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You know you're travelling when you totally lose track of what day of the week it is. Another tell tale sign is out staying your welcome in a country, facilitating the need for a visa run.
We wanted to stay in Indonesia for six weeks, so around 42 days. But the standard visa only allows 30 day visits. You totally take for granted that you will be allowed to enter a country for as long as you need (within reason of course). I mean, even in America, with its notoriously tough policies, you can stay for 90 days simply by applying online for a visa waiver.
Had we know we were visiting Indonesia before we left the UK we could have applied for a 60 day visa at the embassy in London. But when we left the UK in January we had no idea where we would be spending the beach part of our trip. When we decided on Indonesia, in the snowy mountains of Breckenridge, we were surprised and disappointed to learn about the visa situation.
If you don't apply for a 60 day visa in advance you have two options; get a free visa on arrival
which lasts 30 days but cannot be extended. Or pay $35 for a 30 day visa that can be extended for an extra 30 days for an additional fee. The second option sounded appealing until we read about the process. In a nutshell it's painful - it takes 3-5 working days, can only be done at a major city and involves multiple trips to the visa office. After weighing up the options we decided it was going to be quicker, easier and cheaper to get the free visa on arrival and do a visa run to KL. This simply involves leaving Indonesia before our 30 day visa expired and flying back in two days later and getting another free visa on arrival. Simple!
We've both 'done' KL so all we needed was an airport hotel to crash in for two nights. We weren't bothered about seeing any sights and figured we'd use the time to catch up on our ever increasing list of chores.
Paul was in charge of the hotel selection and came up with an awesome option. It didn't quite fit our original requirements (being one hour from the airport) but looked too good to be
true, and pretty good value compared to the airport hotels.
We paid peanuts for a AirAsia flight from Yogya (cheaper than a National Express from London to Heathrow) and a return back to Makassar in Sulawesi. When we booked the flight times were perfect - 1pm so not an early start and still arriving in daylight. Of course we got screwed over again with our return flight which was changed to 8.10am meaning a 4.30am start the day we left KL. Damn those airlines!
We had a huge shopping list and KL airport was going to be our only shopping option - we didn't want to start trekking around KL looking for a shopping centre. Our first stop was duty free to stock up on Smirnoff. We also needed toiletries and sun cream which had been hard to come by in Indonesia. We found a large chemist and felt like kids at Christmas. There was so much choice and lots of familiar brands. It was hard not to go mad. Paul even managed to get a packet of peanut M&Ms which he'd been craving for weeks.
We were expecting our hotel to be in the middle of
nowhere but as our taxi pulled up we spotted a line of restaurants and cafes at the base of the neighbouring high rise. This meant we wouldn't be a captive audience in our hotel for two nights, which was great news, especially for the budget!
The hotel (Capri by Fraser) was just out of this world. Much more in keeping with the type of place we'd stay on a two week holiday. As my friend Jude said when I sent her a picture 'that doesn't look like a place for budget travellers', and she was so right. It was way over budget, but at £65 a night was a complete bargain, especially when you consider we've paid more to stay at a crappy Ibis at Heathrow airport when we get back to London.
Our 25th floor studio was bright, spacious, clean and had the most awesome views of the city. It was quiet, the bed and pillows were comfortable, the towels were bright white and there wasn't a cockroach in sight. We were both over the moon, and wished we'd allowed for more than two nights here.
The infinity pool and bar on the 33rd had more
amazing views and a mezzanine up to several jacuzzi pools (think cold hot tub). It was without a doubt the most glamorous visa run we've ever done!
The area we stayed in was very cosmopolitan and the bars and restaurants just outside of our hotel were full of worker bees, both Malaysian and Western. We had some gorgeous western food and the first decent cocktails in months, all for a fraction of what we'd pay back home. Of course it was pricy compared to Indonesia but it wouldn't break the bank for a couple of nights.
Our one full day was sat doing chores by the pool with the first decent wifi we've had all trip. It's amazing how much you can get done when you have responsive internet. We finally managed to book hotels for the last week of the trip in Hong Kong and Macau, something that's been on the to-do list since February!
All too soon it was time for our crazy early start to catch our flight back to Indonesia. You may not be surprised to hear that we had yet another taxi disaster. Our hotel had been very unhelpful with taxi options,
giving us only one option - to pre book with them for about 3 times what we'd paid coming from the airport. We were travelling before 6am so there was a surcharge, but even so it was ridiculously overpriced - the downside to staying at fancy pants hotels!
We decided to do it ourselves and Paul spent about two hours trying to sort something out. We had a couple of options and in the end we went with the same company who had brought us from the airport. KL airport is really good and advertises the fixed fare taxi counter to stop tourists getting ripped off. We used their app and pre paid for a rate that was half what the hotel were charging and smuggly went back to the rest of our chores.
Unfortunately it didn't work out well for us. At 4.55am we found ourselves without a taxi. When it hadn't arrived we called the driver and he simply told us, in very broken English, that he wasn't coming. Great! As Paul was on the phone I spotted a taxi rank right outside the hotel. How had we not spotted this before? And, why had the
hotel failed to tell us about this when we specially asked if there were any other options to their overpriced service (e.g. a metered cab). I went over and got chatting to a helpful driver who spoke great English - the taxi was metered, great, there was a surcharge for the early hour, fine, the approximate cost was MYR180, ok. We had MYR185 left, so not much margin for traffic or a miscalculation from the driver but we had no choice but to jump in.
We had a tense drive to the airport, both watching the KMs and the cost slowly ticking up. We'd worked out what the cost per KM was so as soon as we saw a sign with the distance to the airport in we'd know how close we were cutting it. Oddly none of the signs show distance so we just had to wait it out and see if we had enough money. If not, the plan was to run into the airport and get more cash from the ATM.
As we drew up the ramp to arrivals the meter showed MYR 120 - too easy. Then the cab stopped and the driver stopped
the meter at which point the 'midnight surcharge' amount was added - ekkk! It took the cost up MYR 179,500! Phew, that was close.
We checked in our bags and then went back to the taxi counter at the airport to get a refund. If only! It turns out that the app on the back of the taxi ticket was for another company. They helped us out after some gentle persuasion and called the driver. His solution was to physically come to the airport and give us the refund in cash. He could be there for 9am. Only problem was we flew at 8am! In the end we left the counter with an email address so we could email the company and try and get a refund. Such a nightmare!
We'd planned to do some more shopping at the airport before we flew but by this point we had only time to grab a quick bite to eat and board the plane.
Whenever you're on a visa run there is always a slight worry that you're not going to get back into the country. We'd played it safe and stayed away for two nights after reading about
people being refused entry because they'd literally flown into and out of Singapore on the same day. The queue for immigration was none existent and we were through in a matter of minutes after a couple of questions about how long we were staying and where we were going.
It was good to be back in Indonesia. I don't think we'd realised how lovely and smiley the people where until we spent two nights away. Arriving at our 'back to reality' hotel we were greeted with smiles from everyone and the most helpful and accommodating front desk staff. They could not apologise more because we'd have a 30 minute wait for our room. This was at 11.45 in the morning!
Now that we are back we will continue our epic journey to the Togean Islands. Let's just hope we're done with all the taxi and flight disasters! Keep your fingers crossed!
***Scroll down for more pictures ***
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Mum M
non-member comment
Missed this!
Just read your nightmare journey to Togean Islands blog. Had missed this as haven't looked at emails since arriving in Trearddur bay. Having a good time. Love it here. Weather not bad so far, a bit mixed, but soldiering on in the true British holiday maker style. Love the blogs but so glad I read about all your disasters after the event! Look after yourselves! Love Mum x