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We left the beaches for a few days of culture in Yogyakarta (pronounced and also spelt Jogjakarta) or Yogya (Jogja). The main tourist attractions in the area are the temples which are said to be on a par with Angkor Wat, in Cambodia.
The great thing about leaving the beaches behind is you find accommodation, food and drink are much cheaper. This meant we were able to stay in a lovely hotel (with a pool!) on a street that ran parallel to the main backpacker hub. The not so good thing about being in a city is the stiflingly heat, and gridlocked roads.
We had three nights in Yogyakarta, which basically gave us two days of sightseeing. Our first stop on day one were the temples at Prambanan, just 17km away. Unfortunately due to traffic it took us almost an hour to get there in a taxi. Although it was super busy, we got to queue jump because foreigners pay significantly more than locals for entrance (£20pp v £5pp) and that extra cash buys you a separate, deserted entrance.
Candi Shiva is the main and busiest temple of Hindu influence and looks very similar to some of the
Ankor Wat temples, but that's not to say it wasn't impressive! It really is an imposing view as you approach from the main entrance. We were surprised to find what could be considered an out of place, tacky 'Hollywood' type sign, but I decided to join the queue for a picture (whilst in Rome and all that).
Candi Shiva is made up of eight minor and eight major temples which visitors have full access to. You can climb the steep, stone steps and wander around to your hearts content. You do need a little patience as it is really busy, but unlike China there is some order to proceedings. We found we had to keep moving to avoid having too many requests for photos from visiting school kids - we'd decided we'd do ten requests before politely saying no, otherwise we'd have struggled to actually do any sightseeing. In the end we got off lightly and had only three requests - our technique clearly worked!
After an hour we decided to check out some of the smaller temples on the site. These were pretty much deserted, the only people we ran into were other westerners. The domestic tourists
were happy to linger around the main temple, and the nearby playground - I'm sure some of the poor, bored kids being dragged around the temple were overjoyed to see the playground.
Candi Sewu, the 'thousand temples', was a real gem. Completely deserted, we had the entire place to ourselves, so we could really experience it at our leisure - the way temples should be! Even though it was much smaller than Shiva the whole experience was more in keeping with our visit to Cambodia.
After two hours we felt like we'd done the place justice and as the day was reaching maximum scorchio levels decided to head back to the hotel. This is where our great day took a turn for the worse. We'd not asked our taxi to wait, as he would only wait for a maximum of two hours and we had no idea how big the place was and how much time we'd need. We foolishly expected there'd be loads of taxis in the car park. But of course, the majority of visitors here are from Indonesia, either on an organised tour or with their own car. We spent an hour searching for a
taxi and had zero luck. This is so ironic because pretty much every second person in the city is offering transport of some description and when we bloody wanted some there wasn't a single cab in sight.
In the end we went back to the entrance and asked the ticket office guy if he could point us in the direction of the public bus station. After 20 minutes of walking we were at the bus station and mere minutes later were sat on the bus. It was a bargain at 20p each (compared to the £10 we'd spent on the cab) but the combination of baking heat, terrible traffic and a multitude of stops nearly tipped us over the edge. And, it didn't even go anywhere close to our hotel so we had a long, hot walk back. It had taken us 2 hours to see the temples and about 3 hours to get home.
We were hot and bothered by the time we got back to the hotel, the afternoon pretty much gone. I decided a refreshing swim was in order, whilst Paul decided he needed some quality down time in our air conditioned room!
Our
second day in Yogya was less successful. We went to the Kraton, the Sultan's palace, which is cited as the biggest attraction in downtown Yogya. To say we were underwhelmed was an understatement - we've clearly been too spoilt by China. We genuinely didn't think it was worth getting out of bed for. There was one building that had a pretty ceiling, but everything else was pretty run down and a real disappointment.
Afterwards we visited the main market street, Malioboro, in search of some new trouser for me, as I am somewhat lacking in lightweight trousers and walking around cities in shorts isn't really the thing here. On our first day on Gili Air I saw some super cute trousers with elephant print on them. The sort of thing you'd never wear at home but that are perfect for travelling. I never bought them and have really regretted it; ever since we've been on the look out for the elusive elephant trousers. Yogya is home to world famous batik, so this was not the place to find them unfortunately.
After a very fruitless, hotter than hell shop we sought refuge in the sanctuary of an air conditioned
Starbucks. I'm a little anti-global brands when travelling. The whole point of travelling is to experience new things, but Paul, ever the caffeine addict, does not always share my view. However on this occasion I was practically marching him into Starbucks, just to escape the heat!
Our Yogya evenings were spent on the backpacker street, Prawirotaman 1. Lined with bars and restaurants we were spoilt for choice. We found a lovely split level bar, overlooking the street which we visited every night for pre dinner drinks. It was almost perfect, but like all bars and restaurants in this area it did not sell any spirits, only beer. I normally have an emergency supply of vodka for such a situation, which I take out in a water bottle. I'd been on a bit of a vodka crisis for over a week and had just enough to see me through until our international flight to KL. That was until the hotel maid mistook it for a half empty bottle of water and threw it away! Noooooooo. I had no choice but to revert to drinking Bintang. Paul was delighted to be sharing his beer with me 😊
As we reflected
on our two days in Yogya, we agreed that we could easily have squeezed the temples and a little downtown time into a day. But our evenings in Yogya had been wonderful - . Prawirotaman reminded us of a smaller versions of Siem Reap (as it was ten years ago).
The next day was the start of our crazy travel week. We will be spending nine nights in eight different hotels. This will allow us to visit Borobudur (the main temple in Java), overnight back in Yogya before doing a visa run to Kuala Lumpur and then taking on the epic journey to get to the remote Togean islands.
Watch this space for more stories of travel disasters, as I'm sure there will be a few!
***Please scroll down for more pictures ***
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Mum M
non-member comment
Hi
Glad to hear you are coping with the heat (just!!) and the culture. You will have moved on by now of course. Sorry to hear about the vodka crisis and the maid's disposal of your stash!!! Hope you have managed to find new supplies!? Your next 9 days sounds hectic! You will be ready for some quality R and R. Have fun! Mx