Pulau Macan | 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

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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)

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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

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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

Most people don’t get over-excited when you mention the Thousand Islands (Pulau Seribu), myself included, however one of these one hundred or so islands (I know, the ‘thousand’ in the name is very misleading) has captured my hippie heart and soul and is now my favourite weekend break within two hours of the Big Durian. Pulau Macan aka Tiger Island (another misleading name as there are no tigers in sight, I assure you) is a tiny island paradise where not a care in the world exists.

Our trip to the island of the tigers began with a speedboat ride, which left Marina Ancol at 8am on Saturday morning. As we pulled out of the harbour, we held our noses for the first five minutes as the boat waded through North Jakarta’s polluted murky waters. After that we were off, and the waters quickly turned sky blue as we marvelled at the many tiny islands we passed, some with small mansions on land, wondering how the other half lived.

From afar, Pulau Macan looks like a small hedge in the middle of the ocean, and as we got closer, it turns out it looks like a very big hedge in the middle of the ocean. The first thing you see as the speedboat pulls into the pier is the row of solar panels, and as a self-confessed eco-warrior, the moment we set foot ashore I was home. Guests were lounging in hammocks, books in hand, chilling out on the driftwood bar overlooking the clear baby-blue ocean, enveloped in giant sofas in the open-air living area with smooth grooves flowing (one positive criticism would be that the playlist needs to be longer and not on constant repeat – only so many times can I hear Eric Clapton’s ‘Cocaine’ over the space of a weekend).

Myself and mystery date decided to go on a rekkie of the island, which lasted about five minutes as the island is only about a hectare in size, discovered a cockerel, some hens, two very happy lounging island cats, and our beautiful hut (I say hut because that’s what it is – not a wall in sight). You really feel at one with nature here. We spent the rest of the morning snorkelling around the islands, kung-fu fighting off some very aggressive little fish who just love to nip you behind your ankles, as well as dodging some very prickly sea urchins! Besides these two ‘deadly predators’ (don’t forget the tigers), the snorkelling around Tiger Island is very pleasant – good visibility, various different corals and thousands of fish.

That afternoon I met the island’s Swiss/Dutch/Indo GM, Marc Zwyer, at the island’s bar and he told me how Pulau Macan is very proud of its sustainability projects. Three years ago, under new management, the island was transformed into an eco-resort and the aim is for guests to be inspired. “The speed boat may not be eco-friendly, but the first thing you’ll notice on our island are the solar panels and the energy generated from these are stored in a big red box which provides electricity, albeit limited, for guests to be able to have a small lamp on in their huts, as well as a fan,” Mark tells me. To be honest the constant cooling breeze that blew through the island was fan enough, but apparently August, which is when we were there, is the best time to visit as the breeze never stops.

“Water is imported to the island on boats and as we don’t get much rain here we use rainwater to hydrate the organic garden which grows chillies, ginseng, cassava and aloe vera,” he continues. “This whole bar you’re sitting at is made of driftwood that our guys go hunting for in the ocean as are most of our huts. We teach local fishermen to make furniture out of driftwood to sell in the hope that this knowledge will be passed on to their children and hopefully end the fishing in these waters.” As it turns out, overfishing is a real problem here and fishermen still use cyanide spray to fish – over our stay I caught sight of at least three fishing boats hovering around the neighbouring islands. The island also has a coral nursery where guests can help with planting new coral.

On the island, guests are encouraged to use water and electricity sparingly, which are lessons we should all use in our day-to-day lives back in civilisation’. The island promotes healthy eating and wellbeing and meals are very healthy, served buffet-style according to the number of guests staying so as to avoid waste (they have a strict 40 guest max policy), and is predominately vegetarian with the additional meat dish to satisfy the carnivores. Pulau Macan can be chartered along with its small neighbouring island for team building exercises like ‘survivor’ where teams have to construct, cook and survive with only natural resources, and the occasional hidden mie goreng packet.

Geologically speaking there is no threat of tsunamis in these waters and Mark assured me there are no pirates, unless you wanted to throw a pirate themed party of course. We stayed an extra night because one night simply wasn’t enough, and our time was spent taking little traditional boat trips to the neighbouring islands to snorkel with the fish, practicing yoga to the sunrise, cozying up to beautiful sunsets, sleeping at 9pm, and just generally feeling like we were thousands of miles away from anywhere, so when the time came to leave the island, we felt more relaxed than we’d ever been.

If you’re a hippie at heart, love to chill out in hammocks and walk around half naked, and can handle the sound of silence, this is the place for you. Book way in advance as the island is almost always fully booked on the weekends.

First published in Indonesia Expat, 30 November 2011.