Full Circle

We're back in Jakarta after a fun couple of weeks on the road in Cambodia and Thailand with a friend from Jakarta. We flew into Bangkok and then made a big clockwise loop by land through Cambodia and back up to Bangkok.

Tourism in Cambodia has really taken off. It was quite a contrast to when I was there 10 years ago and had the place to myself. It was Chinese New Year, so it was even busier than usual, making hotel rooms hard to come by and tourist attracting overrun. We watched the sun set from one of the temples at Angkor with probably 1000 other tourists all clamoring for the best spot.

We spent a couple of days around Angkor seeing the temples and taking a full-day Khmer cooking class, which was great. Then we headed to Phnom Penh, where we wandered around the markets, rode bikes to the Killing Fields and visited the museum that is housed in a former Khmer Rouge prison.

From there we checked out the southern beaches of Sihanoukville, which were surprisingly nice. We spent a few mindless days on the beach and also took a day-trip to a nearby island. It was a nice relaxing few days before heading back to Bangkok for the big frisbee tournament that was the reason for the trip in the first place.

The tournament was a lot of fun. It was a 'hat' tournament, meaning teams were picked by pulling names from a hat (or a virtual hat, in this case). There were 250 players from all over Asia. My team was made up of Malaysian, Chinese and Singaporean nationals, plus expat Dutch, Brits, Canadians and Americans living all over the place. It was a great bunch and we had a lot of fun, going 4-2 and losing in the quarter-finals.

So.... you might be wondering what's next for us. Us too. We've got some job possibilities that we're looking into here in Jakarta and may well end up staying for another year. We're staying with friends for a week or two while we contemplate our future. Will keep you up to date...

Lots of photos on our photo page at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva/ThailandCambodia

Strange Returns

From Solo it was back to Jakarta via Puncak and a weekend with friends and an ease back to Expat life with clean bed, good cheese, wine and paragliding (for Haviva). it was a great weekend and a pretty insane week in Jakarta. There was lots of visiting friends, running errands and visiting old haunts.

We are now off to Cambodia and Thailand for what should be an eating and temple visiting extravaganza.

So that is how they make that!

Next stop heading west was Solo, a smaller version of Yogyakarta that for some reason Howie had in his head he had to make it to. It was a good thing too as it turned out to be a great "last stop" before heading back to Jakarta.

Our first day we decided to take a recommended bike tour of the city. Despite the really really really run down bikes (no brakes is part of the adventure, right?) and the blazing heat (thank goodness Solo is pretty flat) it turned out to be amazing. We stopped at several workshops, all looking like nothing more than a small house from the outside, but containing some pretty big business on the inside. Each village seemed to have a specialty. On the non-edible end we saw sarong weaving (not for the beach, but for prayer time) gong making, and a batik workshop and on the edible end we saw several kinds of crackers that are traditionally eaten with every meal here, tofu, tempe and arak (Indonesian moonshine). Almost all the businesses were family run and seemed to sustain the community with not only the workshops but also sellers and suppliers. Did we need to see the sweaty man kneading the cracker dough with his feet and sweating profusely? Most likely not, but it was pretty cool. (And if you were curious, that is me helping to make tofu. Don't worry this stuff only made it as far as our lunch, not all the way to your local Whole Foods.)

After a long day on the bike and a dunk in the pool, we headed to Warung 310, a seafood restaurant recommended by the othertwo guys on our bike tour. Turned out to be an incredible meal, impeccably cooked with the added bonus of a wonderful owner/chef who invited us to go with him to breakfast the next day. He said the best place was a kambing (goat) warung that was only open from 9-10 AM...not our typical morning start, but how could we really say no? He was not joking about it being a kambing place...we had all parts of the goat on the table from basic sate (meat chunks on a stick) to spinal cord and eyeball. I admit, not my thing, but you could tell this was the real deal. Howie, as honored guest, was graced with the eyeball. He then took us with him to the market so we could tag along while he paid for some prawns he was having shipped in. Like walking around with the governor, this guy was shaking hands, squeezing fruits and chatting it up with everyone. Right up our alley.

Apple picking Indonesia style

Our plan to check out an island off the coast of Java didn't work out today so instead we headed up to the hills surrounding Malang. We missed our annual autumn apple picking adventure with Michal and Chad back in Boston so we decided to take the "orchard tour" at the local Agrowisata (farm hotel). It wasn't quite as successful as our last farm tour, but it was good for a laugh.

We arrived to find we had a choice of 6 different package tours. We chose the 30,000 rupiah ($3 US) tour that included a welcome apple juice, the chance to pick two apples, a visit to the mini zoo (small zoo, not small animals as we were hoping) and a lunch of more apple juice and, the real attraction, nasi goreng apel (apple fried rice).

The only English speaking guide was "in meeting" so we did the tour mostly in Bahasa, not that there was much to tell. After telling us that there were four types of apples (two local varieties, one American and, strangely, an Israeli variety) he led us into the picking area and watched closely as we picked our two apples each. From there we toured the mini-zoo filled with some pretty standard creatures (Canadian chicken? Does that belong in the zoo?) and some bizarre animals (something that looked like a giant turkey-ostrich from Papua), all in depressingly small cages.


Next came the much anticipated nasi goreng apel, which wasn't bad. Not a ton of apel, but pretty tasty. I'm sorry to say we were too cheap to pay extra for the apple satay. That was about it for the tour, except for one last stop at the gift shop, where Haviva picked herself up a snazzy new t-shirt.



Off to Central Java tomorrow morning.

One small step...

We're just back from the moonscape that is the area around Gunung Bromo. Did another crack of dawn hike, this time with an Irish couple. Started hiking at just past 4 and got to an amazing lookout in time for sunrise. Went back to the hotel for breakfast and then hiked down into the crater and up Gunung Bromo, which is the short smoking one on the left.

Today we hopped a couple of busses and are staying in Malang, a nice little medium-sized city with lots of good food to be had. Then its off to to Central Java before heading back to Jakarta.

More photos from East Java at:
http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva/EastJava

Heading West

After leaving Shelley we made our way to Bali for a little beach time and a ferry to take us back to Java. East Java is the last stop on our "must see" list, the Ijen Plateau and Gunung Ijen being stop number one. It was a 3 hour ride to the ferry, a 20 min ferry ride and then a slightly complicated journey to the plateau so we decided to break the trip up and hop off the bus in Kalibaru at a coffee plantation. It turned out to be a great stop. There is not much in Kalibaru besides robusta coffee trees as far as the eye can see, but the plantation villa was really lovely and came with a free plantation tour in the morning. Turns out they do a lot more than coffee and we saw nutmeg trees (and we were served delish nutmeg jam with breakfast), vanilla, cocoa, peppercorn and watched men climb palm trees and tap the blosoms for what will eventually become palm sugar. Had I (Haviva) not gotten eaten alive by mosquitoes it would have been perfect.

From there we got the first of a few buses to Sempol, where we stayed on an arabica coffee plantation with a stunning view of Gunung Ijen, which we were to climb at sunrise. Even smaller than Kalibaru, there really is nothing here but arabica coffee. (They claim to also have macadamia nuts, but we only saw those in chocolate covered form.) At about 5 AM we got on ojeks (motorbike taxis) and rode thru the plateau to the base of Ijen. It was a stunning ride, albeit a little chilly. The hike up was about an hour and a half straight up, but at no point can you feel sorry for yourself since as you climb men carrying 85 kilos of sulfur in baskets slung over their shoulders are coming down past you. They go up and down two times a day all before 1 PM when the clouds set in, plus go into the crater and actually mine the sulfur. Budi, a very nice sulfur miner we met at the top showed us the welts and open wounds he has from carrying the baskets of sulfur, but I guess for 400 rupiah per kilo, it is a good paying job.

The crater rim is gorgeous with stunning views of the plateau, the crater lake and the sulfur vent. Because we figured we could not miss the opportunity, we decided to do the 20 min hike into the crater to the sulfer vent, even though the plumes of sulfur warned us otherwise. It was one of those horrible, totally amazing experiences that I am sure our bodies hate us for. The sulfur smoke as you get close to the vent is intense and there are moments where you absolutely cannot breathe. Even with our mouths and noses covered it was painful to inhale and ours eyes were burning. Of course we were hacking and coughing the whole day (and these guys mining were smoking cigarettes during their breaks) but it was an incredible experience.

Next stop Gunung Bromo - Indonesia's Natural Borabudor.

But how do they know?

Moving on

Sadly it is time for us to leave Dili and East Timor. We've had a great time exploring with Shelley but enough is enough. Wednesday morning we're taking a minibus all the way to Kupang, the capital of West Timor, the Indonesian half of the island of Timor. Should be a lovely 12 hour journey. From there we'll figure out exactly what our next move is, but we've mapped out a rough idea that would bring us back to Jakarta in about 10 days, after some time in Bali and East Java.

Here are some photos from our week in East Timor... http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva/TimorLeste

Dili Ain't Cheap

East Timor has one of the lowest per-capita GDP's around, so there's not much being produced here. That includes food. Unfortunately, the soil isn't very fertile and there aren't really any factories to speak of, so virtually everything short of coffee is imported (and most of the good coffee is exported). That, and the fact that there's an over-abundance of well-paid expats with nothing to spend their money on but food, means that grocery and restaurant prices are extortionate.

The US dollar is the official currency, which makes it feel that much worse for those of us who have been earning rupiah for the past year. In Jakarta we can justify spending 55,000 rupiah ($6 US) on a pint of Ben & Jerry's occasionally. I'm not sure how anyone can justify spending $16.15 US on one though, even if the UN is paying for it.

Animal Transport

You might think that we're riding the local buses with sheep, pigs and goats aboard, but you'd be wrong. Chickens are the only ones lucky enough to ride in the bus, but only when there's room to stuff them under a seat (the well kept fighting cocks might get a seat). The rest get strapped to the front or back or just thrown on top of the bus.

Timor Leste

New years day was a bit quiet, but we spent the day exploring the city. We headed to see Jesus, or at least the giant statue of him at the top of a peak at the end of a nice peninsula, only yo find that this is where all the people in Dili were. Typically an expat area and despite the rain, the beaches were filled with local playing volleyball and generally hanging out. Lots of naked kids running around on the beach. While it looked nice, there were no foreigners around and we decided the smartest thing to do was let the locals have their fun and head to see Jesus another day. Shelly has been there a bunch we headed out a couple days later without here to catch the nice view. A little windy, but you really can see for quite way and the beaches on the other side were gorgeous.

Since Shelly had off January 2nd as well, we headed into central Timor Leste to a "mountain town" that is known for some classic Portuguese architecture and the famed East Timor shade grown coffee. The drive was beautiful and although there is little left of the famed architecture and coffee season is in July, we had a nice day. The little villages are quaintly tucked in the hills and the people and there was no where with a bad view.

Mostly here we are doing a lot of scenic driving and cooking this week. There are great literally deserted white sand beaches to be explored, but the weather has not been cooperating so we seem to end up coming home with groceries and spending hours on dinner (which is fine with us since it has been some time since we have been not bee dependent on a menu.) We also have had lots of internet time so you can now enjoy some photos from Malaysia thru now.

http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva/PenangMalaysia
http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva/LombokFloresWestTimor

Starting the new year in a new country

We arrived in Dili, East Timor on New Year's Eve day after a great couple of weeks on Flores, the land of beautiful scenery, wonderful people, insanely windy roads, local buses filled with chickens, pigs, goats and vomiting locals and roosters that can't tell time and start crowing at 3AM. It was a crazy end to 2007 but we made it to Dili in time to celebrate with our friend Shelley, who is housing us for the time we are here.

Our last week in Flores was great. It started with some really interesting traditional villages around Bajawa. We expected Bajawa and the villages to be very touristy and not really authentic, but were very surprised by the reality. Although there were a few ikat (the traditional woven clothing of both men and women, sort of like a sarong but a bit thicker) hanging around and for sale, the people clearly really lived there, the ikat were obviously made there and the feel was quite genuine. Despite a little rain we had a good village experience and even got a nice hot "shower" in the hot springs about one hour outside of town. (Flores is known for not having any hot showers and hot springs or buckets of boiled water at your hotel are your best bet.)

From there we headed to Moni in an attempt to see the multicolored crater lakes of Kelimutu volcano. I say "attempted" because the rainy season is not the ideal time to be hanging out on the tops of Indonesian volcanoes. In the end we got lucky and were able to see them - onle a great turquise, one chocolate and one slightly rusty colored - only to have our motorbike break down on the way down the volcano, forcing us to hike a few km to the next village and hitch a ride to the bottom. Thank goodness there was a nice guy with a motorbike since we were about 15 K from Moni.

The next morning we woke up and look a local bus 4 hours to Maumere, where we had hoped to get a boat to West Timor. Unfortunately all boats were canceled for a few days because of high seas, so we headed to the airport to try to find a flight. We sat there on standby for 5 hours before they announced that the flight was being rerouted and skipping Maumere due to bad weather. Luckily the airline put on an extra flight the next morning, so we made it to Kupang, West Timor on the 30th, thinking we'd relax and take an 11-hour bus ride to Dili on the 31st.

When we got to our hotel they told us that there would be no such bus because New Year's Eve day is a holiday, so we quickly checked out and found a public bus headed 8 hours up the road on the way to East Timor. We woke up early on the 31st and finished the journey in plenty of time to scrub the filth off ourselves and spend New Year's Eve with Shelley and friends.

Happy New Year to all!!

Its been a long journey from there to here

Sorry sorry sorry...we know it has been a while since the last posting, but please know it is not for lack of effort. This side of the archipelago is a bit more "rustic"....

Anyway, a somewhat brief update: Toba despite the rain ended up being great. I sneezed three times in a row and according to our neighbors from Holland, that made for good weather the next day. We rented a motorbike and cruised around the island. Gorgeous scenery and we even took in a bit of culture. There were two things on the "tourist map", but sadly we could only find one - the stone chairs, which are exactly what they sound like and sadly not the most impressive things in the world. It was a nice ride though and we got back just in time to take a swim before it started to rain again.

From there we headed the next day to Lombok, a island east of Bali (they dub themselves "Bali's sister island" but we don't like that title....) It was a 4 hour car ride with 7 others (one vomiting most of the way) to Medan and then two planes to Lombok. We arrived late in the evening, but were very happy to wake up on the beach. We were in the main tourist center - Senggigi to do some basic planning since that is the last tourist hub we would see for a while. Senggigi is not much to speak of so we booked our boat to Flores (where we are now) and headed to Gili Air - a small small island off the coast of Lombok quite popular with backpackers. It was nice and relaxing. We had fresh fish for dinner brought in by the fisherman right to shore for us to pick out and we did some nice snorkeling as well.

After 2 days of Gili Air, we headed back to Senggigi and joined 12 others for a 4 day/3 night boat trip to Flores, stopping on the way for snorkeling and a trip to Komodo National Park to see the famous endangered Komodo Dragons. Before you get any glamorous ideas, this was not in any way shape or form a luxury cruise. The first reaction at the sight of the boat was "This is it??" We all slept on deck (10 on the upper upper, 4 on the upper) and the squat toilet was some porcelain around a hole to the ocean. The engine had some trouble and we missed much of one day and there is one day where you sail for 18 hours where we hit some slightly rough seas at 2:30 AM. Everything was slightly damp, if not wet, and the bag of ice that was chilling our 8 beers for the journey was melted by day 2. BUT, with all that said, it was a fine cheap way to get to Flores, we had some really good snorkeling that included a shark sighting, a couple eels and a lion fish. We also caught sight of some komodos, which was cool. We were a bit disappointed as none were chowing on buffalo or really doing much more than lazing in the sun, but they are enormous.

The scenery in this part of the archipelago was amazing as well. Like nothing else we have seen, Komodo and many of the surrounding islands are dry - like something out of a sci-fi movie there are great hills of nothing but scorched yellow grass with a couple random green trees poking out of the tops. Although a long journey, it was pretty.

We had big plans to get some things done upon arrival in Flores at Labuan Bajo, but sadly our efforts were a bit fruitless - the Internet was nonexistent, the boat office we needed was mysteriously closed and the post office as well shut down on Fridays at 11 AM. Oh well. We wandered all we could of Labuan Bajo and then headed to Seraya Island - a small almost completely deserted island about an hour from Labuan Bajo. There is only one little string of bungalows (very simple with electricity only on from 6 PM to 10:30 PM) a white sand beach and a really nice reef for snorkeling. A great hide away and by sheer luck some friends from Jakarta were staying there for Christmas. It was nice to see friendly faces. We had amazing snorkeling here - we followed a turtle for about 45 min (he even let Howie pet him a little on the back) saw a school of polka dotted sting rays, and a ton of beautiful fish and coral. It was a nice escape before what we think will be the real backpacking in Flores.

Flores is a lot less developed than most places we have been. Just to give you some idea, we are in Ruteng, the big city that has - gasp! - a grocery store. The road here was incredibly curvy, actually never straight for the full 3 hours, and we were up in the clouds for a long time. The views were amazing and we hear it only gets better from here. Hopefully so will the internet connections and picture will hopefully be soon to follow. From here we head across Flores to see some of the small villages and volcanos and then on to Dili (East Timor) for a visa run and visit to our friends John and Shelly who just moved there about a month ago.

Happy holidays to all. And Happy New Year (just in case we are not close to a computer then...) Pics to be posted as soon as we have the connection to do so...

Majestic (rainy) Lake Toba

Back in Indonesia after a 5 hour boat ride from Penang and then an almost 6 hour minibus ride to Lake Toba. It was a long day of traveling, but well worth it when we arrived in Tuk Tuk - both a fun place to say and a beautiful spot.

Tuk Tuk is on an "island" in Lake Toba about the size of Singapore. A real little backpacker haven, (well set up for backpackers but they seem to be few and far between) we are at a wonderful little hotel right on the lake. The water is clean and clear and when it was not raining we had a great swim and really enjoyed the spot. Sadly, it has been raining since about 5 PM yesterday, but we are still hoping for some noon clearing as seems to be typical this time of year.

Wednesday we head off across the archipelago to Lombok - an island east of Bali that is supposed to be what Bali was like before it became the tourist hotspot that it is. There are a couple even smaller islands that we plan to hit off of there as well, so I guess Toba is just the start of some good lazing in the sun for us.

Eating, Dining, Snacking and Grazing

We saw off my parents on Monday and then headed for Penang, Malysia on Tuesday because my visa was expiring. Wednesday we spent the day eating. No, really. Here's the damage so far (all at different stalls/restaurants) and we're planning on hitting the Chinese night market on the way home:

10:00 - Breakfast of toast and jam at the hotel.
12:00 - char kwao tiaw (Malay stirfried noodles)
12:30 - a fried red bean bun
1:00 - a veggie curry puff in Little India
2:00 - asam laksa - sour fish soup, a Panang specialty
2:30 - some crazy 'sherbert' drink that claims to be the most thirst quenching drink known to man - not bad
3:00-5:00 - nap/food coma
7:00 - back to Little India for oothaban, some kind of savory Indian pacake that is fun to say and to smother in sauces

Tomorrow it is off to a national park for a hike to a beach then it is back to Indonesia in a few days.

A villa, some Parnes, and a whole lot of orangutans

Although it has been our first couple weeks officially as nomads, they have been quite luxurious. It has been an easy entry into life in the road and living out of our packs. The Parnes arrived in Bali last week and we met them at Villa Padi – a stunning villa in the middle of a rice padi about a 500m walk to the beach. We had our own little private pool and a Balinese style living and dining room. The package included one free half hour massage for each of us (which the men forfeited over to the ladies so we could have an hour each), a free seafood bbq (nice red snapper that served as a Thanksgiving dinner), and a car and driver for 8 hours a day (who took up to Ubud one day for a little culture even though some had to be a bit dragged from the villa). Our chef cooked us breakfast in the morning and had the coffee waiting, we were the only people on the beach every time we were there…it was paradise.

From there we did a repeat of The Cohen Family trip to Indonesia and headed to Jogja. It was more of a repeat than we would have liked as Leslie was not feeling great that day, so much like Sharon, she spent one day curled up in the lovely Mercure hotel bed, while we wandered the bird market. We did make it to Borobudur the next day though and we had a great day weaving our way to Magelang, a mid stop on our way to Semarang where we had to catch our flight to Kalimantan to see the orangutans. There is not much between Jogja and Semarang so although the stop was a bit strange – a sort of circus like hotel in the middle of nowhere surrounded by volcanoes and a lovely rolling river – it served its purpose and had a pretty cool swimming pool with a water slide that the young Parnes quite enjoyed.

The flight to Kalimantan, Indonesia’s part Borneo (Malaysia and Bunei share Borneo with Indonesia) was very smooth despite the 10k weight limit on the bags and the small prop plane. A little re-arranging of the Parnes large bags they have been schlepping for 3 weeks since New Zealand, a bag left behind in the Semarang airport (which was there with all its contents when we returned) and some magic motion-sickness prevention wrist bracelets made it a breeze. Upon arrival in Pankalanbun (town of about 39,000 and the gateway to the national park) we were met by our guide where we took a car to a boat that took us to the Rimba Lodge. The lodge is in the middle of the national park and where we spent the night – when you do this trip your only choices for accommodation are sleeping on the boat or the lodge and while the boat is pretty cool, the lodge was a bit more “parent friendly”. The boat ride there was great and there was some amazing monkey and ape sighting on the way. It was a really good sign of things to come. We caught a tree full of proboscis monkeys with the coolest profiles and long hanging tails and we even saw a giant orangutan female in her nest settling in for the night. She was incredible – high in a tree but she stood out with her bright orange hair hanging on to one branch with a long arm and staring right back at us. We were definitely in the jungle.

The next day was all about orangutans. We started at one of the camps about an hour down the river and watched a feeding. The orangutans are released into the wild slowly and the feedings act to both supplement their diet and to help the researchers keep track of various orangutans. It is a simple platform in the middle of the jungle strewn with bananas and some buckets of sweetened milk. It took little patience but slowly you would start to hear trees rustle around you and suddenly they were coming in from all angles. Typically the dominant male comes in first (the males have these huge identifying cheek pads and are really large), although some of those young men did get a sneak in before he got there on this feeding. He has his share and then the mothers and babies generally get in on the action. It was totally incredible. We were so close to the platform and the orangutans were not fussed at all by our being there. They went about stuffing their faces with bananas, swinging on trees as if there was nothing strange at all going on.

From there we went on to Camp Leeky about another hour down the river for another feeding. There are more orangutans who just hang out at Camp Leeky so here more than the first place you are very up close and personal with the apes. Actually, we were so up close and personal that when we arrived there was an orangutan and her baby waiting for us when the boat pulled up. I could not help myself and I sat down pretty close to her on a step. She sauntered over, put her arm around me, clamped one of her feet around my ankle and that was it, we were friends. You are not supposed to touch the orangutans and even though I knew it was wrong I could not stop. Her name was Princess and she is a naughty orangutan who has grown up in Camp Leeky. She knows sign language, has about 5 children and 2 grandchildren, and she has been known to steal a canoe or two and paddle up river. She made me scratch her back – she actually lifted my hand and put it on her back – and we are buddies. AMAZING. Howie sat with her too, but that was not about friendship, she was looking to pick his pockets. The feeding that followed was similar to the morning feeding, except this one included a wild boar who ate the banana peels that fell to the ground and seemed to really freak out some of the orangutans. Again, it was an incredible sight and hard to explain in words.

Now we are back in Jakarta and the Parnes will head back to Arizona tomorrow. We have purchased cheap glasses, had a huge success at the outlet malls and eaten some very fine meals. Howie and I even made it to a nice goodbye party for a couple of our friends moving to East Timor last night. It is weird to be a nomad in a city we lived in and still feel like we do, but we are having fun. The real adventures start December 4^th when we head to Penang Malaysia for a visa run. From there we have no idea where we are going or what we are doing, but we will keep you posted.

For more pics: http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva/ParnesFamilyTrip

Please join me in congratulating Haviva on her last day of work...

That means we've been in Jakarta for exactly one year. It also means that, because of stoopid Indonesian visa rules, Haviva is off to Singapore for the day so she can come back on a tourist visa and officially begin her life of leisure. I've got 4 more days of work - done on Tuesday. Then it's off to Bali to meet my parents for some exploring.

Holy Krakatoa

Please forgive the occasional expletives in the above video, but I assure you there were appropriate at the time. For 6 months we've been talking about chartering the Cecelia Ann, a 60ft sailboat, and sailing to Anak Krakatoa, the "Child of Krakatoa". We finally went this past weekend with 8 friends and were lucky enough to see it erupt for the first time in years. And luck for us our captain was as excited to see it up close as we were, so we got to see quite a show.

The weekend started after work on Friday when we drove a couple of hours west and boarded the boat. We sailed all night and arrived at a great snorkeling spot, where we had breakfast and spent the morning checking out the reef. After lunch we sailed to Krakatoa. Because the government has constantly been changing the no-go zone we weren't sure just how close we'd be able to get. The original boundary was 3km but then it was changed to 10km when the eruptions increased.

Our captain had heard there weren't any patrol boats in the area so after lunch we sailed through the ash cloud to a point about 3km away with the volcano erupting every 15 to 20 minutes. Just before nightfall we sought shelter in a little bay that was (sadly) out of sight of the volcano. A few of us convinced the captain to take us out in the Zodiac to watch it erupt at night, but I won't talk about how cool that was because Haviva didn't get to go.

In the morning we woke up at 4:30 and sailed around the corner to see some nighttime eruptions. With no light in the sky you could see the lava bubbling in the crater as well as the glowing rocks being shot out. After sunrise the captain was feeling confident that A) it was safe and B) there were no patrol boats around so we sailed to about 1 km directly in front of the newly formed crater on the side of the volcano. That's where the best of our video was taken, and also where some Jakarta-based reporters boarded our boat to take some photos and ask some questions.

Sure enough, we woke up this morning in Jakarta to find a photo of three of our friends eating breakfast with Krakatoa erupting in the background on the cover of the Jakarta Post and a similar photo with Haviva and I in it on the cover of another local paper. Their photos and accompanying story turned up all over the web, too. The coolest photo is of our boat with the lava flowing in the background. Truly unforgettable weekend all around, and I didn't even get to the part where Haviva swam with her second turtle.

More photos at www.picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva/krakatoa

2 nights, 6 buses, 2 motocycle taxis, lots of amazing scenery

Haviva had a business trip to Padang at the end of last week so I flew out to meet her for a quick long weekend in the hills of Sumatra. We decided to be overly ambitious and see as much as we could in 2 1/2 days.

I arrived at 8AM on Saturday and we went straight to Bukitinggi, a small hilltop city. After a quick walk around and some lunch we hopped the local bus to Payakumbuh and then took motorcycle taxis to the Hurau Valley, which leaps to the top of the list of most beautiful places we've seen. Picture a steep-walled canyon filled with rice paddies. It was absolutely beautiful - one of those places you just wander around with a smile on your face.

After a night there we headed back to Payakumbuh by motorcycle, then by bus back to Bukitinggi, then another bus to Maninjau, home of a Lake Maninjau, a huge volcanic crater lake. The highlight of the ride into Maninjau is the stretch of road with 44 switchbacks leading down to the lake from the crater rim. When we got to that point I managed to trade my seat for the spot standing on the bottom step of the open door, where I could hang on for life with one hand and snap photos of the incredible view with the other. Good times.

After a night in a lakeside bungalow we retraced our steps by bus back to Bukitinggi and then on to the airport to fly home. It wasn't the most leisurely of weekends, but it certainly was beautiful.

More photos at http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva/Padang