Tea Plantations Halfway from Yogyakarta to the Dieng Area, Indonesia

Pieter happily smiling while standing on a real tea plantation!

More in detail of these tea plants with the mountain view...

To the left you also see the Flamboyant tree bloom.

Pieter at tea plantation in December 1986 in the Kledung Pass area with Mount Sindoro, Java's 2nd highest volcano partly hidden in the clouds.

Here they are working on the tea plantation, hand picking the younger leaves. 

And more young Flamboyant trees blooming.

Don't you love this fertile land that is also called the 'Emerald Belt' as it is right on the Equator and so lush and green.

Have you ever been on any tea plantation?

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{Dieng Plateau Indonesia - Where We Worked} | view the other 2 volcanoes...

The Stonebreaker in Indonesia and Pieter's Paternal Grandmother's Name

 Husband Pieter's Paternal Grandmother was named Steenbreker or in English Stonebreaker.

This is what we both witnessed when passing by on our way from Yogyakarta to the Dieng area in Central Java, where we lived and worked.

For years we have observed this; rather painful for watching such hard labor!

All we learned from our travels and living and working in Indonesia or India, to NEVER EVER COMPLAIN!

Just search the Internet for the art work by French Gustave Courbet 'The Stone Breakers 1849'

That gives us a good perspective of the era.

Cor Jesu, victima peccatorum - Latin

Sacred Heart of Jesus victim for our sins - English

Johanna Christina Steenbreker, Pieter's Paternal Grandmother...

One wonders where they got their name from, some generations back!

Mount Merapi 2,911 meters or 9,551 feet and Rice Fields of Central Java, Indonesia

 Mount Merapi of 2,911 meters or 9,551 feet

Our journey to work in Indonesia always went from Atlanta to Amsterdam, Singapore, Jakarta the capital of Indonesia and another one hour flight from the west of Java to Yogyakarta in Central Java.

Then the journey through the mountains, leaving Mount Merapi behind and traveling towards two other stratovolcanoes where we lived and worked in the Dieng area.

BREATHTAKING views, IF you're lucky with the weather.

Usually early mornings!

Yes, Mount Merapi is a very active volcano and has caused a lot of devastation due to eruptions being accompanied by pyroclastic flows. As late as in 1976 and November 22, 1994 and also in 2010.

Husband Pieter took this photo on his 1st trip in December of 1972, with Mount Merapi in the back.

Clearly you can see the terraces they create for growing vegetables and lots of rice, which they can irrigate with water flowing from the mighty Mount Merapi region.

This is the view of such rice fields or 'sawahs' that Pieter managed to beautifully capture in December of 1972.

All formed by young ash grounds and alluvial lands.

Plowing the rice fields 'sawahs' with their buffaloes and you also see ducks in the water.

Still with Mount Merapi in the background.

This sawa is lined by banana trees.

Quite a job... a muddy affair, and that's how we get our rice products!

Must be hard on the buffaloes...

In Java they seem to manage three crops annually, due to their climate right on the belt of the equator.

Has any of you ever seen such tropical rice fields or sawahs being plowed by buffaloes?