Travel Notes: Banyuwangi

Its been so long since the last time i updated this blog, i havent even write a piece this year, as my first writing in 2011 i'm going to present a travel notes, so here we go..

After Surabaya, Kediri, Tulungagung and Malang, last April i had another chance to do a trip to East Java. This time to a town located on the eastern part of the province. Yup, finally i visited Banyuwangi.

Is it far from Surabaya? yup of course!
Does it worth the journey? lets just say yes..

So this is how i ended up traveling to Banyuwangi..

It was around March, when i joined a training in Samarinda that i got a text from my friend Isma Amalia telling that she's getting married on April 22 in her hometown, Banyuwangi. at first i thought its not very far from Surabaya, but then my lovely boyfriend told me that it was THAT far.. He said it was still around 6 to 7 hours by bus or train from Surabaya.. Holy cr*ap! It IS far..

Long story short, finally we decided to come to the wedding, since both groom and bride are our friends, besides we have a spare time to come. We took a Friday morning flight, i departed from Banjarmasin to Surabaya, and he from Balikpapan to Surabaya. We met at Juanda International Airport and directly heading to the city. We spent the day enjoying the biggest mall in Surabaya - Tunjungan Plaza - with nice lunch, movies, and coffee (well, not really coffee since i had green tea freeze and he had hot chocolate); and night wandering around Gubeng Train Station, tried to find street-hawker and ended up at a park (had no idea what's the name) eating meatballs and es degan plus walking in the drizzle. We finally met up with Rima and Oi, Aulia, Susan and Diar at the station at 10 p.m., then we directly headed to the train which fortunately depart on time.

There's not much to tell about in-train-activities, since we spent most of the time sleeping and the rest chatting. Finally we arrived at the the station at 6 a.m. where 2 cars were already waiting to bring us to Aulia's house. There we spent around 1-1,5 hours grooming ourselves for the wedding then had breakfast. Then another trip started again, from Aulia's house in Banyuwangi, we still have to go to Temuguruh Village, where Isma and Ubay's wedding took place, the distance is around an hour driving. We missed the Akad but we're already there before the reception and had a moment to meet the bride and groom before.

here comes the bride (and the groom, and the parents..)

At the Village Hall we spent the time waiting for the wedding couple chatting with our friends and also taking pictures. They finally arrived then the photo-session began, we waited for our turn of course after the families and relatives, then we had our lunch and watched Rima's performance.

this is us taking pictures with the bride and groom (anyway it was very hot up there on the stage, i couldn't imagine how isma and ubay manage to keep smiling for hours there)

At around 1 we left the Hall and went to the Masjid to pray and change our clothes. Our next destination was Alas Purwo Mangrove Conservation or known as Bedul. Since there were a lot more to join the group, we went there on 3 cars and jostled inside. It took us around 1,5 hours to get there, long enough to make some of us asleep or got leg cramps. When we got there, Aulia and several others directly negotiate the tour package for the all of us. We went for a tour on 2 boats, at first the boats took different route but ended up on the same place, which is the Segoro Anakan. The place is very beautiful, one must come and see the beauty directly, because no proper words to describe it, Subhanallah.. We spent some times here enjoying the beauty, the sand, the view, the sunset, basically everything, yet we should end the joy because we need to go back to Banyuwangi and catch the night-train back to Surabaya.

imagine the all of us inside 3 cars

the classic-version of our photo

That's some snaps from the Banyuwangi trip, hopefully i can bring more travel notes in the future.