Tour de Java - Pangandaran!

After a whirlwind of 2 weeks, traveling across Java and Bali, my first tour is done! It was an absolutely fantastic experience (especially for a solo traveler) the tour company Intrepid and our guide were great, and my travel companions felt like family almost right from the beginning. We had an eclectic mix of people, and everyone got along famously!

So this is the bit about the first place we were - as i write this, this tour has ended, but I'm a little behind! Stay tuned for more crazy pictures:)

We met in Jakarta, then headed to the south coast of Indonesia to a town called Pangandaran. This area is beautiful, it was nice to be by the ocean breeze after 2 months in Bekasi. Our hotel was right next to the water and beautiful, which was great, though a little unnerving as there was a very devastating tsunami in 2006 that destroyed a lot of the town and killed many people. Fortunately for us, we did not experience this during our stay!

While in Pangandaran we toured around the town on human bicycle carts, saw some local activities, like fishing and coconut processing and puppet handicraft. we also did a nature hike with the Indonesian version of Steve Irwin the crocodile hunter...Aip. He was a funny man and many times he nearly got the best of me with my trusting nature...oh Aip.

We did a tour of 'The Green Canyon' which was a river that formed a deep canyon...it was very beautiful. We were able to swim along and look up, it was quite a sight! and very green indeed, with virtually no garbage, which was very refreshing. I also got a chance to surf, which was so fun!! The current was incredibly strong, so that was a little unnerving (makes you appreciate the power of the ocean, and the unavoidable destruction of tsunami waves). It was quite different than when I did it in Tofino in BC, but the skills I learned there helped here. There was much less hand-holding, and more just give it a go, and sink or swim mentality! Even though it was not caught on film, i did quite well for my second go at it! I stood up almost every time and rode a few waves in the whole way to shore...such a fun sport! woweee...haha, I still have a long ways to go though;)

On our very long drive to Pangandaran - we stopped at a lovely restaurant!
On our first morning we got a tour around town...and it was very lovely! very rural, and inevitably some shocking garbage shots.

Some of the local fishermen (whole families really) working together. It was quite a feat of teamwork. They seemed to mostly be catching shrimp.

As a reminder of the dangers of this beautiful town...
And the signs were very confusing! I swear they were contradicting eachother in terms of their direction! I think in this area, you are just screwed no matter which way you run, so maybe its a moot point that they are contradictory!
Aip pulling his first trick, and me naively following along! There is a wild monkey on my back, im lucky to be alive!

Little did we know what Aip had in store for us...nothing short of a dragon hunt, and storming stupidly into a dragon nest!! This is simon protecting us with his dragon stick, as we stalked along the giant monitor lizard paths.
Here is one of the buggers....they were so big! I didnt realize there were other lizards comparable to komodos!
There was an old Japanese bunker from WW2, and stupidly we were lured in by Aip...myself leading the way - to stumble upon not one, not two, but three monsters in the deep!! It was so scary, they came scrambling out of there! I do think we scared them as much as they scared us though!
Some beautiful trees on our jungle walk.
In a cave there were these strange porcupines!! Aip nearly touching one! aiya! They were very cute and tame though.



Tree love

This rude little monkey came and grabbed a bottle right out of Betsy's hand, and opened the twist top, and sat and drank the whole thing!! It was so impressive and hilarious! and yes, it took a lot of balls to come and behave the way he did...no pun intended.

That night we enjoyed some local catch! Such wonderful seafood.


The next day we toured around a traditional market, that included a fish market. It was a little gross, but very interesting...such strange fish pulled out of the sea.

Around the market was also lots and lots of fruits and vegetables.

This is called Salak or snake fruit. It grows on an incredibly spiky giant fern like plant. Its a very strange fruit...it looks like garlic, but it tastes very perfumey and delicious.

The fruit in the foreground is called mangosteen, or manges locally. and the spikey one in the back is durian - both delicious and strange!The hanging fruit is called rambutan - which means hairy fruit. they are very similar to lychees.
And we can't forget about chilies, making everything super spicy! Similar to in Ghana, with almost every meal you have an accompanying 'sambal' which is tomato and chilies mixed together.

Below - at a 'coconut factory' we learned about all the different uses for coconut - the husk can be used for cooking fires, the hair can be used to stuff pillows and mattresses, and the milk for cooking and making oils. This also cleared up the mystery of why young coconuts look so different from the hairy small ones we see in the grocery store...they take the big outer husk off....oooooh



The tropical version of maple syrup involves boiling the nectar of the coconut tree flowers. Its delicious before and after boiling! They call it brown sugar.

Somewhere around that lovely house above, this horrific spider climbed on my back...and Aip, instead of helping get it off, cried, its a great photo! AHHHHH! as it climbed on my neck I wasnt about to wait for a picture, still not knowing if it was poisonous or not! (its not, apparently)
Up in the tree...

To give a sense of scale, these trees are tall!
This man will climb up 20-30 trees a day to collect the coconut tree nectar that are collected in these buckets at the top of the tree...its a risky line of work needless to say. I was impressed by the chicken climbing the tree. i had no idea what i was in for!


I've touched on the topic of puppetry in Indonesia before - wayang - they come in all shapes and sizes. these ones were carved from wood and painted and dressed. very beautiful! The puppeteer is also a very skilled actor and can do many voices...this man here had a deep and hilarious voice!

In this day we swam at the green canyon, then surfed! It was interesting contrasting the water sources...the river was fresh and green and relatively calm. The ocean was super salty and powerful as anything!

Well, that was the first two days...it might take me years to catch up on this blogging, but there is just so much to share! Thanks for reading and lots of love

kim