We arrived back into the heat of the low lying city and drive to our hotel. Best things about the hotel, we have a pool and there was a great restaurant opposite with amazing wood fired pizzas! We went for lunch there and then hit the pool. In the evening we went to an amazing vegetarian restaurant which was set outside with bamboo eating hut areas where you sit on the floor at low tables. The menu was huge and so hard to choose. I had great sweet potato wedges and a tofu curry.
Afterwards we got into rickshaws and cycled the crazy streets to the magic trees! This is in the palace and is basically a roundabout with two trees in the middle. You get blindfolded and you have to walk from 100ft through the trees. It sounds simple, but the number of us who went completely off course was crazy! But yay I did it! I was so hard to walk blindfolded and there were so many people around, but I just made it through! One other girl from our group made it though so it means we are very lucky and our wish will be granted. Good job please! Around the roundabout there were all these lit up pedal cars for hire! It was amazing!
We had three nights in Yogyakarta and day two was a tour to Borobodur temple. This was an old buddist temple just outside Yogyakarta. We arrive and went off to the foreigners entrance and got a sarong to put on over our clothes. We got outside and we were the only ones wearing it! All the locals didn't have to! We had a guide and he told us about the temple and how it was found by an Englishman and it was covered in ash and really falling apart. It has been extensively restored, and I would say it is too perfect. It looks much less sensitively restored than Ankor Wat. As we got to the temple we saw the locals getting their sarongs, so not just us looking like idiots anymore. We were guided round the temple and had our photographs taken so much. At the top layer of the temple you are supposed to walk around tree times clockwise and make you wish. It was so hard to finish the walk as everyone wanted our photo with them. It was funny, but also getting a but annoying! It was so hot that day and was really glad to get back on the bus!
We had the option of visiting a Hindu temple next, but I was so hot I couldn't face it and went home with the majority of the group. I spent the rest of the day in bed as was needing some time out. Too much group! I went out for dinner but can back without eating and went to bed. Nice bit of alone time!
On our final day we had a tour of some of the city. We started with a tour if a batik factory which was great for me of course! We saw the ladies using the hand batik method with such intricacy and detail it was amazing. The men used the block printing method as it required less detail. We also saw the dying process, which looked very unsafe compared to uk standards! It was amazing. We then went to the factory shop, but it was too overwhelming to find anything I wanted. Not sure I love the style either.
After the factory we went to a batik art gallery and I caved and bought a batik picture. I have no idea what I'm going to do with it but it's of a buddah and the stupas at Borobudur and it was 175000 rupiah (£9). I hope it's hand made and not a print!
We walked next to the place and had a really rather boring tour inside. There were so many old men working there as they get free accommodation in the palace grounds for as long as they work there. We watched a bit of a shadow puppet show too, but had no idea what was going on with that! The music was nice though.
After this went to a workshop that made shadow puppets. They are made from Vietnamese water buffalo leather, but it looked like skin and not leather so I'm not sure how they get that off the buffalo. Each puppet is hand made and a pattern is cut into each puppet representing loads of stuff like the elements and three layers of something. They were then painted, but for no apparent reason as you cannot see the colours when it's a shadow puppet!
We stopped for lunch and then went off my ourselves. I went with Tracy to find the markets. We ran into a nice man who helped is find the way who worked as a musician in the palace for the show we had just seen. He had been able to travel all over the world performing for Indonesian consulates in so many countries. He gave us some good advise and told us a better market to go to. We managed to find it and it was a very local market! It was all batik on the ground floor and the women were going crazy for it! Made me even more sure that I'm not a fan of it for clothing. It was huge and very overwhelming. We were definitely the only white people in there. There was no good clothing shopping to be had as everything was long sleeved and unstylish. We decided to leave and got a rickshaw home. Our driver was so old and I'm glad we had the good up as we could use it as blinkers for the scary driving!!
The evening was our last night and we were going to have a night out but it didn't really happen. Me and Tracy got some local moonshine from our local guide but it was so weak! The guide was so drunk but it barely touched the sides of us hardened ladies! He asked us if we had a handover the next day, but no we were fine!
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