Blogs from Indonesia, Asia - page 20

By most standards, The 50 Year Old Backpacker (“T50YOB”) is much more (fool)hardy than his peers. He loves to travel the rustic way because it is more interesting and fun. His peers roll their eyes when he talks excitedly about his travels; they cannot fathom why he doesn’t just want to sip mai tais at a resort. Or, even worse, go on a cruise. But, T50YOB knows that he cannot travel like he used to 25 years ago, so he makes concessions. Despite this, from time to time, he needs to get his a** kicked to remind him that sometimes, age is more than a number. Upon conclusion of the amazing time he had in Tana Toraja, T50YOB had two options to get back to Makassar for his onward trip to Bali. He could: (1) hire ... read more

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Povodne som chcel dat juzne, stredne i severne moluky, no nepasovali mi moc odchody pelni lodi a prelety tento rok boli 2 a viac nasobne ako minuly rok. Po prilete do makasaru pada volba na cisto len severne moluky. Co sa neskor ukazalo ako chyba, bo pocasie mi vobec ale vobec neprialo. Ludia tu boli oproti zbytku indonezie taky viac divokejsi alebo mozno som si zacal vsimat aj viac ako sa chovaju. Mam na mysli, chlast, kurvy. Doprava na hlavnych tahoch bezproblemova kijangom, avsak ak chcel ist clovek niekam mimo uz to bolo zlozite. Taktiez problem s pozicanim motorky. Jedlo niako neprekvapilo. Potapanie fajn len tu plati, ze ak ide clovek sam tak sa nezanory. Bo si musi platit komplet celu lod. Suma sumarum podla mna sev.moluky niesu moc vhodne pre samotneho cestovatela. Pri dvoch a ... read more

They say train is the way to travel on Java. The 8 hour train journey through Central Java and east to Probolinggo was bliss compared to the buses. It consistently moved, it was comfortable, we had aircon, even the toilet was usable. The best part of the journey though was looking out of the window across rice paddies to smoking volcanoes. Pretty incredible and so typically Indonesia. We were headed to Probolinggo as it’s the staging post for visiting Mount Bromo. One of Indonesia’s top natural attractions it is another iconic Indonesian sight that is often said to be one of the most magnificent landscapes you will ever set eyes on. Mount Bromo is part of the Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park. With its top blown off, it is more crater than mountain but the smoke ... read more

Borobudur temple is the largest Buddhist temple in the world. A UNESCO World Heritage site, it is one of the one of the most important Buddhist sites in the world and one of the finest temples in South East Asia. Together with Angkor Wat in Cambodia and Bagan in Myanmar/Burma Lonely Planet considers it one of the great cultural icons of South East Asia. Borobudur is different from Angkor Wat and Bagan by being a single (huge) temple, whereas they are both temple complexes. Having now experienced all 3 we can say that they are each very different. Not much is known about Borobudur temple’s origins, as there are no records of its construction. But it is widely considered to have been built in the 8th or 9th centuries. Buddhism was growing in Java at this ... read more