An early birds special today. The planning was to leave Semarang at 7 a.m., using our trusty bus. However, things didn`t go quite as planned. Some of us arrived more than 30 minutes late at the meeting point just in front of the hotel. Be that as it may, we departed at 7.30 a.m.. After a quick slash `n dash we and the bus were ready to go and winded our way through the streets of Semarang towards the hills surrounding this amazing city. The journey to Yogyakarta was the only thing planned for this day. The bus trip gave us the opportunity to either take pictures of the beautiful landscape with mountains, the Merapi volcano, forest scenery, the little shops at the side of the road, or to get a few extra minutes of sleep. However, the bumpiness of the road and the occasional ‘ooh’s and ‘aah’s coming from the mouths of people amazed by the scenery or one of the many threatening accidents made it pretty much impossible to truly catch up the sleep.
After a few hours and a short rest stop later, we drove through the gate which told us that we had reached Yogyakarta. We pulled over at a cute little fruit store next to a local restaurant, specialized in mushroom dishes. We had a nice lunch and continued our way towards the hotel, where we arrived 1.30 p.m.. We divided the rooms amongst ourselves at the reception and were wondering what we could do with our free afternoon. This is when Rick announced that we could have a tour by bus through the city of Yogyakarta. We would visit the old town center, the palace of the King and a traditional silverware production place, where we could buy a few souvenirs.
This was a nice plan and filled up our afternoon. A guide joined us in the bus and told us all about Yogyakarta on our way to the places to be. It was an informative day on which we travelled a lot, seen beautiful things and, maybe most importantly on a field trip, learned some things as well.
Now, it`s time for some well deserved local dinner.
(Bas Rademacher)
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