Blogs from Indonesia, Asia - page 519

As we couldn't arrange to climb Gunung Merapi, Javas most active volcano, in central Java we headed east from Solo to The Bromo region or Bromo-Tengger-Semeru National Park. It took us a whole day of travelling to reach the village of Cemoro Lawang, perched on the old crater edge. Basically, the arrangement here is that ancient volcanic activity from Gunung Tengger created a large crater of 10km diameter which now forms the main outer crater, of which the village of Cemoro Lawang is perched, with the Sea of Sand (volcanic sands and debris) at the bottom. Within the main crater rim and rising from the Sea of Sand, are the volcanoes of Bromo (active), Batok and Kursi. On the 5th we walked across the Sea of Sand and climbed up to Bromo, which was puffing out ... read more

Back in Bali, we spent the first few days in the obscenely touristy city of Kuta, soaking up the air conditioned shops and thrilled by the wide array of food options. Kuta is Bali's most popular tourist vacation, particularly as a surfing destination for Australians and Europeans looking for a beach vacation. The streets are packed with surf shops, trinket stands, bars, nightclubs, coffee shops and relatively expensive tourist restaurants. If there is any Indonesian authenticity remaining in Kuta, it is hiding far from the swarming city center. After a few days of gorging on the thrilling array of varied food options and pushing our way through hoardes of desperate street vendors, we grew tired of Kuta's hectic pace and rowdy nightlife. We checked out of our hotel and took a taxi back to Sanur, returning ... read more

More mushrooms, more parties.... I have spent the last 4 days chilling on the beach nursing my hangovers. So much for coming to Gilly Trawangan for some R & R. Every night there is a party! I have met some great locals, Addy and Joe who are insererable, Lang who is as cool as..Ali, aka The Magicman - the funniest guy here, Elan - cute as!, Mona, Dan.... Ash turned up yesterday, I met him in Phi Phi at breakfast, we were both nursing hangovers...He had had a long journey from Java, hadn't slept for 48 hours. he reckoned he was going to bed....yeah whatever....I think he got to bed at 8 am this morning!! he was still sucking on mushroom shales at 6am! haha!! It was V's last night though so we had to give ... read more

On the 25th we traveled various back roads to Amed, on the N.E. coast of Bali. One town we drove through is famed for carved wood products and we laughed at a sign proudly declaring "Antiques made to order". Amed is an area described as "rustic Bali from 30 years ago" and we were really looking forward to snorkeling, as well as hiking in the foothills of Gunung Batur. On the way we visited Boseki - the Mother of all Temples, located on the upper slopes of the extinct volcano, Mt. Batur. After a long uphill hike, made all the longer by various touts attempting to sell us service or products to no avail, we reached the temple but a ceremony precluded our entering the main grounds. We are feeling "templed out" and find the temple ... read more

Oh what a change from the places we have been… Bali is pretty good. Not to say that China, Tibet, Nepal and India were bad at all (maybe India had some moments), but we feel like we are in our element now. On the first day we got here Dan and I immediately ran to the beach and jumped into the ocean after we found a place to stay. I think we both felt as if we had been baptized and had been cleansed of our strife (not sin) in India. We decided to stay in Kuta for the first few days to hang out, and get a feel for what we wanted to do while we were here in Bali. Kuta is the tourist capital of the island complete with 5-star hotels, more surf shops ... read more