We take a train from Yogyakarta to Malang. Here we plan to journey to the village of Ngadisari in order to visit Mount Bromo (Mt Bromo is an active volcano). To get there we have to take a bus journey to Probolinggo and then another to Ngadisari.

The train staff in Southeast Asia never seem to have problems entertaining themselves; karaoke is the order of the day.

Because our train arrives in Malang so early in the morning we head into the town a bit to find something to eat and hopefully a cup of coffee. From the station exit, we take the road towards the centre of town and enter quite a plush hotel just off the next roundabout. It has a bakery-cafe annexed to it, were they they sell supposedly fresh breads and beverages to enjoy in their cozy surroundings. Well, the coffee was alright but I tried a piece of their chocolate cake from their display fridge (which, when I asked, was stated to have been baked that morning) and it was hard and dry as flour, so clearly had been standing there a few days.

In the bakery we meet a Dutch couple, Jasper and Karin.

They’ve also come to climb Bromo but they’re considering leaving their baggage behind at a nearby hostel and doing a different route, coming from Ngadisari and then down the other side of Bromo to Tumpang of something on that side. However this purports to be quite a mission so we eventually decide to journey together to Ngadisari and do the trek from there.

It turns out to be the beginning of a week long travel companionship. Jasper runs a pretty hip bar/club, Northern Lights or Noorderlicht, situated in an arted-up industrial estate in Amsterdam. Karen works there too. They’ve put a lot of work into getting the place up and running and now they’re in a position to take a couple of months off to travel.

The following days are filled with good company and plenty of activity, however there’s a notable decrease in velocity, as our bus journey times seem to be getting extrrreeeemely long for even relatively short stints.

In Ngadisari, about 2400m above sea level, we check into the Lava Cafe (150KRp/room/night, basic room; 35Rp/breakfast), which seems to be the only accommodation (of about three) with decent rooms. Even here it’s basic but at least it’s clean. The bonus is that even though we’re not supposed to have hot showers, somehow they are.

That evening, after several hours of journey from the hot Javanese planes to the cold peaks of this volcanic range, we sit together for a couple of beers and some food in the Lava Cafe’s restaurant (I recommend the Spaghetti or club sandwich). And it’s the first time since Lao that we’re wearing pullovers, socks, thermal underwear and trousers. It makes for a refreshing change, but one thing we’re still quite certain about is that we don’t like the cold.

The following morning we plan an early start, 4AM, to make it to Bromo’s crater for sunrise.

Unfortunately, but thankfully, when we wake up it’s raining and we therefore we have to delay our hike and get some more sleep.

Later that morning the weather has cleared up and we hike down into and across the wide, level plateau surrounding the Bromo and neighbouring calderas.

It’s a spectacular sight with the wind sweeping up clouds of dust across the plain and weather clouds blowing down upon us from above.

We pass an ancient Hindu temple about half way, which we don’t enter as is seems to be closed, but I’m told it is historically significant, as the Hindus, during a time of persecution here, found refuge here in this inhospitable place.

The walk up to Bromo’s crater is not too taxing at all and takes under an hour.

They’ve actually built steps all the way up there. On the rim you stand on a long circular mound of grit about 3 metres wide  with a dubious barrier standing between you and the deep, water-filled hole below.

It’s a scary place and with the strong winds we’re experiencing during our visit we have to keep a low profile to prevent being thrown off balance and into the crater.

Afterwards Ebru and I take a walk around the village. Though a seemingly barren and threatening environment, the slopes of this volcanic landscape are extremely fertile and the local people have worked a cascade of terraces into them as far as the eye can see.

Pools of green vegetation burst out from being the black terrace rims starting from miles high down to the baking planes below. It’s truly marvellous to see.

We see a few local folk gathered on the edge of the ridge falling down to the lava plateau. They’re building propellers bade from bamboo, pine branches and iron wire and nails. They test them in the powerful gust blowing in over the plateau; they spin at a dangerous rate and make a loud, chopping noise, which I guess they intend to use to frighten birds away from their crops.

We also have some lovely tea in a little tea shop in the village which is miraculously kept warm by a tiny little coal stove little larger than a coffee tin.

There’s another, even higher, peak nearby which we intend to visit the following morning, this time in company of a German fellow staying at the same guest house. Again we plan to get there before sunrise, but it’s raining so hard all morning that journey isn’t feasible at all. So, somewhat disappointed, we decide to depart back to Probolinggo with a minibus later that morning and move on.

It is a recurring theme on buses all over Java, that buskers hop on with a guitar or other instrument and play a few tunes in order to try and earn a few coins. Wonosobo terminal a few km outside of town but we find a small bus that will take us to Dieng Plateau – allegedly. They drop us in the middle of Wonosobo somewhere and we’re left by the road side with bemo drivers offering to take us to Dieng for 100KRp, which is too expensive. They don’t even want to bargain an inch.

We walk down the road in the direction of Dieng (we saw someone pointing as we were talking) to find a place to sit and have a drink and snack and then ask someone advice. We find a nice coffee shop where we have good coffee and food. The guy working there speaks good English. He appears shocked at the prices the bemo drivers are trying to charge us and agrees it should be way less – about 10KRp or so each on the public bus. We ask if he can point out the public bus we need to get on and he agrees.

What turns out is that the makes a phone call in the background and the bus he waves down for us is his friend’s, completely empty, and the the driver wants 100KRp for the trip. Needless to say we’re somewhat pissed off. We make a stink about it and the guy from the coffee shop apologizes and says it’s his fault and he’ll pay half of the journey if we pay the other. Frustrated and needing to get moving, but will only pay our half when we arrive to the correct destination. En route we realize we may have been scammed again, that the 50000Rp the coffee shop guy paid his buddy might just be returned to him and still we’ll have paid at least 20000Rp more than the good price. Anyway, it’s a nervous ride. It’s gone dark outside, the driver looks from behind like he might be falling asleep. He makes a short pit stop at some tiny village and picks up a couple with a kid – clearly piggy-backing a ride on our fee. But we’re happy that at least someone will be talking to the driver so that he doesn’t fall asleep.

We get to Dieng an hour later. The last half hour of the ride is really nerve-wracking as bus snakes up the mountain road through fog as thick as whipped cream. We recognize a couple of signs for home-stays and when we get off the bus at one of them we verify we are where we want to be before we pay the driver. It’s raining cats and dogs, and the bus driver actually offers to drive us down the road to find a guest house we wish to stay in – reluctantly we accept. We finally find a place (Dieng Pass guesthouse) around the corner and the bus driver goes into some discussion with the lady there. We get really nervous about what he might be saying and we explain we think we’ve been scammed by him and the coffee shop man. Some younger Indonesians there speak English and they translate. They’re surprised; apparently the bus driver just wants to make sure we’ve found a place to stay – weird!

After settling into our room and popping across the road to get some grilled chicken skewers in peanut sauce from a road-side stand (the sole establishment that is open here at this time), we end up chatting to the group of young Indonesians sitting around a small fire-pot in the ground floor of our guest house. They’re all about our age. They turn out to be a really nice bunch of people and we join them for some conversation around the pot. They’re from Jakarta and taking a short holiday, and they’ve organized a bus to take them to various sites the next day. Ebru asks if they have space for two more and kindly they agree to take us along and split the costs. They’re all working in different fields. We tell them how much we liked Jakarta, especially peoples’ friendly attitude. They seem a bit surprised that we like it though and are themselves happy to get out of the city. “It’s a big shopping mall”, Kiki says; apparently there are hundreds – or was it thousands? – of shopping malls in Jakarta.

The next day is awesome! We’re up around 4AM and head to a lookout point where we see the sun rise behind a majestic volcano on the horizon.

Next, we get dropped in a small mountain village and (with a couple of guides) trek for several hours through dense jungle and papaya plantations, to eventually reach a view of a high waterfall on the opposite side of a gorge.

The terrain is so steep here it really makes for some challenging trekking.

Back at the village we soak our feet in their hot springs and stop for some lunch.

The next destination is an old volcano crater. It’s about 100m across and the rocky plunge vertically down for about 100m, ending in a murky crater lake. Scary, just standing next to it. The story is that if you make a wish and throw a stone across, and you manage to hit the other side, your wish will be fulfilled.

We visit an ancient Hindu temple site in the vicinity. I think it’s the oldest Hindu site in Indonesia. There’s not so much of it left but it’s still beautiful. There’s an information centre there where several of the sculptures are preserved and you can view an informative video about the place.

Best of all, just nearby we taste our first Indonesian food which we really enjoy! It’s called Tempe, which is some sort of dough or batter with a fill of vegetables and deep fried. It sure makes a difference when you have someone local guiding you to the decent food.

The next site is really interesting: it’s a huge hot spring in the middle of a volcanic venting site of some sort. The main spring itself is a bubbling lake of ashen grey, cooking and spluttering and casting off a thick cloud of sulphuric steam which stinks like rotten eggs.But all over the area there are small water or gas springs bubbling out of the ground, which is caked in yellow sulphur resin. Fascinating!

After getting dropped back at the home-stay we all make a short visit to the local mosque and thereafter Ebru and I go on to view a beautiful crater lake before the rain comes down.

Sadly, our friends have to move on to their next destination straight away and so we part ways. It’s been great spending time with them and it’s been great meeting some modern Indonesians of our age group to talk with. They’re well educated, open minded, confident and have a great sense of humour.

Indonesia has a few centuries’ history of being violated by outsiders (particularly Dutch and Japanese, then). But around the mid-20th century, after Britain and the US instigated a coup here to replace the democratically elected leader with a ruthless pro-American dictator, hundreds of thousands were killed. With the help of the new leadership, the country was sold out to IMF/World Bank and shackled with so much debt, it would ensure Indonesia would be a cheap sweat shop for western corporations for the foreseeable future. (There are some interesting books and films out by John Perkins and John Pilger on this subject.)

We feel really privileged to have been so warmly welcomed and to have enjoyed time with these lovely Indonesian people. Thank you again to our new friends, and we hope to have you visiting us wherever we end up!

Along the way we get an idea what the city outskirts and the countryside look like.

The carriage is comfortable and clean, much better than we expected. There are electric sockets next to the seats so we can make use of your laptops and get on with some overdue blog work. We do order some of the on board food just to try it, but when I bite into my leg of chicken the smell is so bad that I can’t continue eating it. That’s the only complaint though.

Yogya looks a bit chaotic. We arrive in time to find us some accommodation near the station before sunset. The place is called Monica Hotel and they charge 150KRP/night for the double, which is in reasonable condition and clean. That night we head down the street to a bar called Lucifer, quite a simple place but there’s beer and live music. One thing that is impresses me in Indonesia is the fact that there are so many bands doing really good impressions of other artists’ songs; their voices sound almost identical to the original.

The problem with the accommodation is that it’s right next door to a bar which has live music several nights a week and, following the first night, which is fine, we get progressively less and less sleep as the noise from next door keeps us awake at night and some looney early-risers in the hotel decide it’s a good idea to be loud and cheerful at seven in the morning. As you can imagine, by the fourth morning I’m not the friendliest person to talk to. Of course we could have left to another place but taking time to check out and search for another accommodation of acceptable standard is an annoying waste of time.

Yogya is a vibrant market town where all the streets are bustling with stalls selling bags, clothing, batik art and various hand-made souvenirs, but especially textile goods. We meet a young chap there running a stall for his father and as we’re asking about wholesale prices for some of the goods there, he takes us on a tour of the wholesale market off Malioboro street. They really do produce some wonderful stuff! They use materials such as coconut shell or bamboo in such creative ways.

Walking the streets around here is quite pleasant though, aside from the traffic. With so many stalls and sellers around we expect to be harassed no end, but people are very civilized. They offer their wares but they’re not pushy about selling to you as they are in other places we’ve been.

With the batik sellers you’ve got to be careful though. Many of them around, selling cheap machine-made goods as originals, and there are touts on the streets that will guide you to an alleged genuine batik gallery of store, which is in fact not genuine. It seems the way you can tell the good places from the bad is by the price list: the con artists generally don’t have one and will try to sell you batik at hefty Dollar or Euro rates whereas the artisan shops where batik students and some known artists allegedly produce the wares, they have a price list in Indonesian Rupiahs. Batik art is a very interesting process and some of the work is really impressive. Sadly we have to keep our hands in our pockets as usual.

Aside from the street markets there are a few shopping malls and (besides Pizza Hut) you’ll find some interesting shops there…

Good food is a problem for us here, as it has been in Jakarta. Half the time we’re starving because finding decent food is such a mission, and that tends to affect our mood negatively. The sad result is that we end up spending every other night at Pizza Hut. Once we even walk into a McDonalds to get lunch but the smell in there puts me off and we get cakes and pastries from a nearby bakery instead. The food situation becomes really frustrating. Once we sat down at a nice place near the palace and they served up a snack which looked delicious; bananas made in every different way you can imagine; but for us… naw.

There is one pretty good eating experience we have on one of our scooter excursions though: we happen upon a place called Steak & Shake where they serve a variety of steak dishes with milkshake or cool drink at reasonable prices. We order some kind of a steak sizzler, one of those hot metal plates. Though the steak is under a centimetre thick; it comes with potato chips and a pepper sauce and tastes good, so we’re happy.

The following day we try to find the place again but fail miserably and are sentenced to Pizza Hut again. Incidentally, several times on the main Marlioboro road, we passed by a Dunkin Donuts place, but when we decide to go there for a bite to eat it also seems to have mysteriously disappeared.

Talking about scooter excursions, we head down South from yogya one day and drive along the coast, Parangtritis and Eastwards. Though we don’t really meet with any spectacular beaches as we expected, we do journey through many villages and the landscapes and atmosphere is beautiful.

Another day we ride quite a way out of town to visit the Borobodur Buddhist temple

and the Prambanan Hindu temple.

This is a good day out. The temples are of course ancient and riddled with old base relief sculptures depicting stories of the Buddha’s life. The journey there and back is in itself quite nice, as you can see a couple of volcanoes sticking up on the horizon along the way – quite a beautiful sight.

As for the royal palace in the town, though we did not really find it that interesting over all, there are some interesting items to be found inside.

And it seems that Ebru is also quite the attraction

Right near the train station entrance there is a small bar, which is a must visit! It’s more of a shop with a bar in it, but we see they sell beer and we just have to check it out. The owner is a fun chap and he introduces us to the local wine which is drunk mixed with beer and actually it’s quite nice. He also teaches us what a “ML drink” is (and it seems to me there are plenty of people coming around for these potions).

Over all, Yogya is a good experience. If you can put up with the food or opt for Pizza Hut most of the time, it’s a worthwhile experience. What I like most about the place is that the stuff they produce here, unlike at other Asian markets, does not simply mimick popular western brands, such as Nike, Timberland or Reebok. Here everything is about Yogya – the T-shirts, the caps, the key rings – and it seems to convey a sense of pride in their own place, which I think is cool.

Before leaving Yogya, we undertake a journey for a few days to visit the Dieng Plateau, a few hours drive to the North. On our return we catch the late night train out to Malang, where a volcano awaits.

RECOMMENDATIONS:
– Top places to eat: Pizza Hut, Dunkin Donuts
– Travel by train. Executive seats for long journeys are excellent
– Avoid Monica Hotel if you’re a light sleeper (aside from Mon-Tue when there is no music next door)

We booked the complete transfer between Luang Prabang (Lao) and Chiang Mai (Thailand) via a tour company in LP as we wanted to avoid losing time finding all the transport connections ourselves.

Overview:
– Ticket cost: 310000LAK/pp
– Get to LP North bus terminal
– Take bus from LP to Huei Xai terminal (Bokeo Province)
– Get to the Huei Xai – Chiang Khong river crossing
– Go to Immigration (exit procedures)
– Take boat to Chiang Khong (Thailand)
– Go to Immigration (entry procedures)
– Get to next transport connection to Chiang Mai

The Lao agent (Andy’s Air Ticketing Service, 49/3 Khemkong Road LP, Tel.+856-71260505) gave us a ticket receipt to the border town of Huei Xai and another one which we would show to the tuk-tuk driver there as well as their partner agents along the way for free onward transport.

Initial pick-up was at 18:00 in front of our guest house by tuk-tuk and dropped us off at the LP Nort bus station about 15 minutes later.

At the terminal office we showed our purchase receipt and got our bus tickets. The 19:00 “VIP” bus left almost on schedule (though another traveller told me the buses normally leave when they’re full so we may have been lucky). The ride to Huei Xai took 12 hours (on time).

The trip was not no luxury by western standards but no long bus trip is comfortable and all in all it was not bad. Although all seats were occupied, several pickups were made along the main road, the last being about 5 people who had rolled their car off into the vegetation. (I have no problem this as long as it doesn’t cause big delays or serious discomfort to paying passengers. These poeple also need to get somewhere and don’t have the variety of options we take for granted. They were camped out on the floor and I could only empathise with the discomfort of sitting cramped upright for several hours. There was no on board toilet as explained to us but this is a safer option as they can start to stink; several “refreshment” stops were made. Air con on older buses tends to be a problem so take something warm on board including something for your head.)

We showed our tickets to a tuk-tuk driver in Huei Xai who dropped us off at the partner agent. The partner was located right at the river crossing. They paid the tuk-tuk driver, converted our receipts to minivan tickets for the other side and put a sticker on us to signal a free ride with a tuk-tuk on the Thai side. They excorted us to the immigation office for passport stamping (no fee was involved) and then to the boat. (There is also a money exchange office right at the border office so you can convert your remaining LAK to THB).

Bye Bye Lao. The boat trip to the Thai post was about 5 minutes and there we simply filled out our arrival/departure forms and got our Visa On Arrival stamp for 14 days. Again no fee.

We got on a tuk-tuk near the immigration office, which took us to the partner agent on the Thai side (about 10 minutes). They checked our minivan tickets and half an hour later we were seated in a nice minivan en route to Chiang Mai.

I must say first that I by no means claim to be an expert on the country and do not aim to offend those countrymen who are decent honourable folk – very few of whom we seem to have met, unfortunately. So I see fit report as I experienced and you may accept and dismiss from it what you will.

From the minute you arrive you enter the big tourist mincer in one end and it spits you out on the other, short of cash, feeling violated and with severely diminished faith in humanity.

Forget about doing anything independently as this immediatly exposes you to a whole array of opportunities to get conned by a number of people. In Vietnam you are a TOURIST and you belong on a TOUR wherever you go: this means you pay a large sum up front for transport and specified stops, sights and attractions. The services rendered are rarely up to the standard described, some items are generally skipped or curtailed for one reason or another, and whatever you end up doing you’re bound to feel the grip of another tourist trap, with the preying Vietnamese openly ready to bleed you of another dollar and kick you out as soon as possible to make way for the next punter.

Unpleasant as this sounds, you’re almost sure to be rinsed of far more money and suffer significantly more frustration (from plain dishonesty, scams and things generally not working out the way you want them to) by venturing to travel here on your own whims, than if you had paid up front to be crooked on the tour-mincer. It’s really uncanny: sometimes we really got the feeling that everyone in town was part of the same plot to trick us so there was no one to turn to for a reality check.

I must admit we did have one reasonably good experience: a Mekong Delta boat tour from Can Tho organized through Ms Ha in Can Tho city for about US$50 (7 hours). The tour was pretty much as promised and though we did feel a bit tourist trapped (maybe a bit of lagging paranoia from previous misfortunes) we weren’t dragged through souvenir shops and it made for a nice day out on the river. (One thing that did occur to us though was that nobody seems to be trading any produce on the famous floating markets and the only thing that does change hands are pineapples for tourists… which every boat driver knows to prepare). Actually she even arranged our onward bus ride back to Saigon for us which was reliable. Thanks Ms Ha and co. (she’ll probably show up in your hotel lobby)

Do not expect a smile or kindness anywhere, exont), though even here friendly service is not guaranteed. Also be prepared that if you have already parted with your hard-earned cash in exchange for some service or item, fulfilment of the agreement is by no means certain and in more furtunate cases where it is, do not expect it to be to the standard or in the same form as promised. The reality is you’re out in the cold and your cries will fall on deaf ears and blank faces.

Nonetheless: I would encourage anyone currently in the trap to be firm and relentless in making your complaints heard and trying to fight for your right. These folks clearly take pleasure in making you suffer so it’s only right that they should experience some discomfort themselves! You may feel a bit embarrassed as all the other falangs (foreigners) in that tour bus or office stare silently into space as you rant at the employee, but remember: their uneasy faces only portray the result of their recent injuries in the tourist mincer.

To be fair I have to note an exception: the lovely family running a late night street food stall in Ben Tre looked after us very well. You folks are wonderful!

On the food front: I find it extremely puzzling why people come to Vietnam to partake in Vietnamese cooking lessons! Our culinary experiences from North to South, whether street food or -restaurant, were all very disappointing. Everything is slightly sweet and bland, meat tends to be rubbery and stone-hard kernels in your rice are always a cracking experience! To be honest you’d not be far off an improvement if you only knew how to make french fries from a freezer bag.

Well I think that sums it up really. Our experiences started with entry into Saigon, from there via bus South to Ben Tre and Can Tho and back to Saigon. Then by bus again to Hoi An for a short stay and onward to HaNoi. As we travelled northwards we found people becoming increasingly friendly and English-literate. In Hoi An the Sunflower Hotel was really nice (with pool) and the old town is a chilled out experience, however it does appear that there is nothing going on there except tourism: bars, souvenir shops, restaurants…

HaNoi feels far less threatening than SaiGon. We got a very nice room in the May De Ville Ho/s/tel and staff were helpful. The obvious excursion to do from here is a boat trip to Ha Long Bay. Prices are pretty steep, starting from about US$80 with variing durations and activities. We passed on this however. Some thorough digging through Internet customer reviews (looking at direct trips from HaNoi as well as an alternative travelling to Cat Ba island first) revealed 9 out of 10 customer’s experiences were either partial or complete nightmares. I may be ripped off again in the future but I’ll try my darnedest to ensure it’s not by a Vietnamese!
(As it happens though, Ben and Denise, a Dutch couple we befriended along the way, were pleased with their experience.)

So in conclusion, if you do decide to travel in Viertnam (to me this fits into the Stupid rather than the Crazy category), here’s my advice:

– Don’t trust anyone, get preferrably written itineraries and question into the finest detail! (Where does it stop, who is going to meet me,will I have to take a tuk-tuk, does it go directly to the center, how long will each item last, any additional fees, etc etc…)
– Hold on to your bus tickets, especially on connecting trips! They will try to take them from you but you’ll end up having to buy a new ticket for the next leg if you cannot show your receipt!
– Get a street map and compass pref. before you go somewhere or you’ll have no way of telling where you’re being taken.
– Check customer reviews for tours before you buy (tripadvisor etc are great sources)
– Don’t wear jewelleryand keep your things safe at all times
– SaiGon beer is good, Hanoi beer is ok, chew your rice carefully
– Have a drink in the dive bar in Hoi An