Tangkuban Parahu

Another quinessential Bandung trip is up the dormant volcano known as Tangkuban Parahu, the "Inverted Boat-shape" volcano, which is about 30km north of Bandung. It's a nice spot to spend a few hours, despite the hordes of tourists, and is certainly worth the long journey to get there (at least an hour to drive, more on angkot/colt/ojek).

Here's the legend behind the unusual shape of the volcano: There was once a god who, unbeknownst to himself, fell in love with his mother. He proposes to her and she, for some reason, accepts. I guess this was before the story of Oedipus got into wide circulation. Later she realises this is a terrible idea (as you would) and tries to dissuade him, though not, apparently, by telling him that she's his mother. Instead she opts to ask him to create an enormous lake and a canoe with which to cross it, all in one night. As he's a god this turns out to be difficult, but not impossible. So it's getting towards dawn and she realises, damn, he's going to make it, and so sneaky as you like, she starts making cockerel noises to suggest that dawn is sooner than he thinks. Luckily, this god turns out to be fairly slow-witted, and thinking his task is doomed to failure, he kicks the nearly completed canoe, which lands upside-down on a local mountain ridge (handy, that). Then he goes away and is never heard of again, apparently.

Two creation stories in one: The lake basin in which Bandung is held, and the weird boat-shaped volcano that overlooks it. But I digress.

The entrance fee is the good old-fashioned two-tier price: 50,000 rupiah for foreigners, and about 7,000 rupiah for locals. You have to pay to take a car in, too. The road winds up, past turnings for the "son" and "daughter" craters which are nearby. At one of these (I forget which), you can take an egg to boil in the hot springs, but eating it is not recommended unless you like the taste of sulphur. If you're in a coach you have to get off about halfway up and walk the rest of the way, or take either a minibus or ojek to the lip of the volcano.

At the top there's a fantastic view over the whole crater, at which you can park your car if you get there early enough. One lookout point gives you another great view of the volcano, whilst on the other side above the mosque there's an alright view over Lembang and Bandung in the distance (visible only on those rare clear days). There are also lots of facilities here should you need them: Tourist information, toilets, food stalls, people selling funny hats, angklungs...

The crater itself is quite impressive. There's a stupidly toxic-looking lake at one end and lots of steam at the other end, making a terrific noise as it jets out of the earth. Stumpy-looking trees and shrubs cling to life at the edge of the caldera, and there's a generally noxious, sulphurous smell in the air (probably sulphur). You're supposed to not stand in one place for more than 15 minutes, though how this ruling is applied to the vendors I've no idea.

Walk along around the lip of the volcano for more cool views of the place. There are, typically, a whole load of people selling all kinds of stuff, from angklung and gamelan, through rice bowls and spoons, to obligatory volcano ninjas (don't ask). There are also some more interesting local specialities: Bags of powdered sulphur and knobbly twigs which when brewed are reputedly good for rheumatism. Of course there's food, and fried corn is particularly prevalent. Not sure how I'd feeling about eating it though.

Apparently there are a few weeks of the year when you can actually go inside the crater itself, but this sounds kind of terrifying. Having said that, it's kind of comforting to think that if the volcano did again erupt, you'd be polished off quicker up at the volcano than down in Bandung. And, with all the traffic you'd have to battle with to get out of the way of the lava, you would be polished off.

On the way back down from the volcano, keep an eye out for the massive government tea plantations just off the main road. You can head into the rolling hills and, if you turn your back to the road, you can't see civilization anymore. There's still a little bit of untamed forest at the top of some of these hills, which makes for an amazing contrast with the regular patterns of the tea plantations.

Heading back towards Bandung,you can also see some of the traditional markets that Lembang and nearby towns are famous for. The area, with all its volcanic soil, is very fertile, and is famous for fruit, vegetables, milk and rabbits, all of which you can buy at the roadside.

Finally, if you're like me, you'll want to buy a hammock, which you can also find at the side of the road towards the volcano. The woods here are a well-established camping spot, and apparently "the hammock's the thing." I still have no idea how we shall fit it in our bags.

Dago Pakar

If you're in Bandung and missing green space, Dago Pakar (also known as Dago Park) is probably the place to go. Situated beyond the end of Jalan Dago, it's possibly the only place in all of Bandung where you can go for a walk. Apparently you can walk from here all the way to Lembang in the north-east, but I'm not sure how you go about this.

There are maybe three ways to get to Dago Pakar:

1. Get someone to drive you there. This is definitely the easiest option and is the one we opted for;
2. Take a taxi. Probably easy, but you might get ripped off or run the risk that your friendly neighbourhood taxi driver won't have a clue what you're on about;
3. Take an angkot to Terminal Dago, then look for an ojek (motorbike taxi) to take you to the top. I've never tried to negotiate this, but try to get a price first. Apparently 15,000 rupiah will do the trick.

Once there, it's 50,000 rupiah per foreigner to get in (substantial discounts are available for locals). The best thing about Dago Pakar is that there are trees, birds, plants and green space. It's pretty nice. There are lots of stalls selling food, drink and snacks too, so you could spend a whole day here in exploration. There aren't loads of paths to follow but check out the maps near the entrance anyway - follow the signs for the Japanese Cave (Jepang) and the Dutch Cave.

These two caves were constructed by the Dutch and Japanese during their occupations of Bandung. Why exactly escapes me (the explanatory signs are in Indonesian) but they are extensive bunker systems leading back into the rock from the main path.

The Japanese bunker is massive and very, very dark - if you go in, you can hire a torch for 5,000 rupiah from one of the many guides outside. We didn't hire a guide but if you're a foreigner you'll be accosted with offers of tours and torches. It's not terrifically exciting unless you go quite deep into the cave system where you can see absolutely loads of bats. Hold the torch near your eyes and you'll be able to see the reflections from their eyes. You can also watch their ears twitching as they echo-locate, and even hear their relatively low social calls. There are also some small lizards who live in the air vents of the cave, but beware because these tunnels are pretty small and don't lead to path-level exits in the rock face.

The Dutch bunker is a little further along the path. There is an entrance on either side of the rock face and some side tunnels, so you only need a torch if you're going to explore these (note that if you want a torch, you'll have to pay again for one here). There are some bricked up parts of this tunnel which have been broken into (or out of...), which is kind of creepy. Apparently some torture of revolutionaries took place here during Indonesia's struggle for independence against the Dutch and their allies.

The path continues through the park along the main river, which runs far below you between the trees. The path can sometimes be quite rough so it's worth wearing decent footwear if you're going to explore past the two bunker systems. Alternatively you can get a ojek (again, you'll be accosted by these) along the path - watch out for these as you're walking along, but they do make quite a racket. The cyclists, however, do not (and they don't equip themselves with bells, either).

There are quite a lot of macaques who live in the park, often fed by the stalls who use them to bring tourists in. Whilst they seem quite tame, they can be violent if they think you have food, so be careful, and try not to carry food in your hands or plastic bags. Feeding the monkeys isn't strictly discouraged by the park, but it's not advisable - macaques see the handing over of food as a sign of subservience, and they're eventually going to twig that humans are basically a subservient species who they can run all over; this is how they get so violent and aggressive.

Further down there is a beautiful waterfall that passes through a natural stone arch. Unfortunately the view of it is broken by trees, but you can still just about see it and get a classic Indonesian photo (Gents: Serious face on. Ladies: Point to your super-smile).

There's a fork in the path that leads to an interesting diversion: One of the hydroelectric dams/weirs which supply some of Bandung's electricity. If you're a geeky engineer like me, you can go and see this, look at all the valves, filters and sluice gates. Whilst it ain't exactly pretty, it's pretty interesting. There are also some very large piles of rubbish at either side which are screened out of the river. Sad to think of people chucking rubbish in upstream, but there you go.

The path continues through the park to more waterfalls, woods and ultimately Lembang, but we turned back before we had a chance to explore. But if you find yourself craving the natural world, it's a great place to spend any amount of time.

Pak Udjo's Workshop

To continue our super-Indonesian day, we were driven to Pak Udjo's Workshop, also known simply as Udjo. It's a workshop, shop-gallery and cultural centre in Bandung which focuses on angklung, traditional Indonesian bamboo chimes.

Once you arrive, and if you're lucky, you can catch a musical performance. I don't think there are lots of these per day - there's probably a schedule on their website. This is as strange as it is impressive - it probably makes more sense if you catch it from the start, though, which we failed to do. There are drums, gambang (gamelan) and of course the angklung themselves. Not to mention singing and dancing. I am told the music is to a pentatonic, i.e. five-note scale, similar to traditional Chinese music.

Once you're done with this, head down and through to the workshops. Here you can find the completed instruments. The base unit of an angklung is a small bamboo frame containing two or three pieces of bamboo tuned to the same tone, an octave apart. These are hung on hooks within much larger portable frames. The instrument is played by shaking the smaller frames to a tune. The performance is quite demanding as the instrument can be a couple of metres across, and it's not exactly slow music. I believe that there are regional variations between the chimes, but I'm not sure how this is applied.

Next you can see the angklung and gambang in various stages of construction. The chimes themselves are cut from bamboo to roughly the right length, then about half of the circumference of one half of the length is hacked away, using a machete. These rough bits will be passed to a (very skilled!) chap who shaves bits off until the correct note is achieved. Each chime takes perhaps 5 minutes to create; after 3 minutes I couldn't tell the difference between the note tapped on his xylophone and the note sounding when he struck the chime with his knife. Impressive stuff.

There's also a video about the construction of the chimes, but it was in Indonesian so I had no idea what was going on. Better just to watch the craftsmen producing them.

Lastly you can (and should) go and check out the shop, because it's full of bamboo instruments, puppets and some samples of the music. Because the whole complex is pretty forward-thinking and well set-up for local and foreign tourists, this is perhaps the best place in Bandung to buy handicraft souvenirs of traditional puppets and instruments. Certainly the best place I've seen, anyway, in my six weeks here. It is, of course, very busy - but it's worth the visit to watch the guy tuning bamboo, in the very least.

Pangandaran

Last Thursday was Islamic New Year so we had an extra-long weekend. Originally Friday had been billed as a working day but there's a rapidly growing middle class in Indonesia, so whenever this "sandwich day" happens, the government usually concede and declare it a national holiday. Then more money gets spent in tourist spots and it's reputedly better for the economy. So after work on Wednesday we were driven to the coast, a town called Pangandaran. It took 6 and a half hours to get there, through crazy Bandung traffic, winding mountain roads and eventually rough roads down to the coast. We eventually arrived at about 1am. Fortunately we had pre-booked a hotel and it was quite easy to find, so pretty soon we were in bed, listening to the intense storm outside. At least it meant it was cooler!

The next day we slept in a bit and then had breakfast at the hotel. This was exciting as they had proper coffee, wholemeal bread and even butter! After this we went to explore the town a little as we hadn't seen much the night before. It is a nice, if slightly scruffy, seaside resort town which sits on a peninsula, with a tourist beach on the east side and a business beach on the west side. The end of the peninsula is covered in jungle - this is a protected conservation area, which is why it's still this way.

The east beach is very long and quite busy, but not many people lie on the beach sunbathing because it's stupidly hot and sunny. Much like Malaysia, the sun is strong even when it's behind a cloud, so you have to be careful. There are lots of little cafes, shops and vendors on the beach selling all kinds of food - probably more than there are tourists, in fact. After we'd walked up and down we decided that it would be most fun to go body-boarding because the waves on the beach looked awesome. Of course we got soaking wet and covered in sand, but it was totally worth it for 10k rupiah for an hour's body-board hire (about 65p) - it was fantastically good fun.

After this we were totally exhausted so we retreated to a beach cafe for a fresh coconut, which tasted delicious and is probably pretty good at rehydrating you, all ions and sugars and water. We headed back to the hotel for a quick change then headed out to the business side of the isthmus to find the fish market for dinner. Of course we were the only westerners there but it was fun - you choose your fish/seafood and style of cooking, get some rice and kancung (water spinach). It's all really fresh and delicious and since it's what all the Indonesian families go out to eat, very cheap. Well worth the trek!

After our long day we were totally shattered so went back to the hotel and played cards. We had arranged to meet a tour guide at 12:30pm so in the morning we lazed about a bit, read books by the pool etc. Once our guide arrived we caught a rickshaw to the national park. This was a fun way to see some of the town that we hadn't seen before. I felt sorry for the rickshaw driver though, having to push two people around!

Once there we had an amazing tour around the jungle, which is tiny but compared to the rest of Java absolutely teeming with life. We started in a tiny seaside cove where our guide told us about the tsunami that had hit Pangandaran in 2006. It sounded terrifying. Pangandaran is very low lying and most of the buildings are single-storey, so the 3m wave was devastating. They have recovered very well and there's little trace of the wave in the town. But in the national park, which is less managed, the damage is still visible - massive collections of coral churned up by the wave, salt damage to the trees, washed up boats in odd places.

After this we had an explore in the caves of the national park. There were some very large colonies of bats and two porcupines. Then a walk around the jungle, where we saw barking deer, macaques, black monkeys, monitor lizards, a flying dragon lizard, a snake, some cool millipedes, flying foxes and some hornbills. At last we came to a waterfall over the cliffs into the sea below where we sat and took pictures next to a deep natural pool. Sadly I fell off climbing round and went in, shoulder-deep! It was a bit of a shock but quite funny in the end. We walked back through the jungle to the beach for another coconut, then back to the hotel. Our dinner was a bit disappointing because we chose the only touristy restaurant in all of Pangandaran, which was full of tourists and run by a very stern German woman. A bit odd. The fish market was much better!

The next morning we got up early and went down to our favourite, Bamboo Cafe, for banana pancakes for breakfast. We had another hour's body-boarding but the waves were not quite so good the second time, which was a shame. Or perhaps we were just too tired! The day before had been very long and tiring.

At 1pm it was sadly time to leave so a collective taxi arrived to pick us up. We hadn't anticipated that it would take 8 hours, which was a very long time to be cooped up in a car. Eventually we made it back to the hotel in Bandung, very tired but pleased we'd had such a fantastic and worthwhile trip away.