advance. We also went to the Jurassic Park, the Harry Potter, and the Minions parts. We had a lot of fun (and fear lol) and managed to do almost all thrilling rollercoasters of the park 🤗
Osaka was a great start to explore Japan and we liked the city a lot 🥰 It left us so thrilled and excited as there is so much to discover and do 👾Lue lisää
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Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
1 1
Shimanami Kaido 🚴‍♂️
12.–13. kesäk. 2025, Japani ⋅ ☀️ 22 °C
We decided to do a little bit of cycling for the next two days, so we jumped on a Shinkansen for the first time heading to Onomichi city 🚄
It was impressive how smooth the train ride was, and the punctuality everyone knows from Japan’s transport system was again confirmed 👌

Once arrived, we rented bicycles to start the Shimanami Kaido 🚲
The Shimanami Kaido is a 70-kilometers long road that connects Japan's main island of Honshu to the island of Shikoku, passing over six small islands.
A painted blue line on the road marks the recommended route for cyclists, so it is very easy to follow 🤗 In Japan every town has its own special drain. Such a simple but cute idea to make the world prettier 🩷

We cycled up the Mount Shirataki to visit the temple of Five hundred arhats. At the top of the mountain, there were many stone Buddha statues of different sizes with various poses and expressions. The panoramic view from up there was really spectacular! A monk living there was so kind and offered us a bag of chips- he probably saw how we suffered a bit to come all the way up… 😂

One of the cute little towns, Setoda, is famous all over Japan for its lemons - so we had to try a cake and an ice cream 🍋 It was yummy!

We spent the night sleeping on a futon in a Ryokan located on Omishima island, half distance from our goal. The hostel was cosy and the garden very beautiful 🪴
Following the recommendation of our host, we had dinner at one of the oldest restaurants located nearby and had Takoyaki again. The old lady running the restaurant was so cute, she has been cooking for the last 50 years 🥰

The next day we visited another temple in the morning and had our last stop at Yoshiumi Rose Park, a garden with a variety of 400 different kinds of roses 🌹

Afterwards we ended our cycling trip in Imabari City. Here we took a bus to go back to the city we started from and a train to our next destination.

It was a great two days of cycling 🚴‍♀️🚴‍♂️ Along the way, we enjoyed the stunning views of the sea and islands, the nature, crossing the impressive modern bridges and visiting some of the islands' small villages 🌳Lue lisää
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Matkaaja 😍😍😍 all about 🍋
16.7.2025VastaaKääntää
Matkaaja Woow! Spectaculary 🤗
16.7.2025VastaaKääntää
3 tykkäystä
Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
Hiroshima & Himeji
13.–15. kesäk. 2025, Japani ⋅ ☁️ 23 °C
We chose to go further south to visit Hiroshima, the world's first city to be attacked by an atomic bomb on August 6th in 1945.

Today, Hiroshima is a modern city. As you walk the streets you wouldn't guess that a catastrophic attack changed the city's face drastically only 80 years ago.

The Hiroshima World Peace Memorial Museum was opened in 1955, making it a prime goal to educate about nuclear weapons and its disastrous effects.
The museum displays many personal stories of victims and survivors. It was heartbreaking to read and learn about all the individual losses, challenges and horrible experiences made after the bomb was dropped. Besides the immediate effects, the museum also shows what horrible after effects a nuclear weapon can cause.
Nihon Hidankyo, a Japanese group of atomic bomb survivors, has won the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize. The survivors of the 1945 bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki have been recognised for their efforts to rid the world of nuclear weapons 🕊️

During our stay in Hiroshima it rained a lot. After visiting the museum and A-Bomb dome, we took it slow and easy. We ended our Hiroshima stay by trying the region's famous okonomiyaki 😍

After leaving Hiroshima and on our way to Kyoto, we stopped in Himeji, a small town famous for its castle 🏯 Unlike many other Japanese castles, it was never destroyed by war, earthquake or fire. It was completed in 1609. We spent half a day exploring the castle complex and the nearby gardens. We also learnt about the tumultuous life of Princess Sen. It was a beautiful and nice stop on our way to Kyoto 👍🤗Lue lisää
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Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
1
Kyoto
15.–21. kesäk. 2025, Japani ⋅ ☀️ 31 °C
Our next stop is Kyoto: a city famous for its historical structures, temples and shrines. It was Japan's capital from 794 until 1868.

During our stay we actually woke up quite early to visit some of the famous sights in order to avoid the crowds. It was the best choice made. After 9 a.m. the places were packed and it was hard to manoeuvre around the people 😅
We visited the Fushimi Inari Shrine very early and it was so beautiful ⛩️
The other place was Arashiyama district where you can visit a bamboo forest and small but very nice temples and shrines 🗿

We also joined a night walking tour in Gion district which taught us a lot about the culture of Geishas 🎎 The tour was super nice and we had fun to explore the area with our group. It's not that easy to randomly see Geishas in the street but our guide gave us some tips on where and when to spot them. We've always gotten super excited when we saw one, especially when 4 got out of a taxi right in front of us 😂
We explored more historical areas such as Higashiyama or Pontocho the next days and relaxed by the Kamo river with some sushi 🍣

A fun experience was also joining a tea ceremony with Kimono experience 🍵
We were dressed in traditional Kimonos and learnt about Matcha and the importance of tea in Japan. We were able to wear our kimono for the rest of the day but decided to end our dress up after the ceremony 😆👘

Besides exploring temples and shrines (there are so many in Kyoto!), we also tried a lot of food, such as Sukiyaki - Japan's famous hotpot dish with Wagyu. And of course some sake 🍶

Kyoto was a beautiful city with a nice vibe. Even after 6 days we felt like we had hardly seen half of it. We just need to come back 🥰Lue lisää
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Matkaaja 😍 woow!! Looks great
22.7.2025VastaaKääntää
3 tykkäystä
Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
1 1 1
Nakasendo Trail
21.–24. kesäk. 2025, Japani ⋅ ☁️ 29 °C
After visiting Kyoto we planned on hiking a portion of the historic Nakasendo Trail in the Gifu Prefecture 🎒
The Nakasendo was a mountainous inland route that once connected Edo (present-day Tokyo) with Kyoto during the Edo period (1603-1868).
Part of that route is the 85-kilometer Kiso Road which is home to eleven post towns. Those were created to accommodate travelers on their journey to and from Edo. We decided to hike sections of this path while visiting some of the well-preserved post towns 🏘️

Our hike led through lush green forests, crystal-clear streams, waterfalls and remote rural villages 🌳🏞️
The mountains and forests in this region are home to bears 🐻 Along the way, we always found bells to ring as bears do not like loud noise 🔔 It lowered our chances to come across one, although we sometimes thought seeing one from far away would have been crazy exciting!

Our trail started in Magome and led us through Tsumago-Juku, Kiso-Fukushima and Narai, one of the best preserved post towns. The trail is well marked and today the towns are well connected by train. Even the train rides offered amazing mountain views 😍

Our hostels along the way were all super nice and unique. We spent a nice evening with Argentinians who taught us about anime in Magome, celebrated a birthday with some sake in Nagiso with Germans and enjoyed our first onsen in Kiso-Fukushima 🧖‍♀️🧖‍♂️

It was such a beautiful trip to nature and to rural Japan - and definitely one of our best experiences in Japan 💚Lue lisää
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Matkaaja In Flipflops?!? 🫣🤣🤷🏻‍♀️
25.7.2025VastaaKääntää
Matkaaja Wooooow, such an great view!
25.7.2025VastaaKääntää
Matkaaja Ich liebe das Video 🥰
25.7.2025VastaaKääntää
3 tykkäystä
Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
Tokyo
24. kesäk.–1. heinäk. 2025, Japani ⋅ ☀️ 31 °C
Our last stop in Japan is Tokyo, one of the most populated cities in the world with over 37 million people in the metro area 😱

We took it easy on our first day, walking around Shinjuku district, visiting a few shopping centers and heading towards the Tokyo Metropolitan Government Building for the stunning 360-degree views from its observation decks on the 45th floor 🏙️

In the evening we joined a free walking tour with special focus on the “dark side” of Tokyo.
Our guide told us a lot about Kabukicho district, Japan’s largest entertainment district with bustling nightlife, adult entertainment services, host clubs, and hidden businesses run by the Yakuza. We had a great time, the guide was good and it was only the two of us participating, so it felt more like we were friends walking around the city 😍

The day after we went to TeamLab Borderless, a famous interactive digital art museum. The art moves and interacts with visitors, creating an immersive experience. It is a cool place for making nice pictures 😎
Our afternoon was busy visiting Akihabara district, which is filled with stores dedicated to anime, manga, video games, and maid cafes.

The next morning we went to Gotokuji temple, considered the origin of the lucky cat figurine, with thousands of these statues displayed on the temple grounds. It was the perfect spot for our stuffed cat to make a family picture 😂
In the afternoon we went to the Shibuya scramble crossing. It is crazy how many people cross this intersection every two minutes!

Odaiba, a large artificial island in the bay that is connected to central Tokyo by the rainbow bridge was next on our itinerary. On our way to Odaiba, we stopped at Tsukiji fish market, where you can eat and buy fresh seafood and Japanese delicacies 🍣🍤
On the island it was very nice to have a more quiet time, walking around parks, the beach and enjoying the views over the city by night 🌉

Our Sunday plan was watching a baseball game: Tokyo Yomiuri Giants VS Yokohama BayStars in the Tokyo dome ⚾️
Baseball is the most popular sport in Japan so it was a really nice experience, we even saw a home run! Also, the Tokyo team won! 🥳
In the evening we had booked a restaurant offering an Omakase course. It literally translates to “I leave it up to you”, which means the chef is selecting the dishes, in our case 22 dishes 🤗 He is cooking behind the bar and providing explanations at the same time. There were many interesting combinations of flavors like the appetizer "Grilled Lobster with Sea Urchin" or various kinds of sushi 🤤

On our last day we visited Senso-ji temple, Japan's oldest temple. It was impressive and beautiful but also way too crowded so we did not stay long. We ended our day buying souvenirs and sweets 🍫

We also tried two famous chain restaurants during our stay, one for ramen called Ichiran. Each customer has a little ramen compartment to themselves and the staff interacts with customers on the other side of this compartment. The food was tasty but it was a bit weird to eat in this tiny box.
The second one is Kura Sushi, a conveyor belt sushi restaurant. Here we could enjoy lots of delicious sushi and sashimi at very affordable prices, and it was fun to get our orders delivered on the rack. Something typical Japanese: you were able to join a game. By returning 5 empty plates, you had a chance of winning a sushi figurine 😅

Tokyo was a great experience. It is such a huge and crowded city, and has so much to offer. We both liked it a lot but we also said that we rather enjoy more quiet cities 🤗Lue lisää
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2 tykkäystä
Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
Gerupuk
2.–6. heinäk. 2025, Indonesia ⋅ ☁️ 26 °C
After almost a month in Japan without vitamin sea, it was time again for some beach time 😎☀️

We flew to Indonesia for our last stop and decided to stay in Lombok. We headed directly to the south of the island to a small village called Gerupuk 🏝️

This village is big on fishing and the locals there make their living from commercial fishing or surf tourism. Gerupuk’s waves were supposed to be suited for beginners so we decided to give it a try 🏄‍♀️

All surf spots are a short boat ride from the village as the waves break in the middle of the ocean 🌊 Surfing there turned out to be much more difficult than in Sri Lanka as the waves were quite big and the paddling exhausting. So one session was enough… 😂

As the village only consists of one main road with a few restaurants and plenty of surf shops, the contrast with Tokyo was huge 😅
However, it was perfect to slow down. We relaxed by the swimming pool at our hostel, rented a scooter to chill on the beaches nearby and went on a day trip to Kuta 🛵Lue lisää
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3 tykkäystä
Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
Tetebatu
6.–8. heinäk. 2025, Indonesia ⋅ ☀️ 27 °C
On our way to Northern Lombok we stopped in Tetebatu, a rural area in Lombok known for its small town vibes and rice fields.

Our homestay was a small place with only four rooms in the middle of rice fields. We even had a roof top from where we had a super nice view over the rice fields. In the morning we were also able to see Mount Sangkareang ⛰️

After arriving, we walked around the area and enjoyed the green surroundings 🌿 We also tried our first Gado-Gado in a warung for lunch. It's a steamed vegetable dish with peanut sauce and rice. After that day, Gado-Gado was almost always on our daily menu 😅

The next day we chose to go on a tour with a local guide from our homestay. He showed us around the area and explained a lot about rice farming. We also visited a waterfall which can only be reached by walking through a cave (we didn't go swimming as the water was too cold) 😅
After lunch we made our way to Monkey Forest, where two different species of monkeys live: grey macaques and black langur families. The black langur families are quite shy but we were lucky to see two different kind of families. One even had a baby - it's special as babies have orange fur at first and only later black fur when they are grown up 🧡🐒

On our way back to the homestay, a dog from our lunch spot joined us 🐶 He came all the way down into town and joined us for watching the sunset on the rooftop. Even the locals from our homestay were laughing about it 😄 After getting ready for dinner our dog friend had already left. It was a short but cute acquaintance 😂

Tetebatu was a nice and relaxing place with lots of nature 🥰Lue lisää
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Sabbatical 2025 Matkaaja
Mount Rinjani
8.–11. heinäk. 2025, Indonesia ⋅ ⛅ 25 °C
After enjoying a nice breakfast with a view on the rice fields, we went on a 3,5 hours drive to reach Senaru, a small village located north of the island. Senaru is one of the possible starting points for trekking around Mt. Rinjani, the second-highest volcano in Indonesia with
a peak at 3726m ⛰️

We first visited two beautiful waterfalls located nearby our hotel. Our guide was a lot of fun but we did not swim as it was a bit cold 🥶
We spent the rest of the afternoon at our hotel, enjoying the pool and resting before the start of our adventure at 4:00AM the next day 😊

Since we were unsure about how fit we were and read in the news about a tourist falling down the mountain and dying a few days later, we decided against climbing to the summit and went for a 3D/2N trekking route - the Torean Trek.

We started from Senaru (600m height) and reached Senaru crater at 2641m in the early afternoon. This was our camping site for the night. The view from there was incredible. We could see the summit, the Lake, half of the island of Lombok, Bali, the three Gilis, and the sunset we got that day above the clouds was magical 😍 The temperature for the night was about 5 degrees so a drastic change compared to the start with 26 degrees but we luckily had warm clothes and a very thick sleeping bag 🤗

On the next day we continued our trek towards the lake, could swim a bit to refresh and then headed to the hot springs where we also had a short bath. We finally reached our next spot for the night, right in the middle of the nature, alone with a few monkeys watching us 🐒
The Torean route took us through the jungle on our last trekking day.

The trek was a bit challenging but so rewarding. All the views were so nice, and our dedicated guide and the two porters were the best. They carried our tents, food, and cooked delicious meals all the time for the two of us ❤️ The 3-days-trek was an incredible experience and we are so happy that we were able to do it!

Now time to relax on our next stop, Gili Meno🏝️Lue lisää
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Matkan lopetus
31. heinäkuuta 2025