Driving to Bandung

Last weekend I took the family to Bandung for the weekend just to break up the normal routine. We stayed in the same hotel as last time, the Ibis Styles Braga but choose the family room so it would be easier.
This time we used my works driver and car (the car is free, just pay fuel and the driver) and drove there.

Jakarta to Bandung is about 120km to the east of Jakarta and up in the mountains so it is cooler and more temperate. The city is smaller but equally full of traffic but it is nice and there are a lot more interesting things to do and see, should you want.

We left Jakarta at 10 and soon found the traffic stopped in Bekasi and then once we got past split to Cirebon the road opened up and we were able to go quite fast. The traffic overall was OK except on some major hills and where there were road works. It took around 4 hours to get there, which is the norm.

Once we hit the toll booth and paid the 52k we were immediately stuck in traffic and google maps had the pleasure in telling me that it would take over an hour to get to the hotel regardless which way we took. So instead of taking the most direct route, I folllowed Google maps advice and went off on a mystery tour. And it was a mystery tour because we ended up in the smallest of streets behind the airport and then way out of the city, only to find another road which took us there pretty much directly and it took less than an hour. Google maps did a good job all in all.

Volcano bike was still there

The room in the hotel was larger and had 4 beds. We were advised that if the room smelt of smoke, because this is a smoking room, then they would move us free of charge but we never found the room smelling of smoke, but there was a strange smell regardless. I guess the smell came from where the water was getting out of the shower and under the wooden flooring.

View from the 15th floor

The room unlike the last one was not as well maintained and so there were some problems with the AC switching off, lights not working and the floor. We complained that the free Wifi was not letting us access it. They give free wifi access to the 3 gadgets but if there are 3 already registered and you want to swap on for another, the system would not let you. We had 5. So that was annoying but not really the end of the world.

We ate somewhere in Braga and managed it fairly well with an active Jeremy. He had been good as gold all the way to Bandung in the car and he was still super active when were there. During the evening Yovita went out for food and so I stayed with Jeremy with the hope to get him to sleep but he didn't want to. And when he did he woke at 3am, 6 hours later.

He sat still for 15 seconds

3am in a hotel room is very boring. I was awake with him on and off until 6 when we all got up. We ate at 7 and then wandered into the car free area so Jeremy could run a bit and see the steam roller again near the hotel. But it started to rain so we went back to the hotel.

Out and about

After some discussions, we decided to leave Bandung and head back rather than stop off and do some shopping, so we left the hotel around 10.30. We got back to the house by 2 after stopping off for some coffee and also to buy some groceries on the way back. The actual trip home took 2.5 hours which was good.

All in all it was a quick trip there and back and I think next time we will take the train again.