Yogyakarta - Solo - Dieng trip Feb 2011

This is the trip that I have been waiting for all awhile, the first backpacking trip with budget with friends (well eventually the budget is bit over), but I learned lessons from it :D

So first day, I flew from Changi airport to Adisucito airport in Yogyakarta. I reached there about lunch time and I been there before when I was in junior high school with the school so I didn’t have much time to explore and I had no idea about the place at all. I took the bus to met my friend at town, the journey took about 40 minutes in public transport which annoyed and pissed me off. There were a lot of inconsiderate and rude passengers on the bus (it’s worst than in MRT here). So in the end I reached Malioboro and heading for our lunch at Milas. It was a nice place and environment where the food all vegetarian food. From there we heading to Solo by train. I like the train journey because I really felt like the real backpackers, especially knowing the train fares is about 1.20 SGD.

When we reached Solo, we straight to the accommodation, Cakra Homestay. This place is awesome, it is inherit from generation to generation and now is the 5th generation. I like the room and the environment too, traditional and cozy. The price is cheap IDR 175.000 A/C room. After rest awhile we walked around the town to Gladek where all the street food sold, we ate the tempe bacem (the best I ever tasted), sosis solo and garang asem. We walked around the Town Carnival for abit which is interesting. After a bit of exploring we took traditional trishaw back to the accommodation.

In the morning, we woke up bit late so we decided to walk to Keraton Solo (the Palace) while waiting for the next train back to Yogyakarta. The Keraton is devided to two main area, the museum where they keep all the old vintage stuff and the Palace where people can’t go in as the place is very mystical, only people with the right costume can go in as the sign of respect to the ancestor. The people there is very strong in their traditional belief.

Back to Yogyakarta, we had lunch and head to Dieng. Reached Dieng at night, rest and then climb up to the peak to see the sunrise but too bad the fog was so thick so we can’t really see anything up there. When I climbed up to the peak, the wind was strong, its so dark and foggy, all I could see only few step ahead and it’s damn cold. When I walked down from the peak, I saw all the small stiff path and It scared me, I saw all the tea plantation, vegetable fields and a very nice view of mountains, hills, lake. It’s just beautiful.

We went to Telaga Warna and temples after that on the way back to Yogyakarta. We reached Yogya in the afternoon and then shopping time! After that we had rest and in the morning we headed to Prambanan which is a Hindu temple that built in 8th century. It was wonderful and amazing, I was bit tired tho and bit moody at that time. After Prambanan, we picked up Edith and had lunch at Mbo Berek, then off for karaoke. At night I walked around Malioboro with Sasa, which is again I really feel the backpacking feeling, walking around, exploring and eat on the street side on the last day, because on the day 2 on wards, I felt the trip is being scheduled by my friend’s sister and we were in the car all along and didn’t have much time for adventurous and exploring.

I will be back to Yogya! definitely!