Mount Kinabalu | Angela Jelita Richardson

If, like me, you’re in your element when surrounded by fresh air and Mother Nature, but find yourself living in the crazy, concrete jungle that is Jakarta, you’ll most likely need to get away once in a while to keep your sanity. Here are my top weekend trips to places other than Bali, curated over my five-year stay in the Big Durian.

Best for unwinding – This trip is sure to unknot those tension lumps in your shoulders.

Pulau Macan (Tiger Island) is a 1 hour 40 minute speedboat ride from Ancol Harbour in North Jakarta and couldn’t be any more hassle-free. The boat leaves at 8.30am on Saturdays and you’ll be lounging about on hammocks and snorkelling with local ocean life just after 10am!

As soon as you step off the boat onto the jetty, you’ll feel the stresses of daily life disappear. Sleep in romantic driftwood cabins over the water sans walls or air conditioning, enjoying views of crystal-clear waters and breathtaking sunsets. You’ll find it hard to believe you’re only a few miles away from Jakarta!

The owners of the island have done it well – it’s eco rustic chic at its best. Rainwater is recycled, huts and furniture are made of driftwood, vegetables are grown on the island, and the only pieces of electrical equipment in your digs are a small fan and a small lamp. It’s back to basics here – but not shabby.

Get better acquainted with a good book, enjoy frolicking in the clear waters, have fun canoeing or playing beach volleyball with the kids, or grab a drink and hang out at the rustic bar while playing Jenga or cards with friends. This island will remind you of what life’s all about.

Prices include accommodation, transfers, food and non-alcoholic beverages for one night and two full days. The boat takes you back to reality on Sunday afternoon.

Bring your: swimsuit, a good book

Accessible by: speedboat from Ancol Harbour (1 hour 40 minutes)

Visit: www.pulaumacan.com

—

Best for families – Your kids will love island-hopping and discovering the pristine beaches here.

Belitung Island is just under an hour’s flight away, yet feels like a world away. This island is sparsely populated and has excellent roads – also great if you’re a cyclist. There are only a few hotels on the island and I usually opt for the convenient Aston Belitung Hotel. From here, you can do day trips to Tanjung Tinggi beach – famous for its giant-sized boulders and white sand beaches – and go island-hopping to smaller islands nearby.

There is a turtle sanctuary on Kepayang Island and a 100-year-old lighthouse on Lengkuas Island, which is also home to a gorgeous little beach with shade from trees. Rent your own private fishing boat to get you to the other islands and pay Rp.400,000 for the day. Not recommended to go during high swells, especially with kids, so take heed of your concierge’s advice.

Restaurants on Belitung Island are few and far between, but a must visit is Timpo Duluk, a quaint eatery in town with antique decorations adorning the walls – including an old bicycle! Food is so cheap you’ll hardly believe the bill, but it’s delicious – not to mention spicy!

Bring your: swimsuit, camera, sun block

Accessible by: Plane – Sriwijaya Air or Citilink (50 minute flight)

—

Best for couples – This weekend will seal the deal with that special someone, so don’t go unless you’re serious, or planning to get serious!

Most people have visited Borobudur Temple – it’s on the top of the first-to-visit attractions for any expat or visitor in Indonesia. What people generally overlook, however, are the enchanting Menoreh hills that surround this ancient temple, where one particular hotel is nestled…

The Amanjiwo resort overlooking the Borobudur Temple should be on every couple’s bucket list if looking to take the relationship to the next level, or to remind your loved one of how much they mean to you. There are no signs and they do not advertise, for this place speaks for itself.

The moment you arrive, management meet you personally and cater to your every whim. The hotel grounds are made of large slabs of stone and each villa provides extreme privacy, with private plunge pools or bale- bale to relax in. The swimming pool area is magnificent, worthy of royalty and the on-site bakery makes some of the crispiest croissants I’ve ever tasted!

Book a romantic dinner in your villa’s garden and let your lover’s sweet words whisper to you over the sounds of a sitar playing in the background – just don’t be shocked when you realize there is actually a musician sitting there playing it for you. After dinner, in your villa you’ll find a trail of petals leading to your outdoor sunken bathtub, filled with rose petals for you both to bathe in, and who knows what else. Ask the staff to arrange a picnic for you overlooking where the Elo (female) River meets the Progo (male) and be breath-taken by the view and the lengths the staff here go to please.

Bring your: Lover and KITAS (for special rates)

Accessible by: Plane to Jogjakarta – Garuda, Citilink, Air Asia, Lion Air (45 minutes), then an hour’s drive with Amanjiwo transportation.

Visit: www.amanresorts.com

—

Best for adventure – This long weekend getaway will work your calf muscles and your thirst for new heights.

Hiking may not be everybody’s cup of tea, but Mount Kinabalu on Malaysia’s Borneo is a peak that even weary hikers should conquer. A two and a half hour flight away, the entrance to this UNESCO World Heritage national park is the city of Kota Kinabalu. The hike is one day up and one day down, making a 4,090 metre climb seem like a dream.

What’s great about this hike is there is no rubbish – at all! Unlike many hikes in Indonesia, where rubbish is strewn all over the hiking paths, the guides take littering seriously on Mount Kinabalu. Their motto is ‘leave nothing but footprints and take nothing but photographs’. The national park has everything covered: at every rest station there is a toilet and spring water to fill your drinking bottles up and there’s no need to camp, as there’s a lodge.

Starting your hike at 9am, you’ll reach the Laban Rata lodge by sunset and can enjoy dorm-style, bunk-bed accommodation and showers. The next morning, leave at 2.30am and hike three hours to the summit. You’ll need a decent level of physical fitness to make the peak, as there are sections where you will need to pull yourself up with ropes. After enjoying a breathtaking sunrise over the mountain peak – which will remind you of why you do it to yourself – hike two hours back to the lodge for breakfast, before another four-hour hike back down to the national park’s entrance. For serious thrill-seekers, the descent from the summit can also be done via ferrata, cliff-side rope climbing attached to steel cables.

What are you waiting for?

Bring your: waterproof trousers and waterproof poncho, hiking boots, thermals, fleece, fruit bars and energy gels, gloves with grip, camera

Accessible by: direct flights to Kota Kinabalu with Air Asia (2.5 hours), followed by a 2 hour drive to Kinabalu National Park. You will need a long weekend for this trip.

Visit: www.mountkinabalu.com

There’s a long weekend coming up and you’re trying frantically to book a villa in Bali but it seems everywhere is fully booked. Belitung have no availabilities and you don’t fancy attempting to drive to Bandung or Pelabuhan Ratu for fear it will take you hours and hours to get there. So where are you going to go?

My answer to you is Sabah, Malaysian Borneo. Direct flights from Jakarta to Kota Kinabalu (also known as K.K.) are available and are cheaper than flights to Bali. In two and a half hours you’re in another country and another world and you can enjoy a pedestrianized city with light traffic and fresh air. The attractions in K.K itself are limited to shopping, walking and eating, however it’s what’s just outside of the city that makes the journey to this side of Borneo all the worthwhile.

Descending from the summit of Mount Kinabalu to base camp

Our trip was somewhat adventurous, starting with a two-day hike up and down Mount Kinabalu, located in Kinabalu National Park, a two hour drive from K.K. Peaking at 4090.2 metres this is one of the easier mountains of this stature to conquer and a lot of effort has been put into this trail. Starting the ascent at 9am, we hiked through lush rainforest, admiring several miniature waterfalls during the way, and enjoying rest stations equipped with toilet and treated spring water.

The trail to Labuan Rata, the lodge where hikers rest overnight before ascending to the peak, is six kilometres up and we were four clicks in before the inevitable happened to slow us down – the tropical heavens opened and what a downpour it was. One thing every tour operator and website will tell you is to make sure to bring waterproofs and how right they all were. Waterproof trousers is the one thing you need most after a waterproof poncho.

Spotting Labuan Rata was a glorious moment, which meant shelter and rest. This lodge is made up of several unheated dorm-style rooms of various sizes, equipped with bunk beds and showers. Downstairs a large canteen area serves decent buffet meals for the famished trekker. After cleansing, adorning our thermals and eating as much as we could, our weary bodies tried to catch a few hours sleep before waking again at 1.30am for the final push to Low’s Peak to watch the sunrise.

Now this is where the hike gets hard. Leaving at 2.30 am after a light breakfast, head lamps light the way up steep rock-face and there are actually three segments where you have to pull yourself up rope – gloves with a grip come in very handy. It’s a three-hour climb to the bitter-cold finish where the waking sun welcomes you with open arms and the incredible view opens up to you (if it weren’t below freezing I would have stayed for much longer admiring it).

Two hours later and back at the lodge, a big breakfast was thoroughly enjoyed, followed by a short hour’s rest before a four-hour hike down the mountain the same way from which we came. In true rainforest fashion, the heavens opened up again halfway down, but we smiled and enjoyed it knowing that we were on our way back to a warm shower in a warm hotel room and that our feet could soon get some much-deserved rest.

The next day we organized a day trip to visit a small orangutan sanctuary where young rescued orphans were being rehabilitated. At 130 Ringgid each this was a lovely morning out and meant we were free to walk, yes again, around the city in the afternoon. There are many day trips available, which you can book via a tour operator or through your hotel. Orangutan sanctuary trips book up fast so make sure to reserve in advance during high seasons.

Next on our itinerary was diving at the renowned Sipadan Island, one of the word’s top ten dive destinations. Sipadan, in the Celebes Sea, is only half a km in length and 200 metres in width, and was once at the centre of a territorial dispute between Indonesia and Malaysia, with Malaysia being awarded the island by the International Court of Justice on the basis of “effective occupation” in 2002. Jacques Cousteau said, in his film Borneo: The Ghost of the Sea Turtle, “I have seen other places like Sipadan, 45 years ago, but now no more. Now we have found an untouched piece of art.”

Untouched it may have been, but nowadays many boats from neighbouring islands take you to Sipadan and120 divers daily are permitted to dive in its surrounding waters, with a permit fee of 40 Ringgid per person per day. We enjoyed three dives a day and were lucky to gain access to Sipadan for two whole days, enjoying an abundance of sharks – black tip and white tip – Hawkbill turtles, schools of barracuda, schools of jack fish, schools of bumphead parrotfish and an array of other species of fish and macro sea life, including a rare spotting of a Dragon Seamoth which was one of the sweetest creatures I’ve ever seen!

With such a profusion of divers, it is so important to dive responsibly in these waters to lessen the degrading the effect dive tourism has had on its once pristine reefs. We witnessed a diver carelessly diving along the bottom of the ocean, dragging his second regulator across the reef, breaking off bits of coral on his way. As much as we all tried to pull him up and tell him off in sign language, he carried on, which brings me to an important point; learn to dive properly before you attempt underwater photography.