Yogyakarta

After sending my older son to NS last Wed, the 3 of us went for a vacation in Yogyakarta. We figured that since he has a 2 weeks confinement period in camp ahead of him and that younger boy only starts junior college in Feb, we should do a short trip now.

Wife has been gushing about this place for the last few months as friends who had been there were posting nice photos on FB. Seems like a place with rich history to explore and be close to nature.

We stayed in the Pheonix hotel, which was a smaller replica of our Raffles hotel. It will be celebrating its 100th anniversary this year and we could see the laid-back majestic nature of the hotel environment.

Upon arrival in the morning, we began with an afternoon tour to Prambanan, which was a national park that was a UNESCO World Heritage Site as it was more than 1,000 years old. Our timing was not too good as there was a heavy downpour. Watched a cultural show in the evening before we called it a day.

The next day, we visited the Jomblang cave in the morning. It was quite an adventure, being lowered 90 meters into a sunken cave and then walking another 400 meters to watch the spectacular sights of the waterfalls at the opening on the other side of the cave via the mid-day sun shining down the hole. Magical! The afternoon was spent doing water tubing along the river of Gao Pindul. It was indeed a very physical and eventful day.

We had to sleep early that night as we had to wake up at 3 am to watch the sunrise at Borobudur. The Hindu cultural influence started in the 8th century but by the 15th century, Islam had taken over. We reached Merapi mountain in the late morning to watch up close the still active volcano which was last in action in 2010 with 400+ casualties. Took a 4-wheeler on the bumpy road to get a first-hand account of the disaster. This was followed by a nice Ullen Sentalu museum visit to get to know more about the recent nobility history of Yogja to better understand the Javanese culture.

Wife had to go back the next day for work and we had a chill day with massages at the hotel. Son and I stayed for another 3 days for more father-son bonding sessions. We did a cycling tour of the Kota Gede village and visited the Parangtritis beach, saw a lot of shopping malls and ate a lot. It was good to have spent quality time with him.

This was an enriching trip to the old capital of Indonesia. I never knew that there was so much history (more than 1,300 years) of past civilizations and fantastic natural sights (caves and mountains). The place is like Singapore in the 1950s, very laid back and of a time long ago.