Trip to Bangka Island

August 14, 2012

Trip to Bangka Island - 1/2

I didn’t intend to go to this city this year but there’s a Ramadan promo ticket :D by Garuda Indonesia I haven’t tried this plane before & I really want to go somewhere at that time so that’s why I booked this flight (round trip IDR 707,400) actually there’s another promo round trip around IDR 500,000 but for period travel 6 months since you booked tix. I went to Bangka Island 3 – 6 August 2012 (4D/3N), another place in Indonesia near Sumatera and its one of provinces in Indonesia, Bangka – Belitung. This time I went alone to Bangka but I have friends lived there so I will pay visit & stay at her house.

Day 1 – Friday, 3 August 2012

I arrived around 11.30 AM at Depati Amir Airport, Pangkalpinang, Bangka and my first impression of Bangka is hot!! More hot than Jakarta. The flight took 50 minutes from Jakarta to Bangka. I always feel glad when leaving Jakarta coz free from crazy traffic jam, air pollution & works :p My friend’s friend pick me up from airport to limbong’s house. She was there coz it’s lunch time & she always have lunch at her house (3 minutes from office by motorcycle). After she went back to office, her friend accompanied me to Museum Timah (tin museum) but the officer still on resting time til 2.30 PM so we went first to Makam Kherkof (cemetery for Dutchman who’ve been to Bangka) then we ate Es Kacang Merah (red beans ice) IDR 8,000 at Es Ayong not far from Makam Kherkof. Delicious! the shaved ice was really soft. Back again to Museum Timah, this city well-known with its tin so in this museum will tell you about history, process, production etc about tin. When you enter this museum you only need to write your name on guest book & it’s free. Finished with museum, we went to Pasir Padi Beach (IDR 4,000/car) so windy on that beach, not many people & not really clean. First impression not that good :D from the beach we went to Bangka Botanical Garden, free & just leave your ID card going around BBG then take back your id card before you go, this garden is really big & you can use your car or motorcycle to explore this garden. Then we leave to Tanjung Bunga Beach, we saw a temple near the beach. Actually I have no idea if that was really Tanjung Bunga beach or not ^^;; not stay longer then we went back to city & stopped by Martabak Acau, I ordered chocolate-cheese & egg, the size is really big & uwaaaaaa soooo delicious!! I love martabak!! ^^cross the street we can find Bakpao @IDR 5,000. We had dinner at Resto Jabrik near airport area, since I already full..I couldn’t really enjoy the food at that resto L. Too bad public transportation in Bangka is not too many & hard to find, most of local people already had motorcycle at least. From airport to city you can take taxi IDR 50,000, I don’t know if there is a cab from airport. The cab in Bangka divided in 5 color (area) and market at downtown as centre from 6 AM to 5 PM.

Depati Amir Airport, Pangkalpinang, Bangka

Makam Kherkof (cemetary)

Es Ayong

Es Kacang Merah (red beans)

Museum Timah

ship mockups

Pasir Padi Beach~ too windy & hot! :D

Bangka Botanical Garden not far from Pasir Padi Beach~

Inside the garden~

Temple at Tanjung Bunga Beach

i just love it, the color of this bamboo:)

Martabak Acau ^^

Martabak Super Cheese-Chocolate soo yummyyyy~~~

Martabak Egg *yum yummm

Day 2 – Saturday, 4 August 2012

Today we’re going to Gua Maria (maria cave) at Belinyu, it took almost 3 hours from Pangkalpinang, Belinyu located at north Bangka. Since one of my friends have to work half-day so we started around 1 PM. On our way to Belinyu we pick up another friend at Sungailiat, there were 6 of us heading to Belinyu. What a tortuous & bumpy road we had! Plus sometimes I didn’t understand when my friends talk in Bangka language, I’m totally blank ^^;; all I know is Aok!! It means yess XDD. Gua Maria is a worship place for catholic, but everyone can come to that place no matter what your religion is. They provide candle on that place & some people believe if you lighting candle & pray to Bunda Maria at that place, your wish will come true. There is also Jalan Salib (cross road) which tell story about Jesus who died on the cross, its more like Dolorosa. To enter this place, free J. Across the street with Gua Maria there’s a place to eat Otak-otak @IDR 2,000 & Es Kacang Merah @IDR 5,000. After Gua Maria we went to Rombak Beach at Sungailiat. There were huts on that beach IDR 25,000/ hut for weekdays. We ate Otak-otak there & soooo tasty yummyyy~~ there only 2 cars on that beach, ours & other people. We stayed there until around 6 PM, at night I tried Thew Pu Sui, it’s like soy milk.