Yogyakarta & a couple of volcanoes

From Singapore to Indonesia, quite the country contrast. Gleaming buildings have made way for dusty and crowded streets and the more typical SE Asia vibe, but with a charm not found in modern cities. I arrived in the bustling city of Yogyarkarta, Java and checked in. The main thing to do here is visit Borabador which is another giant temple - I've seen a lot of temples but this one was certainly up there - it's similar to Angkor Wat and looked very impressive in the morning sun.

I had a quick look around the city, not much to see really but welcoming enough - someone in the hostel had been here for over a week, I wondered what they had done! I went to see a silver market but it was more of a street dotted with a few silver shops. Admittly it was very cheap and I tried to find a silver ring but zero would fit me - curse my Western-sized hands! 🖑🖐

In the evening a few people from the hostel went to visit another nice temple - Prahma Dem, getting there was an experience. It was about half an hour away so we decided to catch a local bus for next to nothing and the conditions were to put it mildly... cramped. The bus stops were really strange too - elevated above the ground and just packed with people which you had to maneuver around while they were trying to buy tickets and get on, the system was pretty chaotic but we made it. A very angry Scottish girl was super pissed off, complaining about everything whether it was too much walking, the tourists, the locals, the heat, the food etc - maybe stay at home next time love!

After Yogi as the locals call it, I took a tour to see Mount Bromo and Mount Igen. Two famous volcanoes in Java. Bromo has incredible views and looks like the surface of Mars as the sun rises. You can go right to the rim of crater to see the smoke and hear it bubbling away. It sounds like a million kettles all boiling at once. Igen on the other hand is a little more difficult to ascend to. Up at 3 AM we start to hike up the mountain, It's raining a bit too which makes it slippery. A couple of hours later we start to climb down towards the bottom. Igen is famous for spurting sulphuric blue flames out of it's crater and the only way to see it is in the dark. We had to wear gas masks to filter the sulphur. Making our way down the volcano we passed the miners who extract the sulphur - they're up and down it like yo-yo's but don't live long breathing in the sulphur so regularly. We glimpsed the blue fire which looks a lot like someone has just turned on a giant gas hob, it's not easy to see but when the smoke clears it's an amazing natural phenomenon. Igen's crater also has a beautiful blue lake which is the most acidic in the world. It looks stunning from the top but if you fell in you'd be dissolved. ☠☠☠

The tour included a boat from Java to Bali where you could move on from there. I opted to head for Seminyak a popular beach town - if a little expensive. On the way I witnessed a horrific scene. A local man had crashed a motorbike and was laying in the road, blood coming out of his head and clearly no longer alive! If he'd been wearing a helmet it may have been a different story! Not a good thing to see when you look out the bus window! RIP ☹

I arrived in Seminyak and the next day a couple of us went down to the beach where we were consistently harassed by sellers - one guy was understandly renting sun beds and surfboards whilst another was trying to make me buy a taser stun gun of all things - just what you need at the beach! In the evening we went to a bar that was horror themed. It was pretty cool, they served cocktails in blood bags. Sadly I witnessed another negative - this time a petty crime. A motorbike rode up on the side of the road and ripped a girls handbag off her, no sooner had she noticed, they'd disappeared in a cloud of dust down the road luckily she wasn't hurt. On a happier note we had a fantastic pizza that evening! 🍕

I'm trying to get an uber to Ubud now, seems impossible. The guy keeps cancelling on me. Bali has banned the use of taxi apps. I think the local mafia have something to do with it so they get a cut, so the taxi apps try and operate in secret. I gave up and got a local cab. It was pouring with rain when I arrived there but the hostel was nice.Read more