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Published: October 31st 2012
the view from the magazine
of course that photo was just island no boats....beauty of traveling during Ramadan holidaysSo we were counting days to the end of our Asian adventure now. We had our flight to Sydney booked in around 3 weeks time and still had to visit Java, Bali, Lombok and Gilis. No regrets as it was worth it to stay in Sulawesi for 4 weeks ;-) We did not want to rush and for some reason we kind of already knew that we would end up skipping Bali. After seeing all those magnificent paradise spots we just did not think Bali would work for us. Nevertheless, we thought we give it a try if we find time. We flew from Manado to Surabaya and went straight to the long distance bus terminal and hopped on a bus to
Yogyakarta (68,000R/7$ including dinner).
We had no idea that arriving at night would be such a bad idea as Yogya happened to be completely deserted and there were no buses of angots going to the centre. Good that we met a friendly Indonesian student on a bus and he helped us with finding accommodation for a reasonable price (125,000R with breakfast). He escorted us to the guesthouse where we were welcomed by a sleepy owner who just gave
us our key and went back to bed. We did not plan to stay in Yogya too long – just enough to see Borobodur, the town and some nice markets. We wandered around and it took us some time to digest what we saw – loads of tourist and traffic. Mind you, it was the first big and touristy Indonesian city we visited. The rest were smaller scale places so there was a lot to take in. We loved the main street with Batik boutiques and handicrafts and we even managed to get into the Batik Art Gallery where Art Students from all over Java were showing their work. We could not resist and we bought two pieces of art – one as present for our friends and another one for us. They were so beautiful and one off designs so we were really pleased.
Back in Malaysia we met an older couple whom we helped with a hotel booking online and in return they shared their secret with us. Whenever they go to Borobodur they never pay an entrance fee. For a moment we thought it was really dishonest thing to do but after we splashed on our
Batik art we thought we supported the local economy enough hahatel So they mentioned this very upscale hotel located inside of the historical site of
Borobodur and if you are a guest of this hotel you can get in for free. We decided to try it and we took a rickshaw to the hotel, asked for a room price and pretended we wanted to have lunch there. When we saw that their restaurants was just next to the fence where the temple was we just went on and waiters did not even notice ;-)
We got in and the fist think we thought was … this is it, just that tiny temple? We don’t want to sound unappreciative but we thought it was really overrated … and to pay 20$ for a ticket – crazy. You can spend a whole day in Angkor Wat for this money which is so vast and fantastic. You can imagine we did not have any regrets about skipping the entrance fee. Also we got scammed on our bus tickets (the guy just charged us more because we were tourists) so we did not feel well that day. The street food in Yogya kind
of made it up for us that evening as we went from stall to stall and tried everything from chicken and goat satays and paranthas to BBQ corn and gado-gado. Loved it, but not enough to hang around for longer. We already missed some quiet beach time and turquoise waters of Indonesia. Then we made a brave decision to go and visit Karimunajawa Archipelago
. Yet again, we find a road less traveled! We had seen a small article about it in Air Asia magazine few months earlier and we were carrying this piece of paper with us ever since. We checked Travelblog and found only two entries, checked Trip Advisor and found only 14 reviews of people that happened to visit this place. We immediately thought it was a place for us. We thought it would be another 3 days to get there but we could not have been more wrong.
Karimunjawa is a very popular spot for Indonesians, it just has not been discovered by mass international tourism yet. All the transport infrastructure is in place and after Yogya – Semarang - Jepara port journey we were only a 5h ferry ride away from the archipelago. We
Pine Island
where the lunch point is for all the tours missed the last boat and had to overnight in
Jepara but it is a very pleasant port to hang in so we could not complain.
The next afternoon we landed in
Karimunjawa Island, the main hub for visiting the islands. There are 27 of them in the archipelago so plenty to see and do however mainly Karimunjawa offers places to stay. Lonely Planet did not mention this place at all so we had to look elsewhere for losman suggestions. Thanks to one entry on Trip Advisor we knew where to go. In the port we asked to be taken to
Wisma Apun – based in a stilt house over the water. When we say over the water, we mean literally in the middle of a bay not over the water by the land. After seeing other wismas later on we believe it is the best budget place on the island. They have their own shark pool and we could see them swimming under our feet just when we stepped out of our room (150,000R with breakfast). The owners did not speak much English but we already have learnt how to deal with this. We only needed to communicate if
with shark in Wisma Apun
photo taken from our room - lovely place;-) we wanted a boat ride back to the port or to book a snorkel trip – easy;-) They offer yummy buffet style meals for only 25,000R/2,5$ each every night so need to go to the island really.
We loved it there - small scale, authentic and very rough as for holiday destination. There are some fancy hotels around but 200$ a night seems to be over the budget of majority of people so maybe only some wealthy ones stayed there. We spent our time swimming, snorkeling, Tomek was line fishing a bit and I was again indulging myself with reading thrillers on the deck. One day we booked a trip out to see some of the other islands and we visited
Manewjangan, Tanjung, Cemara Islands and Pine Islands. One of them was the island from the magazine photo;-) They were all deserted, unspoiled and very natural. It was during national holidays (end of Ramadan) so we had a company of plenty of locals but this place must be deserted at any other time.
The only thing that Karimunjawa does not have is a nice beach. Therefore people usually stay for as long as it takes to see the
islands. Snorkel trips are the only way to visit the archipelago and they are not expensive and widely available (80,000R each for a whole day with lunch, watch out as they will try to sell it for 150-200,000). We wanted to sign up for another trip but ocean got really wavy and I just hate boat rides so we skipped it. Overall we were happy with the fact that we tried and succeeded to get there even though initially we had no clue how. It was interesting to see what local tourist spot looks like and how they enjoy themselves. This is a kind of place we would recommend to any nature loving traveler;-)
Additional note about Karimunjawa: •
Homestays in Jepara cost 80-90,000R •
Local transport costs: Yogya to Semarang 20,000R – to Jepara town 15,000R and 15,000R rikshaw to the port itself •
Ferry costs: 77,000R for Air con or 31,000 for economy - both are ok but prefer air con of course. Speed boats cost around 80-90,000R and go every other day. For ferry/boat schedule check: http://www.karimunjawa-ticketing.co.id/ •
Great source of info: http://karimunjawa-islands.info You can book yourself a package which actually works well for the price – we managed to save maybe 15$ each by doing it ourselves. We like the adventure of DIY though ;-)
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Patrick Hammond
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General comment
I am in the middle of reading about your travels and I do not think I have ever read such an interesting, informative travel blog like yours. I and my wife are in our sixties and intend travelling again after a 2 year illness and will travel to Borneo in Jan-April 2013. Keep up the brilliant reports, many thanks.