We had to leave in the early morning to catch the 8am flight to Jakarta. So, after finishing up the packing and giving a big kiss to Koda, we took a cab to the Airport. Had a quick breakfast at Starbucks before boarding the Jetstar flight.
Jetstar was very timely… even early. The flight started boarding half an hour before the departure time and took off right on time. We even landed in Jakarta half an hour early from the scheduled time! I was soooo happy, because we only had 1.5 hour to catch our other flight to Malang.
But the happiness was short-lived. Our baggage took forever to come out! I think it was one of the last ones that came out. We were the first one to arrive at the baggage belt, and one of the last 5 people to leave the belt. I think we waited almost half an hour for our luggage…
Oh, I forgot to tell you, that this was my and Aina’s first time landing in CGK’s Terminal 3… And I was impressed with this international terminal! Soooo huge! To make it even more dramatic, the Jetstar plane was parked at the gate that was located at the very end of the terminal. It was a looooooong walk to the baggage claim area.
Can’t even see the end of the hallway!
Since our next flight was with Sriwijaya Airlines at Terminal 2, it was also our first time trying the inter-terminal skytrain in CGK (Skytrain is Kalayang in Indonesian?). It was definitely a lot faster and more comfortable compared to the old yellow buses from the past.
Thanks to the skytrain, we made it on-time to get to Terminal 2F to meet up with Ari’s parents (Aina’s Popo and Kungkung), Jessi and the little baby Joe (Jessi’s 7-month old son) and caught our flight to Malang!
…Which ended up being delayed for 2 hours. Gahhh…
I guess, domestic flights in Indonesia is ALWAYS delayed. I don’t think I have ever taken a domestic flight that was on time. So annoying.
Since we had 2 hours of nothing to do, we decided to get an early lunch at the Bakmi GM stall at the Terminal 2F (it was only 10:30am at that time… very early lunch, indeed). Unfortunately, they only had 4 bowls of noodles left… and we were a group of 6 hungry people! Makes me wonder, how could you open a restaurant with only having 4 portions of your main dish?
After about 2 hours of waiting, finally our plane arrived. I think, the delay was actually 3 hours, because after the plane had arrived, it took us quite a while to board and the plane had to sit on the side of the runway for a long time before they got their turn to take off.
Malang’s airport is named Abdulrahman Saleh Airport. It’s a tiny airport with no jet bridge, so the passangers alight the plane through the ramp stairs instead. They also don’t have a full loop baggage carousel. Instead, they have a short conveyor belt where they put your luggages, and you have to catch yours where the belt ends.
After we collected all of our luggages, we went out to find the car that we rented. Ari’s mom had made an arrangement with a local driver, who would drive us to our hotel. Originally, the plan was to have lunch in Malang first, then drive to Batu (which located about an hour outside of Malang City) and drop us off at the hotel. But since we got delayed for so long, by the time we landed in Malang, it was waaay over 4PM. No more lunch then.
So, we went straight to Batu, instead, and looked for a place to eat along the way. It was probably a bad decision, because we were in the Ramadhan month, and most people in Indonesia were currently fasting. They would break their fast around 5:30-6pm at that time… which was right about now! After going through 2 fully-booked restaurants, we finally found an empty one. Really empty, that there was no one there at all!
Good thing that the food was great. Or maybe we were just too hungry. So hungry that I completely forgot to take pictures of our very first meal in Malang area… except for the first dish served: Tofus!
Aina loved the meal though. We ordered Rawon, Indonesian beef black soup, originated from East Java, which is around this area, and Aina finished it all.
After the meal, we went straight to the hotel. I had to call them earlier to let them know that we would be arriving late. The hotel’s staff were very, very friendly and kind, though. Maybe it’s an East Java thing, but it seemed like everyone I met there were very kind and friendly.
We were staying at the hotel called Kusuma Agrowisata. The hotel was huuuuuuge! They had so many rooms and bungalows in the vicinity. We had to take a shuttle to get to our room from the Front Office of the hotel, because the room is located down the hill.
I was expecting a normal hotel room, in a building with elevator and stuff. But it turned out that our room was on a ground, like motel/bungalow style with gardens around it. I liked it better this way… But it was too dark to take good photos of the gardens. So, I’ll post more photos and stories about the hotel on Day 3 of the trip.
By the time we got to our room, it was only 8pm, but we were sooooo exhausted. So we opted for an early night and went to bed straight away.
More pictures of the trip in Batu & Malang 2018 Trip photo album. And for the rest of the trip, you can check out the entire stories at Batu 2018: Short Getaway with Family.
