19) Probolinggo and the way to Gunung Bromo

After arriving at the bus terminal (08.09.) we bargained hard with the Bromo-tour salesmen. But we decided to walk to a hotel and do the climb on our own.
The city appeared as a stretch of Indonesian highway dotted with some houses at the sides.
We were lucky getting a completely new hotel with hot water for an ok price :) A hugh dinner, hot shower and an included breakfast... so our way to Bromo could start.
But local transport up the mountain was less easy than we imagined. So it took us 3h and some discussions until we reached the start for our track. We gave our "park entrance" to the driver, so he drove us directly there and showed us how to get in without paying^^
So once we arrived, what to expect? As we know from our climb to Gunung Gede, we are not lucky when it comes to volcanoes and weather. We saw nothing from the sky but clouds and just 2 of the 5 mountains. Luckily the crater of Bromo was one of them... but guess what... that partial luck we paid after 1h walking with some heavy rain :P
After a short stop at the temple to the mountains foot we climbed the crater and had some good views of the inner crater and the surrounding moon-like area until the direction of wind changed and the clouds of sulphur were haunting us :P
So we started our way back through the rain and enjoyed a hot coffee before our driver picked us up.
Back to the warm lower regions we made our way to Surabaya.

Gunung Bromo (left)

the way up

the active crater

quite a way :P

18) Malang - a hidden beauty

A sudden change in plan brought us to the city of Malang, which we didn't intend to visit in the first place.
The city is a laid back beauty not many tourists get to. After our arrival at midnight we discovered the city on the next day (08.09.).
We started our route with a chinese buddhist temple before seeing a market, which turned out to be an alpha version of a shopping mall.
Next we found ourselves in the nice little park of the town. Which provided us some coffee and hot waffles while watching a group of old men funnily comparing their jewellery and enjoying themselves.
After some great early lunch at McD (yeah, blame us :P) we made our way to the bird market of the town. And wow... this one looked like we expected the one in Yogijakarta to be. A market integrated in the little streets and even on a bridge over the river... simply a great atmosphere here.
The flower market was just behind the bird market but the scenery changed completely as we came from a busy market flow into some lush gardens with ladies cutting the flowers.
The town hall was not too impressing but with the park infront and the good atmosphere in the whole city, it appeared friendly as well :)
A long walk to the millionairs row was supposed to be the end of our tour. Some good looking villas and an army museum lined along an alleè of palm trees.
As we couldn't find a taxi, a local picked us up for the way back to our hotel. At the afternoon we left the town to go for Probolinggo as we wanted to climb Gunung Bromo.

old men in a healthy discussion in Malang park

mosque

Malangs's bird market

really busy :)

the flower market