Bakauheni > Solok (1117km by bus, 31h)

How is 31 hours travelling by airplane? Painful? Scary? Sooo long? Okay, so I will tell you how is 31 hours in an Indonesian bus! In fact, I don’t mind the time. Normally I just sleep the whole way like I’ve done between Kutoarjo and Merak. But this trip was kind of different. The traffic in Indonesia can be seen as crazy compare to modern countries. People drive everywhere even on the wrong side of the road but everything is going slow and fluent. The dangerous one are the buses. They always go as quickly as they can like they are doing a race! They have a copilot who wave his arm out of the bus to clear the road when needed. I think during that trip, the bus drove more on the right side than on the left haha.

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Merak > Bakauheni (30km by ferry)

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Well, I have spent the last 12 hours in a bus travelling from Kutoarjo to Merak. I did not really noticed which road we took. I did not really care about it because there was nothing to see at night. I’ve been half asleep the whole way expecting to be recharged and fresh when I would arrive to Merak. I was the last guy in the bus at the end and the driver had a moment of hesitation when he saw that I was still in the bus. Actually I was confused too. Did I miss the stop? I know it was the last stop so it should be ok. We clarified the situation and soon I had my feet on the ground and my bike to assemble again. The staff was looking at me and even helped me. They were very nice. Later on, I’ve been looking for a place where to get some breakfast. I knew the ferry here run 24/24 so time is not so important. I met a guy who was working not far away and spoke a bit of English. I had my breakfast and we chat maybe during an hour. He told me he has a friend who work in the ferry station and could help me. Well, OK, thank you. Finally I followed him and his friend who were driving a scooter. We passed across different entrances, I did not see any queue. When we arrived front of the “bridge” that goes to the ferry the guy told me “you can go”. “But where do I pay?” “This is OK”.

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