Loving life in Yogyakarta with the locals.

We made contact with Anto, a warm showers host - this is an organization for cycle tourists - initially to meet up to chat and talk about cycling in the Yogyakarta area. We met up and he had Reon (Ryan) in tow, a 14 year old young lad who also loves cycling. He was proudly wearing a NZ bivouac cycle shirt sent to him by another NZ cyclist, Graham Frith from Hammer Springs who is cycling 43000 km from NZ through Asia and raising awareness of prostate cancer. His blog " grumgoesglobal.com" is worth checking out. They met him a couple of months ago. We had a nice afternoon and on Anto's encouragement cleaned our bikes... Another cycle tourist, Tim, from the Netherlands arrived that evening. Tim has been cycling for 2 and a half years, and his budget for Indonesia was only $3 per day which was for food. He camps or stays with people, has had an amazing trip finishing in Bali where his family are joining him. ( Photo of Tim, Trevor and Anto) Anto took the 3 of us for a 55 km cycle the next day to some smaller temples, local eating places and quieter roads, a really enjoyable day. Great chatting with other cyclists. 

The city roads are busy, I am quite amazed at how we are negotiating the streets, traffic, lights, it has been good following Anto and Reon around, they are both steady careful cyclists as you need to be! Anto helped us get some bike boxes as we have decided not to extend our  visa but to fly to KL instead. Trevor just tied the boxes on to the  back of his bike like the locals. After our trip out to Borabador we stayed with Anto which was great. The hotel was fine but it is easy to feel a bit of a spectator in the tourist areas instead of being a part of local life. The food in Yogyakarta was the best and amazingly cheap. There were food stalls on both sides of the rd from Anto's place. They changed about 2 pm with different people running them and different food. We could get 3 meals, nasi gorang or noodle soup and 3 ice teas for NZ $2.50!! We did quite a bit of sitting around outside eating and drinking tea. One day they made corn fritters, I think we had 20 between us for $1

We were going to go caving with Reon and his dad but it rained all night so had to change plans. Reon took us cycling for the day, first to a local eatery across the rd from his place for a traditional breakfast of rice porridge with vege, then out into the country side to a local park and to two waterfalls. We had a dip at the second one. He was a fantastic guide, sharing his local knowledge and we had a fun day cycling 55 km. He is also one of Indonesia's top age group climbers, amazing who you meet along the way.

Java is definitely more wealthy than the other islands we have been on. More infrastructure, more people, more fertile land. 

It has been an amazing 2 months in Indonesia, just over 2000km of cycling. Our most enduring memory will be the fantastic, friendly people and the endless " Hellooooooo Misterrrrr"  that resonated through the villages on the islands of Flores and Sumbawa. The excited school kids running down the roads after us as if we were celebrities and the many people who took the time to escort us or help out. 

Selamut Jalan Indonesia!!