Adventures By Design

In which the travelers cross the equator

We had a little trouble sleeping last night as our neighbors in the rooms next to ours kept up quite a racket until the wee hours. This hotel was a little strange, and I don’t think we’ll be staying there again if we go back through KL. The lobby was always full of shifty-eyed men who watched us as we walked through, but would never make eye contact if we looked back. We only saw two women the whole time we were there, one was a housekeeper, and the other was working too, in, um, another profession. Not a place we’d recommend to friends, especially single women.

Nonetheless we woke up feeling pretty well-rested and got ready to take the bus to the airport. First we had to try to make our bags lighter because Air Asia only allows 15kg before they charge exorbitant excess baggage fees. Both of us filled our carry-ons with as many books and other heavy things possible (the Lonely Planet Southeast Asia book alone must weigh a kilo or two). Properly re-packed we headed to the bus station to find our way to the airport.

At the bus station one of the many touts took charge of us and told us that he’d get us on a bus. That was about the point where our communication stopped. We waited around for about 10 minutes with no idea what was happening, until the tout motioned for us to follow him and we headed outside to a bus. We climbed on, settled our bags, and found the best seats, and then the bus took off… with only us onboard! For the first 20 minutes of the ride we were the sole passengers on a big 36 seat bus. We did pick up a few more people eventually, but there were only ever five of us on there, a far cry from the packed bus that took us into KL from the airport a couple of weeks ago.

We had lunch at the Kuala Lumpur airport; due to a lack of choices we had McDonald’s… a mistake we hope not to repeat. Both of us felt a little ill afterwards, and we know that there was virtually no nutritional value in our food. After lunch we changed some money and then headed off to board our flight.

On arrival in Yogyakarta (pronounced Jogjakarta) we got our visa processed, picked up our bags, and headed into the mob of taxi drivers eager to take us to our destination. We checked with two counters inside the airport and were quoted 70,000 rupiah and 45,000 rupiah (about $7.75 and $5), not happy with these prices we headed outside to try our luck there. Unfortunately the best price we could get outside was 50,000 ($5.55) but we couldn’t get back into the airport security-controlled arrival area to go with the cheapest price. When we did the math and realized that it was only a difference of 55 cents, and that the whole 20 minute plus ride was going to be less than $6, we just went with the guy offering us a ride for 50,000 rupiah.

After a ride through town we arrived at our hotel, the Duta Garden. Gin found this hotel on the internet, and while it’s certainly not the cheapest in town, it has a pool, free breakfast and afternoon snacks, free internet, a garden right outside our room with a patio for us to sit on, and a bathtub in the bathroom, something we haven’t seen since we left Canada! All this for about $30.

After we checked in Ric settled into the air-con to do some work on the computer, and Gin sat on the patio with her tea and book. After an hour or so several voices started singing in the area around us; it was the Muslim call to prayer. As you may or may not know Indonesia has the largest population of Muslims of any country, so the call is probably something we’ll hear a lot of. It was quite beautiful sitting on the patio and listening to the many voices with different, harmonizing calls. Unfortunately we can’t really record it for you so you’ll have to use your imagination, or better yet, visit Indonesia.

Later we ordered dinner from the hotel restaurant and went for a quick, ten-minute walk around our hotel. The area seems nice with a few restaurants and cafes, and lots of men offering transportation: we have about 6 rides on offer for tomorrow! Now Ric’s playing on Gin’s Nintendo DSL and Gin’s going to go have a bath in that bathtub!