Heading from the deserted beach of the mentawai islands to the chaos of Jakarta was always going to be tough but we were both craving some city life.... Not to mention some western food! From leaving the island we had a long journey ahead of us.....

3 hours by coconut boat

10 hours by ferry with very little sleep maybe 2 hours at most.

1 hour taxi to the hostel. All the rooms were booked so we manged to get 3 hours sleep on the sofa.

2.5 hours flying from Padang to Jakarta followed by another 1.5 taxi journey. To say we were shattered was an understatement. Our hostel was great and we weren't far from dominos pizza....hmmm cheese never tasted so good ;0) after a good nights sleep we headed out for a walk around Jakarta, I had been told that Jakarta was a place full of polution and rubbish and they weren't wrong. We spent the whole day walking around the streets people watching and taking in all the many sights, sounds and awful smells! Unfortunately this was all that I saw of Jakarta as I think the travelling and sudden shock of moving from the mentawai islands to Jakarta took its toll and I was in bed ill for the next day or so. Poor Ed soon ended up in the same way and we were both feeling sorry for ourselves. So we took the opportunity to chill out watch some films, get some laundry done and just generally do nothing! We had decided to get out of Jakarta quite quickly so we booked a train to take us to Yogyakarta, it would take 8 hours by train to travel there however we were going executive class!!