Getting WILD in Penanggungan!

Kids following Rosie and Wez
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The journey to the Seloliman Nature Reserve is a long one -- and definitely not a pretty one--, but, as we discovered, well worth the investment.   The first and longest leg of the adventure was via train, something I am really beginning to dread in Indonesia.  This train trip was made even more exciting because we didn't have train tickets!  You see, Yude had only managed to convince Intrepid to let him take us to Jodja a few days before we arrived and after we had left Jakarta, so our train tickets were waiting for us in the city we were supposed to have gone to instead, Solo.  This isn't necessarily a problem, it seemed anyway, because Yude knows the whole country, or at least people on the Intrepid route... so he was able to schmooze the conductor and we got on.  The problem now was that we didn't have seats.  No seats on the 45-degree train... right.  Yude taught us how to say, "Is this seat taken?" in Indonesian, and we walked up and down the train -- the entire train -- to no avail.  So Wez, Rosie, Sara and I ended up sitting on counter-tops in this abandoned kitchen car!  It wasn't all that bad, except that every time the train stopped, we had to run back to where our bags were being stowed, to make sure that no one walked off with them.  That was a bit of a drag.

Village kids -- so cute!
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Yude soon became our saviour and said that there were seats in the VIP car -- A/C included!  For a mere $2 USD, I was happily taken back to the VIP car, where I was promptly given a towelette for my face and a reclining, padded seat.  What joy!!!  Liz soon joined me and we swiftly passed out, drugged up on too many gravol.  I think I have finally made my peace with the Indonesian train system...  :)

I was extremely freaked out when I went to close the door and a gigantic frog was just hanging out on the other side. I screamed and Liz had to come save me.

GROSS! Kid proudly showing off his catch of huge spider
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When we arrived, we were shuffled into a mini-bus, which drove us the rest of the way to the Nature Reserve.  We arrived pretty late and had just enough time to settle into our rooms before dinner.  Our rooms... okay, well, where should I start?  First, our room was called "Frog Room", and we soon learned why!  The bathroom of every room was open to the outside, but had a concrete wall, so it wasn't open to every peeping tom.  Pretty unique, that's for sure.  But since it was open to the elements, we had FROGS... in the bathroom!  Several frogs, in fact.  I was extremely freaked out when I went to close the door and a gigantic frog was just hanging out on the other side.  I screamed and Liz had to come save me.  :)  But giant frogs aside, the rooms were pretty cool and we were interested as to what sort of jungle we would see in the morning when the light revealed our surroundings to us!

Beautiful tiered rice paddy fields
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Dinner consisted of a buffet of yummy Indonesian classics.  We devoured the food very happily and then had a quiet evening.  Liz and some others watched a video on the orangutans in Sumatra, while I read my book in peace.  The common area of the hotel was extremely relaxing, and I enjoyed the solitude.  We fell asleep listening to the sounds of the wild.  Love the jungle!

Waking up was exciting, especially when we opened our door and saw the enormous mountain staring back at us through the jungle.  We almost couldn't believe that we had fallen asleep in the shadow of a mountain -- none the wiser!   It was quite the surprise.  Breakfast was another buffet, including delicious banana pancakes and super pineapple jam.  Who knew: pineapple jam?  But SO good!

Weird donkey-thing at Nature Park
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Since we didn't have much time, we were quickly organized for our tour of the nature park.  Basically, this jungle-park is all about conservation.  It is run by an Indonesian NGO that is worried about the continued health of the Indonesian jungles.  The nature park was thus set up to educate Indonesian children -- and a few tourists too! -- about the jungle and how we can protect it.  Our guide took us through the facilities of the nature park, including huge cabins designed for schoolchildren campers.  One cabin was immense and was designed to house 60 students.  What a cool field trip that would be for a kid, eh?  A night in the jungle!  We were shown the library, which contains information about the flora and fauna of the jungle and we even encountered a group of school kids, visiting the park on a day-trip.

Sara finally caught a dragonfly! -- on nature walk
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Our tour then continued through the jungle, into the neighbouring village, where we absolutely fell in love with some village children -- and they with us!  I have way too many photos of these adorable children, who were just mesmerized with my camera.  I would take their photo and then they insisted on seeing it right away and when I showed them, they ran away, almost afraid of the image!  With the children following our every move, we walked through the village and down into the rice paddy fields.  The kids were jumping in and out of the stream, skipping and running along with us as we walked through the fields.  It was quite a good walk!

Peanuts drying in the sun
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On the way back, we got a real taste of village life, seeing the cows and chickens just wandering about (we stayed well clear of the chickens tho!!).  We saw peanuts being dried in the sun, which would be eventually sold, maybe exported to Canada!  The most interesting part of the tour was when we encountered a large group of village people, apparently getting ready for a party.  In fact they were, preparing a huge feast for the upcoming circumcision of a ten year-old village boy!  We met the boy -- soon to be a man, we were told -- and he was quite embarrassed.  It was interesting to see the entire town getting ready to celebrate him.  We also had the change to mingle with some older people and we learned a lot about village life, including how young the women are when they get married and start having children.  Indonesian families are extremely large, even though most people are poor... they just like to have large families.  So women start the process early, it seems!

My protege!
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After the tour, we had just enough time to shower and pack before a quick lunch and then back on the road, this time journeying to Mount Bromo, where we would be up at 3AM to see the sun rise!