Holiday, Idul Fitri, Eid the end of Ramadam

At the end of a month of fasting Indonesia celebrates Idul Fitri with a national holiday. We at English First had a few days too. So off we went, first to Pasuruan to stay at the family home. After that visits to grandparents, uncles and aunts in Bojonegoro, Tuban, and Trenggalek.

The coast near Tuban
In between we did manage to have some relaxation. Here are some of the family very much at home in the pool. Rose's sister Ratna in the shallow end with her eldest boy Dhanu. Yudha Rose's second brother swims while Koko the youngest brother bursts out of the depths.

Ross an Australian teacher from EF joined the family on this trip. He and I went off in the Terios to explore the countryside around the volcano Mount Bromo.

Driving up towards Bromo the land changes. The fields become terraces, and the crops change from rice and sugar cane to vegetables. Here you can see frames for growing vines for peas and beans.

The settlements are often small here, and perched on the tops of ridges surrounded by their fields.

Every inch of the hills seems to be farmed. No matter how steep the land is terraced and irrigated. In many places a system of plastic piping has been layed and water from tanks is gravity fed to spray and feed these steep fields.

As we climbed higher we passed through the cloud layer. It was very quiet and cool here. The air was full of swifts swooping and diving in what appeared to be a feeding frenzy.

Terraces in the clouds. Here the fields had cabbages and onions.

Looking back down the valley you can see the road we have followed, and a quarry where the black basalt has been taken to build roads and walls.

The end of the road, literally. The road deteriorated and we had driven a few miles on stones, but here the road just stopped so we continued on foot.

The endless volcanic ridges around us. Looking more like North Wales or the Lake District than tropical Asia, the temprature was more like a hot August day in the UK as well.

Looking back down through the valleys to one of the villages below. You can see the brown bracken like ferns covering the foreground. See too the mass of clouds that had been blowing up around the mountains all day making them invisible from Pasuruan.

Here you see the trees and plants on top of the mountain. So many of the hills and mountains have been stripped of trees. Here some trees are growing back, but it does not look like the jungle you would expect, or that we saw pockets of on the way up the mountain. The ground is covered in long grasses, and ferns. The soil is a grey volcanic dust, totally dry at this time of year.

Here you see Ross in action with his camera phone filming the top of the mountain.

Although volcanoes are everywhere on Java, and many of the other islands of Indonesia, the haze and dust in the air keeps them hidden most of the time. Here you can see part of the range of volcanoes above Malang.