We knew we would have to be organized with our plans as we would be travelling during the month of Ramadan, and so we were not overly surprised to find out that the train from Yogyakarta to Malang that we had intended to take, was fully booked. But never fear, there is always a personal driver to be hired, and so between the three of us, we split a 9 hour car ride to Probolinggo instead - our base for visiting the famous Mount Bromo.

We treated ourselves to two nights in a nice hotel, and got excited over things like kettles and separated-from-the-toilet showers in our rooms. Instead of taking the traditional sunrise tour of Mount Bromo, we slept in and visited in the afternoon which felt like a relief; it is very easy to get caught up in all the "sunrise experiences" that are offered in southeast Asia. The three of us were taken into the Bromo Tengger Semuru National Park by jeep, and were driven around the awesome, barren landscape to check out various views of the volcanoes. Bromo is active! And so it was a bit surreal to be able to take the short climb to the top of the crater and look down to see the steam whirling around and rising. It was an incredible sight, but we were happy that it was only "gently" active at the moment.

Our last night in Probolinggo marked the beginning of Eid al-Fitr, and from our balcony we sat and watched the fireworks going off around the city and up into the hills; such a lively, colourful sky.

P.S.: If you are checking out the photos in the "Indonesia" folder, they have unfortunately ended up completely out of order, and we will try to fix them soon!