Long journey from Banda Aceh to Meulaboh

In May 2017 I had a trip from Banda Aceh to Meulaboh, normally it would take around 4 hours. At around 09:30 a rental was ready to picked me up in the airport to go directly to Meulaboh, 245 km from Banda Aceh. Meulaboh is the capital city of West Aceh District which the most suffered during tsunami. As I don't like spicy food and the driver informed he's not sure whether there was any restaurant on the way to eat, I bought noodle with meat ball in the airport for my lunch on the way. We would pass 3 mountains and some beaches.

Most of the road was quite in good condition, it's built by foreign country as donation after tsunami in Aceh. I heard whenever the road is not perfect or a little bit broken, they would like to fix and make it perfect. For them safety is number one. In some areas, it's still being repaired because of some landslides broke the road. We had to be careful and sometimes we had to wait for our turn, as half of the road was fixed, only one way could be used. Lucky the traffic in Aceh was not as crowded as in Java. We passed by a beach, some huts were built at the edge of the beach, unfortunately it's empty, nobody there, maybe because of its workday.

On the way I still saw some construction activities, some new mosques were built too although Tsunami occurred in 13 years ago. In Aceh most of the buildings were brand new, as most of them had been demolished by the ferocity of tsunami disaster. We went through a winding road on the mountain, sometimes it's turned sharply almost 180 degrees. It's very scaring as the other side was steep cliff, the driver had to really concentrate and focus, unless we could plunge to the cliff. Going down from the mountain we found another beach. This time the wind blew so hard, the high wave hit heavily to the rock that created water splashed such as foggy. I asked the driver to stop for a while and let me take the picture. No parking area, he just stopped at the edge of the street while I stepped over the fence to get better picture. The driver helped to take my picture once, then he went back to the car. I took some more pictures, even taking selfie :-)

We had to go through another mountain, the driver said that this one had a beautiful scenery, we could see an island from the cliff. Some monkeys at the edge of the street or on the fence could be seen on the way there. After another 30 minutes we reached the place, so many huts there selling food and beverage, most of them sold instant noodles :-) anyway not all of them were open. We stopped at one of the hut, buying tea & cracker, then we ate our lunch there. The seller was kind enough, they allowed us to enjoy our lunch although we brought our own food.

It's called Geurette Peak, we could see the islands from the bench of the hut. Actually it would be good to see the sunset here. The weather was colder than Banda Aceh, the wind blew nicely. I took many pictures even panoramic one, but getting my picture with the islands as the background it's rather difficult as it's backlight. The background was much lighter than my seat. The driver said before tsunami both islands were connected, now it's not anymore. It belongs to a person, swallow nest was available there, it would produce more money to the owner as the nest is expensive.

After lunch when we'll continue our journey, I saw a very stunning scenery, the beach with its greenish land, so I asked the driver to stop. This time he didn't follow me, just staying in the car. I took the picture from behind a fence between huts. I'm still not satisfied, so I entered the empty hut, as I didn't see anyone there to take from different angle. Really it's very amazing scenery, I seldom saw a beach side by side with a very fertile land and you still could see the hill behind it. It's a perfect combination.

Continue the journey, we passed by some small village, sometimes on the road we met cows, even the driver honked the horn, the cow didn't step away, so we had to be patient and try to avoid them. There was a traffic signage displayed "Beware cows" :-) The unique tradition here, if a car accidentally hit the cows, the cows' owner must pay for the car damage, as he/she must be responsible to take care of the cows to avoid walking on the road.

Around 13:30 we reached the last bridge to Meulaboh, unfortunately we stucked on a long queue, they said that the bridge was repaired, it would be opened at 14:00. No other way to go to Meulaboh, so we surrendered to wait for the fixed bridge. Many trucks with heavy cargo, I saw a big truck loaded oil palm. Wait and wait and wait.. till 15:00 o'clock no indication of the bridge would be opened. I called my friend it seemed that I could reach Meulaboh on time, so I asked her to meet me at the mosque near to the bridge. It would take another 45 minutes after the bridge to reach Meulaboh. Finally around 16:00 the bridge was opened, the small car was prioritized, anyway it had to wait for the turn with another direction, as only one side of the bridge could be used. Then the big trucks and buses were allowed to go through. As we had waited almost 3 hours, my driver was not patient enough to wait for my friend to come. We decided to go passing the bridge to pick her up. After meeting her, we decided to go back to Banda Aceh directly.

Poor my friend, she could not see the beautiful beach, as it's getting dark when we passed by the beach. Anyway we still could stop by a beach to take her picture although there's noise on the photo as it's too dark. We stopped by a small hut to have dinner before continuing the trip. It's quite scary journey especially on the mountain with steep turned, it's dark, no light at all, only some sticker available at the edge of the road that could be illuminate when the car's light shines on it. It must be very tiring for the driver, lucky that he's very skilled driver, so we could reached the hotel in Banda Aceh around 23:00 o'clock. I was in the car from 09:30-23:00, what a long journey. It's been paid with the amazing scenery along the departure way to Meulaboh.

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Wonderful Granite Boulders Beach in Belitung

I took one day leave on the 7th Jun so I could spend a long weekend with my sisters and mother to Belitung that I've dreamt to visit. Frankly speaking it's because of "Laskar Pelangi" movie that I've seen which shows the beautiful beach in that island, on the East coast of Sumatra. I spent 4D3N in the island, I didn't join any tour, just rented a car from internet with the driver to bring us around the island

The car rental (Avanza) cost IDR 250.000,-/day while the driver cost IDR 100.000/day. It's a brand new car that picked us up at H. AS. Hanandjoeddin airport, Tanjung Pandan. We had to wait quite a long time for the baggage, the aiport was quite small and hot, only 2 baggage belt available. I decided to meet the driver outside the airport to arrange the trip while my sisters were waiting for the baggages. Lucky we had a kind, polite and smart driver, we had finished the plan when my sisters got the baggage.

On the 1st day we would visit the closest beach to our hotel which is the most popular beach for tourism and used in the movie. The second day would rent a boat to go for island hop at least to 4 islands depend on the weather. The last day would go to East Belitung which would take 1.5 - 2 hours drive from our hotel, where "Laskar Pelangi" school was, and the home of the current famous vice major of Jakarta, Ahok, came from.

I would share with you my second day trip story, it's very satisfying. Our driver wouldn't mind accompanying us. The boat cost IDR 400.000,-/day with 2 boatman. We could bring the food by ourselves, or ask them to provide for us. My driver had suggested us to order meal box before the day, and he had brought it when he picked us in the hotel at 07:30 in the morning. We also bought a cartoon of water in the bottle as it would be difficult or more expensive in those visited islands.

The sun shone very bright when we sailed from Tanjung Kelayang beach, we're glad it wasn't rained at all. The first island we visited called "Pulau Pasir" (Sand Island). No human/plant live there, just beautiful white sandy island with some big beautiful starfish. The island would be submerged after midday or during high tide, so you had to visit it in the morning. We're lucky two boats just left the island, so we could enjoy the island alone as if it's our own island. We took many pictures and enjoy the soft white sand. It's very hot though, you should wear hat or scarf to protect your skin. After enjoying the sand and beach, we decided to leave when another boats had arrived.

"Pulau Batu Berlayar" (Sailing Rock Island) was the second island we've visited, it's very amazing. So many beautiful granite stones formed beautifully, no people live here. Some shells were attached to the stone looked like flower at the bottom of the stone. Be careful to step on it as it's very sharp, it could hurt your skin. My sister found "sea urchin" at the other side of the island. There was quite a big population of the poisonous animal, although it looked cute. My youngest sister was dare enough to climb on the stone, while we prefered just to pose on the beach or among the stones. After walking around the small island, more and more people came, we continued our trip to another island.

We're headed to "Lengkuas" island where the 129-year-old lighthouse operated. The visitors always had a lunch here while enjoying the beach, some groups had team building activities. Before disembarked at the island, we stopped in the middle of the sea. It's the time for snorkling or feeding the fish from the boat. You could rent the snorkeling equipment. I was the only one who would go for snorkling, as my sisters and mom prefered to feed the fish from the boat. Try to wear the rental snorkeling mask I had difficulty to wear the pipe because the edge of the pipe to the mouth was designed vertically instead of horizontally, I didn't use to it. Lucky my sister brought her swimming google, so I could still enjoy the very beautiful underwater park. Our driver and one of the sailor were accompanying me. Many colorful fishes came because my sisters and mom kept feeding them, I could enjoy them eating around me.

The wave was quite high, after tired swimming around the boat, I boarded to the ship. With the wet swimsuit I put on my clothes. We went directly to the island where we could take a bath and visit the toilet, you had to pay IDR 2000/person for toilet while IDR 5000/person for bathing. We went to the beach with its big stones, taking some pictures with the lighthouse background. It's very hot, and we already felt hungry, so we decided to take lunch. If you ordered the food, they would grill the seafood in this island. The boat sailor would provide ground cloth to sit on the beach while having lunch. My sister was not feeling well, she got seasick when I was snorkling. If you're in the boat when the wave was high, you would get seasick easily. We ordered hot tea cost IDR 5000/glass, we had our lunch accompany with the popular fish cracker in the lighthouse's office building aisle. After having lunch and drinking the hot tea, my sister got better.

The next island was called "Pulau Burung" (Bird Island), as there was stone looked similar to the head of eagle. Our driver was kind enough to become our photographer, he took our pictures on the stone right in front of the bird stone. He brought us to the huts area where people could rent for staying overnight. Anyway it's very quite, I didn't see anyone stay there, it seemed abandon as it's rather smelly. He brought us to the wooden pier next to the biggest hut there, it's very beautiful, you could see the gradation color of the sea.

The last island was called "Pulau Babi / Kepayang" (Pig Island), formerly it's used by people to raise pig farm, not anymore now. To reach the other side of the beach we had to walk through small forest. It's quite far around half an hour walking. There was a small turtle conservation, which's trying to save turtle from extinction. We visited the conservation while we're waiting for our order at the small restaurant. It contains many babies turtle and some bigh turtles on the cement ponds. A small field was in the fence where the turtle eggs burried. Back to the restaurant we enjoyed our banana fried and fresh coconut, my sister was also ordered black coffee, they didn't have the milk for the coffee. In front of the restaurant was quite a beautiful beach where some boats disembarked there. The sand here was rather rough, it's not as soft as the other side where our boat's landed. The visitors could also stay in the island to enjoy the sunset or diving/snorkling. We're tired already, to go back to the boat we had to walk another half an hour to follow the same path in the forest. Walking back to the boat felt faster now, we still took some pictures on the beach.

Visit Belitung would be incomplete if you don't go by boat to reach the beautiful islands where the stones were amazing formed by God with its gradation color. If you would like more islands to visit, it's easy, just ask the boatman to stop by.

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Tasty Tender Deer Steak in Pakanbaru

Visit Pekanbaru as the capital city of Riau, in Sumatra last Oct 2010, we were welcome by the drizzle. The driver informed that in Riau the weather changed within hours, from very shiny day to heavily raining. The Sultan Syarif Kasim II international airport also serves flights to and from neighbouring countries such as Malaysia and Singapore. Maybe some of you has heard about Pekanbaru, because the city regular suffered from smoke due to forest fires during dry season that impacted to Malaysia and Singapore too. Some modern building were spread out in the city, such as library building built similar to an open book.



We stopped by for lunch in a restaurant called “Pondok Patin Haji Yunus”. They provided traditional Sumatra food from Pekanbaru such as Ikan Patin (catfish), the soft fish cooking with curry. The restaurant environment was nice, it’s a traditional house on the fish pond. A live music, simple band with a singer accompanied guests having lunch. Most of the food was spicy and hot, but they also provided fried chicken for anybody who didn’t like spicy food. The beverage name was very creative and funny, such as “es airmata pengantin” (bride’s tears ice), “es laksamana mengamuk” (admiral’s furious ice), etc. It’s raining hard when we were eating, but it’s only for a while.


The Great Mosque of An-Nur was one of places that we’d visited. It’s raining hard when we stopped at the front of the mosque, so we had to run to avoid getting wet. The Mosque was beautiful and big, we had to put off our shoes to enter the mosque hall on the second floor. A colorful Al Qur’an (the moslem bible) was provided for the guest. Arabic calligraph was carved with golden color on the pillar in the mosque. After satisfying enjoy the interior, we went down the stairs.


At the back of the mosque, there’s a traditional wedding party, it’s very colorful and cheerful. Lucky for our friend from Lausanne, because it’s a new thing for him to see the bride and bridegroom wearing the traditional Minangkabau wedding clothes. We peeped from the front door to see the party inside. Then we continue the journey to “Pasar Bawah”, a very crowded traditional market that you could find souvenirs, accessories, toys, snacks, etc. It’s very hot and stuffy, difficult to walk and shop, so we only stayed there less than an hour.


My friend and I stayed in the Labersa Grand Hotel and Convention, the garden was very beautiful with a group of elephants on the pool with fountain and small bridge. There was a restaurant with a huge aquarium up to the wall in the middle of the restaurant. The lobby was also nice at night with its lighting. On the top floor, there was a leisure place with coaches and also a bar with many gorgeous paintings on the wall. It’s a pity it’s so quiet, nobody visited or served the floor.


On the next day my friend from Pekanbaru offered us to taste deer meat, it’s quite far and going through some small roads, I don’t think I could find it by myself. Reaching the Kayu Manis Garden Resto and Gallery, we had to climb some stairs. We selected the place on the terrace, it’s bright and you could enjoy the scenery. For the menu he recommended to select deer steak served on the hot plate. It took quite a long time to cook it (around 30 minutes), so while waiting for it, I took some pictures to record the beautiful scenery. Some bungalows were provided with different name for guests who want privacy with their group. Different interior and design were applied for each room and bungalow. Indoor room was decorated with some paintings, ceramics, antiques, etc.


I ordered Martabe, traditional juice mixture of passion fruit and Dutch eggplant. When the meal was ready, it's looked very attempting and smelled good. My friend’s recommendation was 100% correct, the deer steak’s very delicious and tender, although it’s rather too spicy for me. It’s the first time for me to eat deer, definitely I want it again sometime. Don’t forget to visit this restaurant if you want to try the unique food.

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