Yogyakarta- From South to North...To further South.

21.10.11

We started today with our free breakfast (Well not free but included in the price of the hotel)

and we were ready to go Exploring.

Our hotel is in the south of the city, on a road filled with 'mid range' accommodation called Prawirotaman. We were armed with a map we were given on check-in and 2 our flasks filled with already luke-warm water. We headed north (obviously) and quickly found ourselves on road names nowhere to be found on our map, however we knew which direction roughly to head and figured we'd be fine. We were busy comparing the city to other places we'd been and to India in general. It felt very different, the roads were smooth and had pavements, ones you could walk on at nearly all times and that weren't covered in rubbish and/or excrement (which is always a bonus!). Every few feet there was huge pots of shrubs and flowers, it felt a lot 'greener' than similar places in India. We began to notice many of the shops had bird cages hanging outside, I remembered reading somewhere something about song birds being prized possessions here.

Along the pavements there where vendors selling glass bottles of fuel and pouring them into motorbike tanks with a hosepipe. I guess access to Petrol stations isn't as common or easy as back home and the bikes have small engines, the guys selling the petrol seemed to be doing good business. There were lots of places making their trade through motorbike maintenance or similar.

We found our way through lots of little winding streets to places we could see on the map, but actually this pottering around, no real clue of where we were was the highlight of the day. We got to see lots of places you wouldn't bother to go looking for and we greeted warmly by the people, homes and businesses we walked past, with lots of people wanting to just say hello and wave as we walked past, with lots of smiles and giggles thrown in. Smiling seemed to be a lovely theme here, all in all it has to be the place we have been with the happiest looking people (possibly joint actually with the smiling and excited faces we saw in the slums in Pune).

So we made our way to the main street in of the town, which has markets and stalls everywhere, it is very popular with tourist and local students and also some of the markets looked to be doing very good business with the locals. This road leads from the area called Kraton (The sultans Palace and surroundings) up to the north towards the train station, we had missed seeing the palace on route up to this road as we had taken lots of little side roads. We walked up and down the best part of Malioboro road, although it is much the same as many similar roads in cities across south east Asia that we have seen. Now we headed back south but this time to find the Sultans Palace, which we promptly found a few minutes later at 12.20, only to find that today the palace shuts at 12.oo. No looking around there for us today but it was no drama as we can easily head back another day if needed.

We then went looking for the Water Castle, which was used by the Sultan to bath. Before we could find it a 'Guide' found us and showed us to the temple. He followed us in and when we explained we did not want a guide and could not pay for one, he said it was included in the price of the ticket and we would not have to pay. So we allowed him to show us around, he was very nice and quite informative as he ushered us around the Sultans water palace. This was built as a kind of playground fore the sultan, with 3 pools, sauna rooms, a tower that the sultan could watch his wives bathing from and underwater tunnels. There was even an underwater mosque. Much of the area is in ruins, a recent earthquake causing part of it to be inaccessible. Our guide actually lived in the grounds of the Castle. He took us around the narrow streets and showed us his home and the homes of his family members, most of which were employed by the current Sultan as he is. The current sultan has 1 wife and 5 children and one of his daughters had just got married. The royal wedding was held on the 18th October in Jogja, so we just missed it! Our 'guide' did take us to various Batik and puppet making emporiums, but there was no problem with us not buying anything.

From the Water Castle, we continued south along a wide, busy road hoping to find the Bird Market. The Bird Market is permanent and there are rows of small stalls/shops selling mainly birds in beautiful decorated cages. There were all sorts of birds, including huge cockerels, owls, ducks, pigeons, tiny songbirds, ducklings tied all kinds of weird and wonderful colours and more colourful parrot like birds. It was fascinating to walk around although quite upsetting at times, as the cages were usually tiny and quite often had large numbers of birds inside. There were also bats, lizards, ants, maggots and crickets on sale. At a couple of other stalls we came across gerbils, that were quite entertaining as they kept standing on their hind legs and then toppling over backwards!

By this point we were really quite tired and had been sweating buckets all day so we walked back to the hotel for a refreshing swim before going back to Via Via for another delicious meal!

Our first train journey in Indonesia.

20.10.11

This morning we had to tackle the buses to get to the train station. So we left at 6.30am to avoid rush hour, this was a good move! We potentially had 2 changes at progressively busier stations but at our first stop one of the conductors helped us out. He told us to wait to one side and he would tell us when a direct bus to Gambir came. He then let us get on the back of the bus after everyone had got off instead of with the crush of people at the front doors. This was good news as I would have struggles to get me and my backpack on safely. It was pretty rammed none-the-less and we were glad we only had a few stops.

At Gambir we had a wait of an hour an half which was fine as there was a plug socket so we could do some blog writing.

WE had booked ticket in Executive Class which we had debated on because it was so much more than Business Class. But we thought it would probably be worth the money if Martin was comfortable on a 8 hour journey. It was definitely worth it! We had plenty of space with reclining seats. There was aircon with a nice citrus scent pumped in every so often. There were TV screens playing Indonesian music videos with the odd Westlife/Alicia Keys/Foo Fights song chucked in, terrible slapstick comedy sketch shows and cheesy horror flicks. This was a bit odd considering there were several young children on the train. We had 2 waiters in the carriage who were constantly coming up and down the train with snacks and beverages for sale and we bought lunch off them. This was edible and served to us at the exact time they said it would be!

During the 8 hours we travelled about half the length of Java. We only travelled a few minutes at any one time without seeing some kind of settlement. For most of the journey it was overcast and the landscape was flat, mainly rice fields separated by trenches, some flooded, some bright green and some dry. Throughout the fields were dotted small shelters where workers could take shelter. Along the train tracks we saw many towns and villages, which generally seemed to be alot better off than some of the areas we past through in India. I don't remember seeing any apartment blocks apart from on leaving Jakarta, unlike India where the main well-off areas seem to be made up of apartment buildings. The roofs here were mainly pitched and a lot of the houses had beautiful teak doors and window-frames.

As we got further towards Jogja the sky became more overcast and there was a good few miles of torrential rain. The landscape became more mountainous and there were more trees. We arrived at Jogja about half an hour late at 5pm.

As we exited the train station we expected to get mobbed by taxi and rickshaw drivers. However to our suprise they were all stood patiently by their rickshaws smiling! We got in to a cycle rickshaw. The cycle rickshaws here are different to those in India. Instead of the bike pulling the rickshaw, here the bike is behind the rickshaw. We were cycled all the way through the middle of Jogja down the main road so we could get a good feel for the town. It is a young persons, being the educational capital of Java. The main street is full of stalls selling batik and is very lively. The hotel, Duta, we wanted to stay in is about 3 km away from the main street.

When we arrived there it was more expensive than we anticipated so Martin went for a hunt around the other hotels as there were loads nearby. The cheapest we could find was about £1 less than Duta and wasn't as nice. So we took the room at Duta, the first room on this trip without it's own bathroom. But the hotel itself is so worth it. The rooms are arranged around a small but beautiful pool, that has a 12 foot waterfall that trickles in to it. The whole hotel is beautiful with lots of communal space and each room has seating on a balcony. You also get free wifi and breakfast so I would recommend this place!

This evening we went to find the ViaVia restaurant up the road. This is a worldwide chain of restaurants that puts its profits back in to the local community. The food was amazing! Another recommendation!