Malela Trip - April 21 2013

20 April 2013 20:00 hrs

Gather in my office before leaving. This is the meeting point.
Lihat Peta Lebih Besar Leaving at around 8.30 pm.

This is orange inn, nice place to stay. We arrived past midnight and plan to leave at 5.00 am. This is located in Bandung and not quite easy to find, so you may want to use GPS. Staying here costs us Rp 850 grand. We reserved 2 rooms, one for the men, and one for the women. Women has 4 beds and 1 shared bathroom. This is how the room looks like. The black thing hanging on the wall behind is an LCD TV, got an aircon, and the bathroom is at the door to the right.

This is the alley

And from outside, you can see the bed, these are for 2.

And this one is for dining room or breakfast. Dont get trick by the lights. It is very early, 6 am in the morning, so there werent much light.


After a while, we try to find breakfast and this is what we got. Nikmat Rasa 3 Kupat Tahu, wasnt very delicious, but I swiped them all anyway. This food only costs us 35,000 for 7 people.


Along the way, there are quite many markets which causes bad traffic.
We left Bandung at 6 and arrive at 11/12.


And given that it took us quite long to get there, you may want to know the scenery you will see along the way.


At about 11.45, we arrive at check point 1, which is the last recommended place for you to park the car and ride ojek to the waterfall. It took us about 30 mts to get to the waterfall. Just to note, the ojek around here will ask you for like 100k per person, but somehow we manage to just pay 50k per person. This 50K is for you to go there and back. Basically, this ojek will wait for you at the nearest diner just before the waterfall.
This is one of my friend and his ojek driver in the diner.

And these are the surrounding of the diner:

The road is actually very steep, but not shown here because I didnt bring the right lens. The driver who rides with Taufiq (one with red tshirt) is an employee of a boutique in Jakarta. He was there to visit his grandma and meanwhile also get some extra money by taking some visitors to the waterfall.

Right after everyone gather, we left for the waterfall.
This is Yuni, one of the youngest member in our team.


This is how it looks like on the side.

The road itself took us only 30 mts, in fact on the way up, it is only 15 mts.

At this point you can already see the waterfall. We also took some time to take picture here. I know this aint good of a photograph. I think because we havent had our lunch, I lose some of my brain functionality.

And these are the pictures of some wild flowers and plants you can find.

The route has been paved here, but only partially. My friend said that this was built by one of the previous governor and stop once he is not re-elected.

Now when you see these huts, this is the end of the paved road. After this point, you will walk in the raw soil, but no worry, pathed already. I think these huts are used by the farmer to rest.


Locals are farming rice here. I manage to sneak a peek of one of the clean shoes they are using and surprisingly, they're using pink shoes.

Starting from this road, I havent been able to shoot much, mainly because it is very slippery and I didnt bring my hiking shoes. I even slipped and fell to my ass here, so be careful.


Not long but quite challenging down steep path, we arrive at the waterfall. We cant go down because it is rainy and you can see the water is brownish rather than clear water.


After about 30 minutes, we must go back up because it already starts raining. This time around, I was in the very front. I didnt bring my camera bag thus I have to walk fast to reach the hut to protect my camera. Truth be told, turns out that 2 of my friends were detouring themselves and some are worry because they couldnt see me and Yuni so they thought we're lost too. We met them in the huts and order some warm drinks from locals there. 3 of them and the guide are soaking wet. In the second picture is our beloved EO, wury and bully victim, Aris.


Again, from this hut, we rush back to the diner where all the ojek drivers are waiting for us. Once again I led, not to brag on it though :p. Coming in after me is Yuni and the rest.


At the diner, we stop for a minute, drink some hot tea, eat some bala - bala before continuing. One bala2 is priced at Rp 500, and the hot tea if I'm not mistaken is also more or the less the same. We were also charged with parking cost for the driver, which is Rp 2k per motor bike.
We were worry like hell because the road is definitely going to be very slippery and the Ojek drivers were forced to wait for us a bit up on the hill. I and one of my friend even have to take off my sandals and walk bare foot uphill.


But dont you worry, the torture didnt stop here, we still have to take ojek back to the car park, the road is very bad, and they go super speed. I manage to take some pictures though. And pls dont complain whether it is estethically correct or not, these all I took while riding on a crazy ojek.


At the car park, we clean ourselves and pay 30k to the shop owner for using water, toilet and room to change. We also need to pay 10k for the car park.
After cleaning up, we decided to went back home, but not without stopping by to have dinner. This is where we have dinner. Shop is named ma'lela (read: Mak Lela), instead of malela. For 7 person, we only need to pay 140k, quite cheap :).


I think this is the end of our journey to Malela. After this, not much to tell, except that we tried to find car wash in the rest area along the toll road but unfortunately the service was closed before its official closing time.
See you on the next trip.