East Kalimantan Beautiful Jewelry

It was the third time I visited Balikpapan on early June 2010. We had lunch at Kemala beach, the sand is light yellow and very soft. It’s located near the city area. The restaurant seemed similar to Jimbaran restaurants in Bali, you could see from the restaurant signage, also from the decoration with black and white square sarongs coverage the pillar and also at the ceiling. There were some stands providing different foods. You could eat inside under the roof or outdoor on the sea sand. We preferred eating indoor, as Indonesian people we don’t like sunbathing, our skin is already too dark :-)


While waiting the food, I went to the edge of the beach to take some pictures. I took off my shoes to feel the soft sand. Based on my colleague’s info, there are sport activities on the beach, such as banana boat, parasailing, etc. At weekend Balikpapan people like to have entertainment/leisure there while enjoying the beach and watching the plane flying on the upper of the beach. The plane seems very close because the airport is very near to the beach.

At night we went to the middle of the hill at Pertamina houses area to take pictures of the eternal flame from the oil drilling with its oil refinery site as a revitalized center of petroleum production. It’s very beautiful shining in the dark of the night. My friend, the professional photographer suggested the proper measurement for getting the good result. It’s very satisfying to see the wonderful picture, as if I’m professional already :-) I only used pocket camera, so the result was not as detail and excellent such as my colleague taking it with SLR camera.

On the next day after working, we got a chance to stop by half an hour in the popular market called Kebun Sayur. You could find beautiful accessories, gemstones, ethnic souvenirs, jewelry made of combination of gemstones and silver, crystal, handicraft, etc. You should good in bargaining so you could have a very competitive price, you have to pay cash, no credit card or debit card.

My friend bought Dayak (tribe in Kalimantan) souvenirs while I bought many colorful and beautiful bracelets made of silver and gemstones, some of them made of glisten crystal. Although it’s very short time, I was happy that I could add my accessories collection with beautiful ethnic ones.


We reached the airport an hour before the flight took off, there was a place that you could see the airport area in front of a restaurant. We should pay Rp. 3.000,- per person to go inside the place right on the top of Sepinggan airport. It’s very windy, it’s good to see the plane landed and flied. The airport is just next to the sea, you could see the sea as the background of the airport.

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