The Thousand Islands and Pulau Tidung

There is a group of islands north of Jakarta known as Pulau Seribu (The Thousand Islands), many of them very close and reputedly dirty and polluted as a result, while others are privately owned, although you can stay on them for a small fortune. I have had several different people recommend one of the more distant ones, Pulau Tidung, one even saying it is like Bali before it got popular. So that is where I went last weekend, joining a cheap tour with a friend, which meant travelling on the public ferry, and staying in some pretty basic accommodation. The ferry left at 6am, and was crowded, uncomfortable, and looked as if it had been found in the land that health & safety forgot. But no matter, three hours later we arrived at the island. There are actually two Pulau Tidungs, a large inhabited island, connected to a smaller one by a wooden walkway.

After dumping our stuff in the accommodation, we were taken for some snorkelling on a smaller boat. It was lovely to be out of Jakarta and sailing between tropical islands, but the weather wasn’t great and not dissimilar to a beach trip in Wales: it was drizzling and not all that warm. The snorkelling was ok, nice enough water but a lot of dead coral. We explored the town a little; the people seem to lead a basic and quite traditional life, and although the streets are quite narrow, you do still have to keep dodging bikes and scooters, just like Jakarta.

The Sunday, however, was much better. We walked the length of the island (about 2km) and across the walkway to the smaller island. The weather was hot and sunny, the islands stunningly beautiful, and suddenly the comparison with Bali didn’t seem quite so fatuous. The walkway is fantastic, stretching between the islands through super clear water, and with a little bridge that people take turns jumping and diving off. Although the islands are beautiful, and the sand is nice, the beaches themselves are not amazing, being short, very shallow, and slightly dirty.

The return to Jakarta was significantly less smooth than the trip out. Essentially, there were too many people to fit on the ferry. There were also too many people to fit on the fishing boat the island laid on, which departed looking dangerously overcrowded. So the remaining island goers sat around in the sun, getting hotter and more agitated as no one seemed to know what was going on. Eventually another ferry turned up, from where I don’t know, as it certainly wasn’t scheduled. There were blissfully few people on it, so despite the wait and uncertainty, the journey back was relatively comfortable and quick.

It didn’t take long to come back to earth; as we neared Jakarta we sailed through rubbish and what smelt like sewage, we were then forced into a sweaty and crowded angkot before driving through the stinking fish market, and into the deafening traffic where every driver seemed to be leaning on his horn – hello Jakarta!