Dieng Plateau

With the combination of alcohol consumption, dehydration and sleep depravation I didn't wake up as refreshed as usual but I managed to catch up on some sleep in the car. We were heading east as is the theme with this trip towards Borobudur. 

Two hours east of Purwokerto was our first stop and a chance for mum to replenish road snacks. We stopped at a kiosk adjacent to the Kali Serayu river, which had some lovely gardens and also an excellent view of the valley and river, plus plantations on the other side of the river.

It was a veritable Salak bonanza. Salak, also known as crocodile balls was kind of our fruit of the trip. Easy to peel, eat and not very messy. Most importantly though for our sensitive western bellies, Salak acted as a bit of a constipant.

We pushed further east and then sharply north up the slow narrow windy mountain roads up towards the Dieng Plateau. The Dieng Plateau is popular with backpackers and hikers and is saturated with plantations and rice terraces. It also has 8 Hindu temples and being 2000m above sea level, has much lower temperatures than the rest of tropical Indonesia.

We visited one of the Hindu temple complexes, comprising of Arjuna Temple, Candi Srikandi, Candi Puntadewa and Candi Sembadra; all adjacent to each other, then the already grey skies, or is it clouds; opened up and drenched us in a downpour. Being new years day and a national holiday, we didn't stay long as all the attractions had ridiculously long car queues.

We had a short lunch at an empty hotel on the way back and continued on the road until we arrived at the ridiculously posh Plataran Borobudur Resort & Spa in Borobudur. We were lucky enough to score an upgrade on our hotel rooms.

I succumbed to an early night for a sunrise visit to Borobudur Temple in the morning, hopeful that our guide JP has organised something for the morning, because honestly, based on experience so far, expectations were low.