Bandung Day 3

Day 3 started off bright and early for us. Got up at 7am to prepare and have breakfast and dutifully met our driver for the day. We rented a car (toyota Avanza) from MPVrentcar, and I have to say, I'm very impressed with both the car and the service.

So we set off for Kawah Putih. Our initial plan was to go to Tangkuban Perahu, but reading comments on tripadvisor seemed as if people preferred Kawah Putih more. 

We saw really scenic views on our way there. Rice fields, tea plantations, horses on the roads, all the things that you don't normally see in Singapore. 

 Look at the cute uncle on the right. Posing so happily for our camera.

People sitting on the roof of their cars. Damn dangerous don't know how come they dare to do it.

And finally we reached. You were supposed to wait at the bottom of the hill till they have 13 people, then you take the van up.

We went on a weekday so there were very little people. In the end we got tired of waiting and paid more to drive our car up. The way up is really really cooling, and the air is really fresh.

The crater lake.

We stayed there for like, almost an hour taking pictures. But the air has this very heavy sulphur smell and its not pleasant. There are people selling masks so you might want to buy it if you can't stand the smell. According to our driver, you should drink milk to neutralize the toxins afterwards.

 Tea plantations.

From there, we took a half an hour drive out to the lake. There are people selling some roadside snacks and I know, they're supposedly really unhygienic and all, but try them, you'll be amazed at how nice they taste like. My favourite was the flour with mixed vegetable thing but K really liked the fried bananas. The fried sticky rice was really good too.

The really colourful boats. You can choose between motor ones, or leg-pedal ones, or the rowing ones. We took the rowing ones. Don't worry about not having enough energy, there's an uncle will be coming along with you and he was the one who was doing the rowing most of the time. We were too busy taking pictures.

In the middle of the lake there's an island called the love island. We stopped there for a while for more camwhoring. There was another group of teenage boys there and they were laughing at us because we were acting like amazed tourists. They probably think we don't understand what they were saying but our driver did. >.^

After that, we went to this hot spring place (I forgot the name) to take pictures. K and I wanted to go soak at Walini, but our friends didn't, so being nice people, we just stopped by here for some photo-taking.

This place is about 10 mins drive from the lake, but heard that it only provides cold water, whereas Walini has hot water. Do note that even if you stop to just take pictures, you need to pay $5000 per person.

Next, we went to the strawberry farms. I were quite unlucky as there were a few closed strawberry farms that day. You have to drive past and look in, and stop if you see farms with nice strawberries. Normally its about $30 000 per kg, but because that day not a lot of farms were open, the owner insisted on $40 000 per kg.

Actually the farms were different from what I thought, I thought it'll be some mass produced farm, but it's actually individual households. They have all this bags of strawberry plants in the yard and you just ask each household how much they charge.

According to my friend, the ugly ones, like those with two tips, are supposedly sweeter. I don't know how true is that but you can try and find out yourselves.

In the end we bought about 1kg for the four of us.

It's really fun but don't get too carried away. I feel that even 1kg for 4 person is too much, and we couldn't finish it.

We went to Sindang Reret for lunch before heading back to the city.

This place is over-hyped seriously. Yeah the atmosphere is nice, yeah the toilets are clean (damn important to me), but the food wasn't that nice. I mean, it wasn't bad, but I expected it to be much better.

My milk with egg, honey and ginger. I don't remember its Indonesian name already.

They are supposedly famous for their oxtail soup. Its not bad but nothing to rave about imho. The mushroom from Dakken was much better.

Fried fish with sweet black sauce. It was too dry for my liking. I think Bandung really doesn't have good seafood, or at least the kind that we chinese are used to. Johor, or even Bangkok has much better ones.

The way back took about three hours also. Initially wanted to try seafood, but upon our driver's recommendations, we headed to Stone Cafe instead. You can see the city view from here, but the city view is not that bright as well. Did I mention that all their lights are really really dim? I wonder how they see on the streets.

Stone Cafe is located right beside The Valley, but supposedly at half the price. The food is quite nice, so maybe if you're curious you can try both and compare which is more worth it.

Live music from the band. 

It's actually an outdoor setting with different huts. You sit on the floor around a table and I really like the cosy feeling you get.

 The mushroom soup wasn't that good compared to Dakken (from my Day 2 post). A tad too salty for my liking. I prefer my soup to be more creamy. The tom yum soup was really spicy. Better be prepared before you drink otherwise you'll choke from the spice.

Some beef thing with cheese but it tasted really good. I like.

Fried calamari rings.

 Mine was the center drink. Green tea ice blended or something. But it was too creamy. The mango peach was good though.

Lamb shank. By far my favourite for the night. It was actually K's dish, we were still a bit full from the late lunch so we ordered a pizza to share. But K claimed that he was really hungry so he ordered extra. But in the end I ate more than half of it.

 The driver says the strawberries can be kept in the open but I suggest you put them in the fridge la. Slows down their riping process.


After dinner, K and I went to Zen family spa and reflexology for massage. This place was recommended by our driver because according to her "it never failed her customers before and everybody left happy".

True enough, we were really impressed with the whole place and the massage. We reached quite late so only had time for a one hour oil massage (I chose lavender). I really wanted the strawberry scrub though, smelled really heavenly. You have to reach before 9pm because they close at 11pm. Other massage places close really early.

And this place was a pleasant surprise after our horrible experience with the hotel massage parlor.

We didn't manage to take any photos because our friends brought our camera and phones back to the hotel. But here's their business card. I swear this could possibly the best massage place in Bandung already.

Like what I said, Bandung is not really a place for shopping but the sight-seeing is really good. I wouldn't mind coming back to visit Papandayan and Tangkuban Perahu, and all the hot springs.