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Published: September 10th 2023
The fruit falls near the tree… ~ Indonesian Proverb
HE SAID... Today we were travelling east from Mount Bromo to
Kalibaru– by road.
We checked out of the Grand Whiz Hotel, clambered into the back of a minibus and left the volcanic Bromo region at 10:30am. The descent was slow, as we were dropping from a high altitude. We eventually levelled on flat land, turned onto a busy road and sped towards Kalibaru. We stopped at a petrol station around midday for a short break, picked up some fried banana chips from an IslamicMart (attached to the petrol station) and then continued our eastward journey.
We passed affluent villages with old colonial homesteads and dwellings. We passed less affluent villages with basic dwellings and evident poverty. We passed sugar cane plantations, tobacco plantations, rice fields, palm groves, water canals and rail tracks. The landscape was lush and open. In contrast, the road we were travelling on was bustling with traffic.
We stopped for lunch at Mangli Restaurant in Jember around 2pm. The restaurant was large and airy, with high ceilings and dark timber furniture. There was a pond full of fish at the entrance, and the staff were very friendly and welcoming. We settled at
a long table and ordered
ayam cabe ijo (fried marinated chicken with green chilli sauce). It was so incredibly spicy. The waiter was worried when I ordered it, and cautioned me that it was very spicy. However, it was perfect. The chicken was so tender, and the green chilli sauce was delicious.
Ren refreshed with a soursop juice, while I opted for a Bintang beer. Surprisingly, the beer was served slightly frozen in the bottle. The restaurant staff stored the Bintang bottles at minus seven degrees, so when each bottle is opened, it pours in an icy slurry. It was so refreshing, and a welcome reprieve from Java’s tropical heat. The whole lunch experience was very relaxing. Feeling completely re-energised, we clambered back into our minibus and left Mangli Restaurant around 3:30pm.
The sky had darkened and rain spots dotted the windscreen of the minibus. We wondered if a rain storm was about to hit. We continued eastwards (or southeast to be precise) on a busy road towards Kalibaru. The landscape was now predominately suburban. Shops and dwellings were built right up to the roadside, while larger buildings were set back a little. Children swam in rivers. Adults
sat quietly on wooden seats and observed life pass before them. Some talked among themselves. Farmers worked silently in rice fields. Locals played soccer, cradled young babies, sped by on motor cycles and heeded the afternoon call to prayer. All the while, we sped towards Kalibaru – our last stop in Java before crossing into Bali.
The landscape changed to lush green forest as we began to ascend a steep winding mountain road. Ramshackle huts stood forlorn on the roadside as stark reminders of Java’s struggling and forgotten populace. I can’t even begin to imagine the harsh conditions facing the inhabitants of these huts.
With dusk falling, we caught glimpses of coffee plantations in the fading light as we descended into Kalibaru. We arrived at Margo Utomo Eco Resort around 5:30pm, and it was already dark. We checked in, dropped out packs in our villa and headed out to get some provisions. The tiny hill town of Kalibaru is not what I would describe as an easy place to navigate, so we were lucky the resort had an incredibly friendly receptionist who helped us with Google maps and directions. We walked to the nearest Indomaret, picked up some
drinks and made our way back to the resort. As we carefully navigated the busy and noisy road that cuts straight through the dishevelled town, we drew the attention of many locals who were amused (or possibly bemused) by the presence of foreigners in their village.
We picked up some freshly made pizza bread from the resort’s bakery (which was delicious), grabbed a bottle of Bintang beer from the resort’s restaurant and headed back to our villa. We organised our packs for an early start the following day, then relaxed into the evening. It was the perfect time and place to catch up on our travel notes.
This had been an extraordinary travel day. We’d been on the go since 2am (climbing volcanic craters and exploring volcanic landscapes), and I was feeling the effect of 19 hours without any sleep or rest. It was time for bed, and we slept soundly in our basic but comfortable villa.
We woke early, which was unsurprising given our early night and lengthy repose. A tender request had come in via email the day before, and it was due before our return to Australia, so I had to look ahead and
decide on a time and place to work on it. I started some initial planning in the resort’s reception area (as there was no Wi-Fi in our villa) before heading to breakfast at 6:30am.
The resort’s breakfast area was open and airy, and after perusing the limited but beautifully arranged buffet offerings, I enjoyed the following:
> yoghurt with fresh banana
> homemade bread from the resort’s bakery (toasted with fried eggs; and toasted with homemade jam)
> watermelon juice
> tea and coffee.
There were three types of jam (nutmeg, pineapple and clove), and they were intriguing. Made onsite at the resort, they had quirkily distinct flavours, especially the nutmeg jam. I certainly enjoyed trying them all, but I don’t think I’d ever seek them out.
We piled our breakfast plates a little higher than usual, as we were skipping lunch to catch an earlier ferry from Ketapang (on Java’s eastern coast) to Gilimanuk (on Bali’s western coast). However, we had one final stop in Java before leaving its shores. We were dropping into Glenmore, an interesting village en route to the ferry terminal.
As we were preparing to leave we met Batman, the resort’s
thirty-year-old resident fruit bat. She was tame, domesticated and very fond of the maintenance staff. And they were fond of her. We enjoyed our short stay at the resort, and we were pleasantly surprised when the staff lined up outside reception to bid us farewell. They were all so incredibly friendly. We clambered into our waiting minibus and left Margo Utomo Eco Resort at 8am.
We’d been on the road for about an hour when we pulled into Glenmore, a tiny village just south of Kalibaru. The trees in the streets and small boutique shops exuded a Bohemian ambiance, and it was very appealing. I noticed an old local man sitting beside a street stall with a small but intriguing collection of analogue watches, and I wanted to jump out and buy one (as my Fitbit had died a week earlier when I was swimming in the Green Canyon). Who had worn these chunky silver second-hand watches? Where had they been? What had they seen? Unfortunately, we didn’t have time to stop. The irony of not having time to buy a watch made the lost opportunity all the worse. But to be honest, it was nothing more than an
inconsequential travel regret. We all have them.
The reason we had detoured into Glenmore was to visit a coffee, cocoa and rubber plantation, which was located just outside the village. Hence the reason for not stopping at the old man’s watch stall…
We walked around the planation with a guide, who pointed out the various crops of coffee, cocoa, rubber, nutmeg, cloves, cardamon and peppercorn. The tour was interesting enough, but I think I would have preferred to skip the plantation tour and go straight to Ketapang for an earlier ferry to Bali (which depart every 45 minutes).
The plantation’s factory was old and tired, with colonial machinery from the early 1900s. It was still functional, and the factory was producing a consistent amount of coffee, cocoa and rubber, so there was no real need to invest a considerable amount of money into infrastructure updates. This was my observation, however. Our guide remained impartial in his commentary.
As we wandered through the factory, we watched the rubber production and packaging process, and one of the female packing staff made us a rubber bracelet (which I loved). It was an impromptu gesture on her part, and one
I appreciated – especially given the bustling nature of the packing shed. Each bracelet carried a pungent smell of petroleum, which Ren wasn’t fond of. I hoped the smell would eventually disappear from mine.
After walking around the lush gardens and sampling fruit from a variety of different trees, we finished our tour on the verandah of an old colonial dwelling, where we sampled coffee from the plantation, along with fried bananas, fried tempeh, dragon fruit (white and red), guava and papaya. We also sampled tea with powdered ginger, which was very refreshing.
We piled into a waiting minibus and left the plantation (and the village of Glenmore) around 11am. Our remaining hours in Java involved a two-hour drive to Ketapang. The narrow road was bumpy and busy, and the landscape was predominantly suburban. Factories, public buildings and dwellings lined the roadside. Some were grand, many were not. Rice fields lay silently in every available space, while half-finished structures stood abandoned, succumbing to the suffocating grip of green foliage creeping from the ground. Occasionally we would find ourselves driving through large rice fields, but the rural vista would soon give way to village life.
After a brief
stop at a FarlyMart in the seaport of Ketapang (to hydrate and prepare for our imminent crossing), we drove to the ferry terminal. It was 1pm, and our 12-day journey through Java had come to an end. We looked across the Bali Strait to Gilimanuk, our point of entry to the island of Bali. We’d really enjoyed our Java experience, and I felt a tinge of sadness leaving. Yet I was about to set foot in Bali for the first time. There was excitement in the air.
SHE SAID... After our amazing morning watching the sunrise over Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park and climbing Mount Bromo, we had returned to our hotel for a quick breakfast and shower before departing to our next destination –
Kalibaru.
At 10:30am we piled into a minibus and began our long journey further east. Kalibaru was going to be our last stop in Java, and I was looking forward to our stay in a regional hill town. The first hour of our drive took us past small villages and beautifully neat farms of corn, beans and tomatoes. We also passed through the regional town of Probolingo with schools and health
clinics. However, even in the town, every spare space between buildings was still productively farmed. That first hour of the drive was very scenic.
It wasn’t until we descended from the mountains that the rice fields very slowly returned into view. We passed many cemeteries on one stretch of road, and I was intrigued by the fact that all the cemeteries we’d seen seemed to be filled with frangipani tress. Susi (our group leader) explained that frangipani is considered a cemetery flower in Java, but conversely in Bali it’s seen as a thing of beauty and often used in offerings to the gods.
Two hours into the trip we stopped at a petrol station with an IslamicMart (I have taken a weird interest in the different chains of mini marts we’ve been visiting on our road trips). We’d just passed the city of Lumajang which is famous for its bananas, and the shop had shelves full of
pisang kripik (banana chips) of every size, shape and flavour. Coming from a country that stocks very few types of bananas, I continue to be fascinated with the many different varieties grown and loved here. I suppose it’s similar to the
many different types of apples we grow for different purposes. It took us ages, but with Susi’s help, we all stocked up on giant packs of banana chips! 😊
We had also started seeing sugarcane plantations on both sides of the road, and the plantations seemed to stretch for kilometres. Most of them had feather duster-like flowers on the top of their stalks which I’d never seen before. Susi pointed out the Dutch built canals that we were driving along. They had been built to irrigate the plantations as far back as the 1800s, and amazingly are still in use.
The early start was catching up with me, and I napped for over an hour until we stopped at Jember to have lunch at Taman Mangli Indah Restaurant. The restaurant is a traditional styled building surrounded by a large pond full of large koi (decorative carp) and a shady garden area. The restaurant sells little packets of fish food, and the feeding frenzy of the different gold, white and black fish was pretty full on.
I was still full from the massive breakfast at our Bromo hotel, so I only wanted a drink. I’d been seeing quite
a lot of soursop fruits since we arrived, so I ordered a soursop juice. I’ve tasted this fruit in other Asian countries, but really fell in love with it in Mexico. The juice was beautifully refreshing and exactly what I needed. Andrew ordered
ayam cabe ijo (fried chicken with green chillies) and it was utterly delicious! The thick coating of green chillies made it a bit too hot for me, but the flavour was amazing. The Indonesians cook amazing chicken dishes!
Back in the minibus, I napped a bit more after lunch and when Andrew woke me up – we’d already arrived at Margo Utomo Eco Resort! The eco-resort looked like a leafy retreat, which was in stark contrast to the dusty street surrounds. It used to be a plantation, and the reception area was housed in the old colonial plantation homestead. It was set up museum-style with old portraits, black and white photos and furniture from the colonial era. The welcome drink of cold nutmeg juice was surprisingly not to my liking. I loved the nutmeg drinks we had in Malaysia, and I couldn’t figure out why this one tasted so off. Andrew gave me his ‘you’re being
a princess’ look before downing three of the glasses. But in my defence, many glasses had been abandoned after one sip. 😄
It was an overcast and slightly drizzly evening as we walked through the lovely gardens of the eco-resort to our villas. Our traditional villa was basic but comfortable, and the high ceilings of the traditional tiled roof gave it a nice feel. We needed to stock up on drinks, so we walked down to the local Indomaret supermarket after getting directions from the lovely receptionist.
I really enjoyed our 10-minute walk through the town centre, despite the main road being a noisy thoroughfare for big speeding trucks. The rain had stopped, and the locals were out and about. They clearly didn’t get many tourists in town, as their expressions at seeing us were quite priceless. We got excited waves from children, the women smiled reticently and the men greeted Andrew very warmly. It was very clear from the dress code of the women, and from the behaviour of the men, that this was a very traditional town.
We bought a stock of
teh tarik (iced traditional milky tea), iced lemon tea and a cashew nut
ice cream (which was absolutely delicious) for our return journey. As we walked back to the eco-resort along the dusty main road, with fast melting ice cream running down my hand, I realised that this was a glimpse into regional Javanese life that outsiders rarely get to see. It’s why we value this type of travel so much – it allows us to see the highlights of a place, but also allows experiences in under-the-tourist-radar places such as these.
Back in the eco-resort, we dropped into the onsite bakery and picked up a slice of pizza to accompany Andrew’s beer that he bought from their restaurant. They also offered an in-room massage service, but something about the way Susi mentioned it made me realise there was subtext… and I decided to wait until Bali for my long overdue massage.
We were very tired from our 2am start that morning, and since neither of us felt like dinner, we opted to chill in our villa, catch up on travel notes and have an early night. I also used the time to reorganise my pack. It had been getting unwieldy over the past few days, and it gave me more
joy than it probably should to have it in perfect order again. 😉
I slept extremely well until we were woken just before 4am by the early call to prayer. However, it wasn’t just the 10 or so minute call to prayer that we heard. As in Seloliman, it involved the whole 45-minute service being broadcast, with multiple mosques competing for air space. This is a massive generalisation, but the call to prayer in Indonesia doesn’t seem to be as lyrical or hypnotic as I’ve found it to be in other Muslim countries. As a result, it’s impossible to sleep through.
Speaking of our stay in Seloliman, I considered how ironic it was that despite our eco-retreat in Kalibaru being in the middle of a town, it was actually quieter and more peaceful than our Seloliman jungle bungalow! The bungalow had been surrounded by jungle on three sides and a tiny village on one side. How can a tiny village produce so much more noise than a medium sized town???
We were up early, but with no wifi in the room we had to walk to the reception area to check email and social media. We headed
to breakfast as soon as they opened, and the breakfast buffet was laid out in a lovely traditional open sided building. Breakfast was a small but inviting spread of watermelon and pineapple juice, fresh bananas, yoghurt from their cows,
nasi goreng (fried rice), fried eggs, pickled vegetables, bread and croissants, fresh whipped butter and three fruit jams of nutmeg, pineapple and clove. Everything on the table (even the rice!) was either from their bakery or organic farm (which includes dairy cows).
I enjoyed the fresh juice and fruit, croissants with the fresh whipped butter, as well as a plate of fried rice topped with fried eggs. I really wanted to love the fresh bread and fruit jams, but the bread was doughy and there was something unbalanced in the flavours of the jams. Regardless of this, the staff were so proud of their farm and produce, and it felt good to be supporting such a wholesome business model.
As we were walking back to our villa, two staff members were standing at a large fern, and we were informed that their resident female fruit bat was asleep in the centre of the fern. The nearby gardener saw my
piqued interest and reached in and grabbed the bat. I was appalled at first, but then realised that she was happy enough for the gardener to handle her. She showed no fear and held onto his arm while licking his skin – I assume she was attracted to the salt. The bat is 30 years old and had arrived at the property as a lost little one… and never left. I loved that she had adopted the eco-resort and that they cared for her like a pet.
I could have stayed and observed the fruit bat for a lot longer, but we had to finish packing and check out by 8am. We were travelling to Bali later on, but before we drove to the port to cross the Bali Strait, we were visiting a plantation – the main reason for our visit to Kalibaru. Despite staying that the eco-resort for only one night, the staff had treated us like long term guests. They even lined up to wave goodbye. It was beautiful Javanese hospitality. 😊
As we drove through the town centre, we could see that the streets were lined with shop after shop of metal household goods
– massive woks, pots and pans, silver ladles, trays etc. Given the hills around Kalibaru are famously full of coffee and cocoa plantations, I hadn’t expected that Kalibaru would also be the centre of metal household items!
We eventually drove down a narrow road with old shady trees. This was the neighbourhood of Glenmore. The very prosperous Glenmore Plantation had been set up in the early 1900s by a Scotsman, and the attached neighbourhood (on plantation land) had adopted the name too. The houses and buildings looked affluent, and I was fascinated to hear about the plantation.
We met Huro, a guide at the Glenmore Plantation. The plantation had changed hands many times since its original owner, and now belonged to Chinese and Indonesian owners in a 50/50 split. The temperature at the plantation was very mild and pleasant, but we still spent time applying sunscreen and insect repellent before our tour. I had thought we were visiting a coffee plantation, but it seems they have diversified into fruit, spices, rubber and cocoa too – all worthy cash crops from Java.
We started in the coffee tree nursery. Huro explained the difference between the robusta trees that
sit in full sun and the arabica trees which are more fragile and are partly shaded by acacia trees. Some sun is needed to keep the trees free of mould. Robusta coffee is easier to grow and fetches a lower price due to higher supply, whereas arabica coffee is more expensive due to it being harder to grow. The plantation only deals with raw products, and their coffee beans are exported.
Huro then talked about the rubber trees. He described the process of bleeding the trees of their sap. We later visited the rubber processing plant, where we watched workers on the plant floor. I think the process involved the raw latex being poured into water tubs and then moulded into sheets by manually sliding metal blades into the tubs. Each rubber sheet is fed through a machine to flatten it, then smoked and packed for shipping. I think this was the process, but it was rather difficult to follow the descriptions Huro was giving us. Apparently, their exported rubber ends up in tyres for F1 racing cars.
While walking through the plantation we also saw the cocoa tree farm. The trees produce a small male fruit and
larger female fruit (which is the one harvested for its seeds). Huro opened a ripe yellow cocoa pod and asked us to taste its contents. The seeds had an outer fleshy layer which tasted faintly like lychee! I really liked it. However, this tasty fleshy layer is of no use to the producers, and they get rid of it through fermentation (the outer layer breaks down, leaving the naked seed). The cocoa seeds are then dried, roasted and exported – predominantly to chocolate manufacturers.
We were then led to what may have been the original plantation homestead, where we sat on a beautiful verandah for drinks and snacks. While it seemed romantic to have coffee in a coffee plantation, the Glenmore plantation only deals with raw coffee beans… so I’m not sure whose coffee we were drinking, or whose coffee was for sale on the table.
Andrew had the strong brew coffee while I opted for tea, which Huro assured me would taste better with a teaspoon of fresh ginger powder stirred through – and it did! We were also served fried banana fritters, fried tempeh and fresh fruit platters with two types of dragon fruit, red guavas
and papaya. My long search for tasty dragon fruit had finally ended – the white dragon fruit on the platter was sensational – crisp and sweet! And although the red dragon fruit looked stunning, it had the usual watery nothing-taste.
I had really enjoyed our walk through the plantation with Huro. Not only did he give us a briefing on the various plantation crops, but he had also been eager for us to taste all the tropical fruit we came across. I particularly enjoyed the jambo (rose apple) and soursop tastings. Huro had basically picked every ripe soursop fruit he could find, and I realised that eating fresh soursop was even more delicious than having it in juice, smoothie or ice cream form.
However, when we entered the factory area, the tour took a weird turn. He lost focus, and we were often left wondering why we were standing in front of empty vats or machinery that wasn’t working. Apart from the rubber processing we witnessed, the coffee and cocoa processing areas weren’t running – so it was a massive waste of about an hour walking through a ghost factory. The only two things of interest to us
were the old but highly graphic safety posters on the walls, and the really ancient processing machines! It looked like they hadn’t modernised anything in the factory since it started over 100 years ago.
It wasn’t one of the more successful farm/factory visits we’ve done, but on the bright side, we had been well fed and watered in preparation for our three-hour drive to the ferry port in Ketapang on the very eastern tip of Java. Our drive to the port was along a road with very heavy traffic, which wasn’t surprising given this was the road leading to the main port that services the ferries to Bali.
With nothing to keep me interested on this traffic-congested journey, I slept for most of the journey (very unsurprisingly). The crazy hours of the day before were catching up with me. We stopped at a FarlyMart for a last toilet stop, and to buy drinks and snacks for the ferry ride.
This was the end of our time in Java, and as much as I was excited to board the ferry and start a new adventure, I was sad to leave Java. It had been a fabulous and exciting journey that had exceeded all my expectations.
Next we travel east to the island of Bali, the island of the gods.
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Chris L
non-member comment
Java coffee
I have indulged in innumerable cups of java coffee. Wonderful to see the land it hails from.