Jakarta November 8-13, 2025

After a long flight with a stopover in Doha, Qatar, I landed in Jakarta at 10:00 PM. Then I took a taxi, negotiating the fare to 320,000 Indonesian Rupiah, to a hotel in the city center.

An hour later, I was completely exhausted in bed, in a windowless room, but with a freezing cold air conditioning unit that I had to turn off first. Then I quickly made some tea; fortunately, there was a selection in the room.

To my horror, I realized the next morning that it was already 11:00 AM. Since Andreas is arriving today, I also booked another accommodation. Check-out is at 12:00 PM, so I have an hour to pack my bag. Just before 12:00, I return my key and look for something to have for breakfast. I try Starbucks, as I am familiar with it. Unfortunately, it was a bad choice; the cheese quiche tastes terrible.

Then I walk through the tropical, humid, warm climate to our accommodation for the next 4 days. It's a great apartment on the 29th floor with a beautiful view over Jakarta. Here, too, I first have to stop the air conditioning. The apartment has 2 bedrooms, a large living room with a kitchen, and a bathroom. Everywhere there are floor-to-ceiling windows.

Andreas has announced that his flight from Hong Kong is delayed and he will arrive around 0:30 AM.

This gives me plenty of time to explore Old Town Jakarta. Indonesia was under Dutch colonial rule, which is evident in the architecture and building names. There is a governor's office, which is the former city hall, and a post office. In a lovely historic café, I drink a non-alcoholic cocktail and continue strolling through the old town, which is not very large. I plan to come back here the next day with Andreas. By the way, you can rent very colorful bicycles here and ride around on a designated route; you often see a couple riding together on one bike.

For transportation in Jakarta, I use Grab taxis, which work similarly to Uber.

Since Andreas is likely to be hungry, I grab him something to drink from a small minimarket directly next to our accommodation and some food from a Dutch bakery. However, the offerings are not very healthy; everything tastes very artificial.

I arrive at the airport on time and have to wait another hour until Andreas finally arrives.

The next day, we wake up late and go to eat at Café Postkantor. It is already noon, so we cannot choose anything from the breakfast menu. We try a bit of everything and luckily make a good choice - Nasi Goreng.

Then we head back to the former old town, but thanks to the completely overfilled streets with scooters weaving between the cars and ignored traffic lights, it takes forever to get there. We first stop at Café Batavia, which seems to be primarily frequented by Western tourists. It looks like it is decorated straight from the colonial era. We do not make a good choice this time; there were a lot of fried desserts, which were not very tasty.

At 6:00 PM, it is already dark. We take a Grab taxi back and go out to eat a bit more. While doing so, we take a look at the cathedral and the mosque from the outside; we are not allowed inside either building because a VIP has announced their arrival. I personally cannot eat too much as the tropical temperatures and jet lag are still bothering me.

The next day (Monday, November 10), we wake up a bit earlier and look for a place to have breakfast. Then we take a taxi for about 2.5 hours near the town of Sentul, where we want to hike to a series of waterfalls in the jungle. The last few kilometers are through typical Indonesian villages; life happens mainly in front of the houses, and there are stalls everywhere selling things. Upon arriving at the parking lot, I ask the driver to wait; fortunately, he agrees; otherwise, we would have had a problem later.

We set off on a hike of about 2.5 hours, primarily uphill along a river. We pass wooden huts, but we are almost alone. Only at the last waterfall, Cugur Love, do we encounter a small group of Indonesians. We chat briefly. Once we are alone again, we put on our swimsuits and go for a swim in the waterfall. That was a fantastic experience to bathe in the jungle.

We are caught in the rain but manage to return on time, so our driver does not have to wait long.

The next day, we only have time until early afternoon since Andreas still wants to go to his Hatsune Miku concert.

This time, we manage to visit the cathedral and the mosque. It is the largest mosque in Southeast Asia and the third largest in the world. We are guided around by a guide, and we must cover our legs with a cloth. A class of students in front of the mosque wants to take photos with us.

By the way, the religions in Indonesia live peacefully alongside each other. There is even a connection corridor between the cathedral and the mosque, but it is not open to the public.

This time we go to bed not so late since our flight the next day is around 12:30 PM to Labuan Bajo on Flores Island. We do not want to start late as the streets in Jakarta are completely congested.