{Our arrival in Jakarta, Indonesia}

As promised in my previous post Fly with us to Jakarta, Indonesia, now I show you some photos of our arrival in Jakarta at Soekarno-Hatta International Airport. Click on the hyperlink's photo gallery to see this beautiful airport. It is designed by French architect Paul Andreu, who also designed the Charles de Gaulle International Airport in Paris, France.

Of course it makes one longing for a shower and a good bed after two nights on the plane. Our last years of consulting we were fortunate to use the day-hotel of Mercure Schiphol Terminal in The Netherlands. That way at least you can sleep for several hours during the 12-hour lay-over and get a refreshing shower.

After arriving in Jakarta, we always used a taxi from the Blue Bird Group, for taking us to the  Aryaduta Hotel. This used to be Hyatt, now it is under the Lippo group. Driving the toll road it gets you into the busy city of over 9 million people. Arrival at the airport would be around 16:00 o'clock in the afternoon. Remember that between Georgia, USA and Java, Indonesia there is a time difference of 12 hours. Our night is their day! Actually we did make this commute to our work in Indonesia a total of 21 times, from Atlanta, USA.

Good morning Jakarta; Selamat pagi Jakarta...

Naturally we would wake up very early the next morning, almost before dawn... Sunrise in Indonesia is around 6:00 o'clock, year round. Sunset is around 18:00 o'clock, also year round. One has to get used to the shorter days as this country is right on the equator.

The view from our room at the Aryaduta hotel was incredible, almost like a painting...

A bustling city is waking up!

This is taken from the Hyatt lounge where we had our breakfast with great view from the huge windows.

 Packed up and ready for the last leg of our journey to work... waiting in the lobby of the Aryaduta hotel.

It feels great for having had a nice bed + shower...

My leather journal has been written and the newspaper read.

Here you can see where we are and where we are heading to.

Indonesia is the 4th most populous country in the world and is very spread out. See my link below (Fly with us to Jakarta Indonesia) for a map of Indonesia in relation to the USA. 

The flight on KLM Royal Dutch Airlnes made a stop in Singapore, before reaching the capital of Indonesia; Jakarta.

Our final destination is Yogyakarta by plane, but this trip we will go by helicopter...

At Halim, the military airport of Jakarta.

Getting our luggage into this helicopter... 

Ready for the last leg of the journey...

Baggage handling is easy.

Pieter is already  seated and I will have to get next to him in the center seat...

Take off...

The view from the heli was breathtaking but it is very hard to capture on camera...

Two pilots are on board as is necessary in Indonesia, a country that is full with vulcanoes. Mount Merapi which is near Yogyakarta is 2,930 m (9,613 ft) and last erupted in November 2010. Previous large eruption occurred in 2006, shortly before the Yogyakarta earthquake.

Indonesia is in the ring of fire, an area with a large number of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions.

Due to the clouds coming in, we could not reach our final destination in Central Java on the Dieng plateau. So one more hotel night in Yogyakarta and early morning we finally arrived.

English is widely spoken but often in a funny way.

As is here used on the sign of Hellypad instead of Heli Pad...

This is in the mountains, at one of the mushroom plants' location.

Stay tuned for more about our consulting work in Indonesia near the Indonesian Twin Volcano Sumbing-Sindoro...

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