Wednesday 15 September 2010

Road Trip Between Two Volcanos

Four places in six days. We rode a car from Jakarta to Garut for ten hours on that special day. Normally, the trip would take only about four hours driving, but it seems like all Jakarta's citizens are transmigrating to their hometowns in Eid Mubarak (Idul Fitri, Islamic holiday). Traffic jams were unavoidable. However, it was paid off after bathing in sulfur water pool from the volcano while enjoying exotic mountain view of Garut.

Guntur Mountain View from Sumber Alam Hotel

Cool Garut's air can be balanced with Sundanese food and Garut's traditional tea. The best parts of the food are the local tasty liwet rice together with the hot spicy sambal (chili sauce). My empty stomach after bathing in the natural jacuzzi was then completed with vetiver tea; it tastes like ginger and herbs tea with floating strawberries.

Vetiver Tea of Garut
A Crater in Kamojang Craters area

On the next day, we visited beautiful yet mystical Kamojang Craters in Guntur Mountain. Garut is gifted with two volcanos, Guntur and Papandayan, and a green Putri Mountain.

The road trip continued as we were heading south and downhill to Pangandaran. It is very popular for its beach tourism, though I didn't enjoy the beach in Pangandaran. 30 kilometers west from Pangandaran there is Batu Karas Cove where people surf like crazy. Fifteen minutes from the beach, there is another extraordinary beauty called Green Canyon. Using a small boat of five persons, we cruised down the green river until we reached an open cave with stalactite-stalagmite. Fascinating! The journey should be continued by swimming to find a place called Pemandian Putri (bathing pool for the princess). I couldn't go on as I had my period, thus I'm keeping my huge curiosity until the next visit. Between the Green Canyon and Pangandaran, another eye charmer jazz up the trip. Big waves and offshore scenery are the special features of Batu Hiu (shark stone) beach. Cliffs stand firmly on the beach and a garden with gazebos and various trees on top reminds me of a Balinese beach view. 
The View from Batu Hiu's Garden
Batu Hiu
The Green Canyon
 The third and fourth day are spent in Purwokerto, a small city in the south of Slamet Mountain. It is a hometown of my mom, so we came to visit some relatives. Nothing special to be told about the city other than the food. A collection of Central Javanese cuisines, like lamb satay, soto, tahu kupat (tofu and rice), bakso jawa (Javanese meatballs) are available there, thus I called the trip as 'culinary tour' in my facebook account. 

Finally, we were back to the mountain again as we climbed the northern side of Slamet Mountain to a place called Guci. There were lots of cars heading up and down the volcano, while there is only a narrow lane available. Once again the traffic was horrible! According to the hotel owner, it has always been very bad every Eid, so better not to visit Guci at that moment. Just like Garut, Guci which is located south from a city of Tegal, is a nice place to indulge yourself with hot spring. My family and I were lucky to stay not in a five stars but nice hotel there. Yep! There were many people going up without a place to have them after a long tiring journey.
The view from Guci Indah Hotel
Once again I thank God for giving Indonesia such lovely natural beauties, mountains and beaches. It is our job now to preserve, not only treating it for commercial purpose only.