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We've been traveling so much that I've fallen way behind on this and all other reports. Today we take you to East and Central Java for Wisata Bahari Lamongan and Wonderia, in that order. Interestingly, many of the airports in East Java are closed at the moment, due to the eruption of Mount Raung. Once again, I visited a seismically active country and nothing happened. I know that I'm being stupid, but I am terribly curious as to what an earthquake feels like. Here's to hoping that I never find out. This is the well-themed entrance to Wisata Bahari Lamongan, aka WBL. The park is on the shore of the Java Sea. This was a Thursday, so the entrance price was about US$4.62. The guests at this park seemed very interested in taking photos with us. It started innocently enough. Cheryl had started taking pictures with her phone as well. The whole family wants in! And still more. And still more. Around this point I got a call from one of the managers of Jawa Timur Group, who own the park. We had contacted them earlier about getting the kiddie credit at Jawa Timur Park I. I walked away to chat for a bit. And this is what I saw when I turned around. It got totally out of hand. We started running away from people to avoid being photographed again. There was one credit, the wooden mouse, which was not as smooth as the one we had ridden at Jawa Timur Park 2. And there was this powered, which was fun, right on the water. This park was a real hodge podge. There were miniatures... ...nicely themed natural scenes... ...and utterly bizarre theming elements. There were also some decent flats. And it was a big park. This was the wooden mouse from a distance. The funniest and strangest thing we encountered was the "Cat Museum". There were informational displays. "Pussy on vacation to WBL" And then lots of actual cats. Although I wasn't sure how genuine the breeds were. I guess the Himalayans were real, but this didn't look like a Maine Coon, for instance. And there were several hallways like this. And then a huge meandering cat sculpture garden. I think it took five minutes to walk past the sculptures. Bizarre but fun. We did a huge indoor haunted hospital walk-through also. Camel rides. Then we hopped back in the car and headed to Semarang, which is the capital of Central Java. That was a trip and a half, or 2-3 hours plus 5 hours for traffic. Good thing we had GPS, because the driver had no idea how to find the Crowne Plaza in Semarang. The next day we visited Semarang's park, Wonderia. This park sold us entrance tickets, yet seemed abandoned. We had to search for an operator and ticket seller for the ride. The park was not in good shape. The only people there were attending some large meeting of women around a huge outside table (I didn't photograph them). It was more like a public park with a 50 cent admission fee. We then found the "big" credit. But we were told that it's not running anymore. So you'll see it as SBNO in rcdb now. It was like one of those abandoned amusement parks on the internet, except that this one is actually still "open" for business. One bright spot, sort of, was the dark ride. I wonder if the eyes still light up. The dark ride "operated" in complete darkness with not a single gag. At one point, the power went out and we were just sitting there in pitch black. We yelled to each other in the darkness. Eventually the power came back on. Creepy. Found this in the exit area wreckage. And that was our brief visit to Wonderia in Semarang. Then it was on a plane back to Jakarta. Thanks for joining us for this update!

I also remember the Ghost House being a decent dark ride, and the Pirate Ghost Ship was just bizzare. See photos. Also, here's a video from the train ride at Suroboyo Carnival. [youtu_be] [/youtu_be] Pirate Ghost Ship at Suroboyo Carnival Night Market Pirate Ghost Ship at Suroboyo Carnival Night Market

I'm finally partially recovered from my jet lag so that I can post another segment of this report. I was trying to do this last night after having taken a sleeping pill and I literally couldn't see the screen. Slightly better after finally getting some actual sleep during actual night-time hours. Here we go. First, here's a video, which I finally understood how to embed. Sorry it has facebook-y stuff with it. [fbvideo] [/fbvideo] As promised, I wanted to show you pictures of the lovely Taman Remaja Surabaya. It had some real charm at night, with lots of cheap but oddly beautiful light sculptures made of inexpensive light ropes and such. Unfortunately, the park was completely dead at its evening opening time and we were practically the only guests. We were told that the newer park (Suroboyo Carnival, where we were next headed), was taking away what little business they had. So a pall hung over this charming but sad place. The operator hadn't shown up yet for the "big" coaster, so we got the Wacky Worm credit. These cheesy but charming light scultptures were all over. Train Cheap light ropes made for a great entrance to the... Ghost House! Spooky Great Cars And the Devil There were lots of these cheap light things all over. It was beautiful in the dead quiet. As I said, there were few, if any, other guests. Note shark and crocodile theme, which will come up again. We finally did get on the larger credit. Here's a photo as dusk was falling. And a little bit later. Thank you for a beautiful evening, green fellow. I think it had been raining on and off all day, and a longer shower hit as we moved across town to the new park, Suroboyo Carnival. It was at least drizzling, but we hoped to get on the two credits. Oooh, street performers. There were a few more customers here, but not that many more, thanks to the rain. This park has the obvious advantage of being new and fresh. Sura/Suro and Boya/Boyo are the amazing Shark and Crocodile team from whom the city get its name. It's the 2nd largest city in Indonesia, with a metro area population greater than 5mm, according to Wikipedia. The theming continues in the restrooms! The rain was dying off, but they wouldn't open the first credit, so we just waited on a bench on the platform. I think the ops were a bit annoyed with us waiting there (I was too tired to care), but eventually they chatted with us a little bit. And eventually they started testing. It was touch and go for a few minutes because it looked like the track was too slippery and the car valleyed before the lift chain, but eventually they got it going. Thanks for the credit guys! There were a lot of rides, but I didn't get a lot of good photos, thanks to the darkness, and my laziness. I was starting to lose it at this point of the trip. Jet lag and exhaustion were catching up and making me snappy and impatient. This was a really weird haunted walk-through. There was some okay theming. This is the only picture I can find of the other credit, which we got without any waiting. There were a TON of souvenir shops, which might explain why we the name is sometimes Suroboyo Carnival Night Market. Most of the shops had the same set of park t-shirts, but they were actually pretty nice so I got two. Here's one. Thanks for visiting Surabaya with us. Next stop will be Wisata Bahari Lamogan!

Killer reports. If someone explained the Kidzania concept to me, I might say "meh", but the execution is obviously brilliant. Very very cool franchise. And to be a big kid commuting around Japan again! Awesome.

Epic report!

Doing this segment of the trip report prompted me to finally do a TripAdvisor review of that hotel. It's pending now but I'll share the link as soon as it's up. *evil laugh*

Thanks for reading and thanks for the comments, everyone. This part of the report includes our failed trip to Trans Studio in Makassar, and the next day's parks that we did in daylight, leaving that evening's parks for the next update. Advance apologies for the snarkiest update so far. Let's begin. We woke up at our beautiful hotel in Bandung. Ate a hearty Asian hotel breakfast. Drove back to Jakarta Airport and boarded this flight to Makassar, which is on the island of Sulawesi. It's a 2-hour flight. We arrived in Makassar, checked in to the airport hotel, and got a taxi to the city. Trans Studio is inside a mall. It's about 7pm and the mall is scheduled to close at 10pm. And the ticket office is closed. Whoops. Two hour flight for nothing. Shit. After a night in the shittiest hotel ever (Avoid the ibis Hotel at Makassar Airport at all costs), we had an early flight to Surabaya. Garuda Indonesia is part of SkyTeam, and so is a Delta affiliate. Now I don't know what the hell we were thinking, but I find it interesting that, on the very same day the New York Times ran a front page article highlighting Indonesia's poor air safety record (http://nyti.ms/1BlxHwv), we booked plane tickets on an Indonesian airline. We survived all 3 internal flights on Garuda. Surabaya, you may recall, was the origin city of Air Asia 8501. Once we landed in Surabaya, we met our driver at the airport and proceeded to drive south to Batu. This is our first destination, Jawa Timur Park 1. Welcome! Looks cool. Worth noting Dutch influence. Kantoor is the Dutch word for "office". Weekday visit comes to a whopping USD$4.60. Two of four credits down! Nicely themed entrance, in any case. Guest star Rick takes in the grand entrance plaza. Jawa (Java) is home to ancient human civilizations (think Java Man), and those aboriginal cultural roots are celebrated in the entrance area. Rick leads us into the park. Rick has a spontaneous harem form around him. We will call him "Big Love Rick". A science center. As you might guess, lots of school kids. Beautiful grounds with Indonesia/Java-themed displays. This was a first. This "ride" was 3 flume logs chained together with an outboard motor on the lead log. Theming. A patriotic Indonesia display that we did not visit. Everything I know about early Indonesian politics I learned from "The Year of Living Dangerously". Animatronics gone bad. Ulat Coaster was not down, but actually operating, but no amount of Rick trying to bribe the operator would get him to relax the height restriction. We saw the op almost cave, as the increasing bribes approached his monthly salary. Volcano Coaster down. Looked like fun. Clown does not find Rick tasty. Some weird ass random themeing. Like this. Finally a working credit that will let us ride. Yay! Actually some nice topiary. This seemed to be a seminal moment, when Javans stopping for photos started to get out of hand. I guess Westerners are rare in East Java. My hair is getting frizzy from the humidity. The powered Jet Coaster was fun. There's a water park too. A dark walk through. There were a lot of these around and they were actually decent. Rick and a staffer check their phones. We then headed off to Jawa Timur Park 2, aka Batu Secret Zoo, which has a hotel with strange architecture. Meanwhile, a camel appears to have discovered the new taste sensation that is Rick's arm. That's USD$5.77. Richard B. has commented on the oddity of the "Batu Secret Zoo" name. Not a well-kept secret. You must navigate a meandering zoo to get to the rides. I love primates of all sorts. There were some decent crowds. White wallaby! No idea what the hell these are. We have noticed a fondness for American prairie dogs (or gophers?) at Asian zoos. Shark Coaster credit! We're happy when we see a credit! Apparently your Tinggi has to be 100cm but fortunately they didn't check. And here's an actual highlight: A woodie! Sweet. There are actually 2 wooden mouse coasters in Indonesia. These are actually fun. I liked this one. My favorite is the one at Blackpool. Bizarre tilt-a-whirl. We're getting hungry. Little did we know. Another haunted walk-through. I liked this photo so much I posted it on Facebook at the time. And Jawa Timur Park 2/Batu Secret Zoo wins the award for worst theme park pizza ever. Appears to be a Japanese product. We also had the confusing/annoying must-put-money-on-a-card-to-buy-food-system. Hey, if you're looking for really good theme park pizza, Cheryl and I were at Adventureland in Long Island on Friday. It's definitely pizza parlor quality. Next update: The Sad Beauty of Taman Remaja Surabaya and the new Suruboyo Carnival Night Market. Hope you enjoyed.

Finals, I assume? I've just run the gauntlet myself.

Hey Philrad71, I like your avatar. While I am not familiar with that particular song/album, I do really like a few Belle & Sebastian songs.

I swear, I wasn't fishing for compliments or sympathy. I was just whining. 'Cause I'm a whiner.

^^^LOL Now there's some content I would love to see!

^^^Thanks, Elissa. I still think my reports are boring. Maybe I should go more for a Struffel style. "At 9:53 we left the hotel. At 10:01, we had traveled 1 kilometer. etc."

Great report!

Unfortunately this thread has received little traction (like a lot of my reports), but I'll keep on keepin' on. Thanks for those who've read, and who've commented. My style is just a little too documental, which often makes it boring. Oh, well. We made it back to Jungleland, then whiffed on Bandung Carnival Land, then hit Trans Studio Bandung. We're back at Jungleland, and it's a nice day, but rain still threatens. Everyone was leaving when we were here yesterday in the rain, but now we're here fairly close to opening. So we run through the covered part to get to the coasters as the sky darkens. We had lunch here today or yesterday. Here's a map. Pretty good-sized park. About USD$11 on weekdays! To the Harvest Coaster! In the queue. Now, I had started going back and forth with the park's twitter, saying, "we're almost there!" And the twitter said they were coming to Harvest Coaster to meet us! And that's how we met Widalia Pagun, the park's Digital Marketing and Social Media manager. This was before we met Widalia, waiting in the queue. So Widalia was very excited to meet enthusiasts, or westerners, or both. She had lived in Germany for a while. This was the other credit, closed. Snake Coaster, a Zierer Force 2, apparently has footer problems because the ground is too saturated. We learned that Bogor is nicknamed "The Rain City". So it was appropriately lush. And nicely themed. With some good flats. A ferris wheel. Disk-O Swings And Widalia insisted we go on the Air Race. That was my last time, everyone. And a dark ride. And Widalia gave us some swag, like this! And this! She even went out to lunch with us! Check out her tweets at @JungleLand_Indo ! Sadly, we don't have a picture. Back on the road, about 2-3 hours give or take 5 hours for traffic. Funny sticker. After a zillion hours of driving in traffic, we arrived at Bandung Carnival Land to find it closed. So it was on to... Trans Studio Indoor Theme Park! This is in a mall, but it's huge. This is the ground level lobby. First stop was the Premier launch coaster, Yamaha Racing Coaster. This is by far the best coaster in Indonesia. As you know, my camera sucks at night, but here are shots. It's a bit like the defunct Speed The Ride and Big Apple Coaster with indoor stations and coasters that go outside. And there is great themeing on the side of the building where the ride shoots out. Decent ride. Here is the upstairs lobby area. And sort of a midway, which was cool. There is a lot going on in this park, but of course we were j-lagged and completely out of it. They had a pretty good "small world" ride. With Indonesian Elvis. Small World of Indonesia And a Baskin-Robbins sponsorship! Here was the Jurassic section. We paused for a photo. Then went for the flying ships. I love these rides that track on the roof. Cheryl heading up the stairs. Our chariot. And some pirate ship views. Sorry about my terrible night camera. A shoot-the-chutes. We should have done it as it goes through a plane wreck. I think that's what it is. The park is really well done, but I did have to roll my eyes when I saw the "Harry Potter Ripoff" section. Wizard Battle! My only other complaint was the money card system. You needed to use a card to pay for stuff, but the charging stations all seemed to be closed or down. I can't remember if you could get a refund on the balance. I think you could. Apparently it's all about keeping control of the cash so employees don't steal. We did encounter many places with such card systems. They had a really good store. And I got my shirt! We left around closing time, went to the mall food court, and I scored a waffle! Here was another no-cash card system. All in all a good visit. Next chapter: Watch us travel really far to not get a credit!

Taking a break from grading papers, even though I only have 8 million more to do. Okay, from Dunia Fantasi we drove south, out of Jakarta, to Bogor, which was about 2 hours away, give or take 5 hours for traffic. I'm serious. Indonesia is THE worst traffic country in the world. So we finally made it to Jungleland, and of course the skies opened up. Heading to Jungleland in Bogor and it's threatening to rain, more so as we get closer. We make it to the globe and the covered entrance area (common at Asian theme parks). For some reason, my photos with actual rain are all in the car, but it was really pouring while we waited here for it to let up. And it pretty much starts to pour at this point. But we see some decent theming in this area, which is mostly restaurants and some shops and kiosks. We had a decent meal, but it was difficult to communicate with wait staff. It looks pretty good. But the rain doesn't stop and we give up and head to the hotel. It's too close to closing time to hope that rides will reopen. Now forgive me, but I have to spend some time on our hotel, the Novotel Bogor. For one thing, I got this really cool night shot of a sconce with wildlife. Cheryl and I got up really early to get a run in at the gym, and we were really taken by the lush grounds. Apparently Bogor was the summer residence for the Governor when the Dutch held Indonesia. The hotel is actually the "Novotel Bogor Golf Resort & Convention Center". And the grounds are really lovely. We had to meander around the property to find the gym and there was a surprise at every turn. This is a view back to the hotel. So nice. A little man-made brook ran through the property. There was a kids' obstacle course. We finally got to the fitness area and there was this gorgeous pool. Lush trees line the path as we head back after the workout. Then it was into our car and off to: Taman Safari Indonesia. Our plan had been to go straight to the rides but somehow our driver snookered us into doing the safari. Note the higher prices for international guests. Malam is noon and siang is evening. This was not in the plan because we needed to drive to another park and another city today, but we didn't regret it. I loved these things when I was a kid. Anyone remember Jungle Habitat in NJ? They were selling tons of carrots outside the gates of the park and now we realized why. You can open your windows and feed these wild animals. Uh, now close window and do not feed carrots, or arms. Rhinos. We've already seen 2 of the Big 5. World's Deadliest Animatronic. Crocs. Three of the Big 5! Well, technically no, as these are Asian elephants. Whoa. We were stuck behind these guys for a few minutes. And again, where are we? Taman Safari Indonesia! Our first selfie in front of the sign. And another as the herd of elephants came walking through the amusement area entrance. This was where the elephants hang out, apparently. This shot is from a bit later, when you could go for rides. The keepers were letting people take pictures and stuff. Time for rides? It wasn't exactly easy to find the rides. Finally, THE coaster. It wasn't the one we had been looking for. Always satisfying to report a change to rcdb, although I wasn't particularly happy to trade a roller for a powered. Random bumper car picture. Goodbye, Jet Coasters, hello, Mining Coaster. There were guys working up there. Scheduled maintenance. They were just cleaning the train, rubbing it down with rags. Finally a staffer told us that they would open about 45 minutes later. Ugh. My guidebook had warned us: Indonesia's sense of time is different and they don't see time as a limited resource. We tried to relax and go with it. In fact, it was quite liberating. If we made arrangements with a driver for 9AM, we didn't jump up from breakfast to be there on the dot. We could linger over an extra cup of coffee and the driver and hotel staff wouldn't bat an eye when we showed 5 or 15 minutes late. We walked around. Nothing else was running and we were the only ones in the park. This is what happens when you don't understand the fine print on the website. When the website is working, that is. Other tourists who waited for this coaster to open. Eventually more guests arrived. There was a train. But every time we walked by it had just left the station. Alternative transport. Yay!!! Finally opened! And I don't count powereds. But Rick does! It was actually a really fun ride and we got 3 circuits. Okay, next update will be the return to rainy Jungleland!

^^^I think it was actually more like milk tea or bubble tea than coffee. I had read about it in the guide book that this was a popular flavor so I wanted to try it anyway. It wasn't bad, but yeah, it sounds sorta bad.

Click here for Jakarta Mall Parks Update on Page 6! We spent Spring Break in Indonesia, the 4th largest country in the world, by population, and the largest Muslim nation in the world, by population. I know that this is a theme park forum, but I do want to address some issues raised by our choice of destination, given recent events. You may have noticed some recent articles in the news about Indonesia's execution of a group of drug smugglers known as the Bali 9. Two Australians, the ringleaders, were among the Bali 9, and they have been awaiting execution for years. Many Australians, who are important to the Indonesian tourism industry, were starting to talk about boycotting Indonesia while we were preparing to go on the trip. Indonesia abruptly began preparing for the executions after years of leaving the situation in limbo. Some of those Australians expressing boycott opinions are valued TPR friends. Australia was and is justifiably pissed off, as were/are several other affected nations. We admit to being concerned, but not outraged. Maybe we're moral cowards. We had already bought our tickets and had made all of our arrangements. We also naively thought that Indonesia wasn't really going to execute the Bali 9. I read about the oft-delayed executions every day leading up to our trip. The Bali 9 had been in prison for more than 10 years. Indonesia did execute 8 of the Bali 9, however, by firing squad. Fortunately the executions happened after we had returned home. Part of me certainly understands those calling for a boycott, but another part of me feels that the "West" needs to continue to reach out to Indonesia and help it along the path to economic development. The average Indonesian has about a fifth of the purchasing power that typical Americans and Australians do. I don't think it's okay to execute non-violent drug smugglers. I've never had very strong feelings one way or another on capital punishment, but I know that we generally reserve that punishment for murderers in the U.S. Moreover, some of the news about judicial corruption related to the Bali 9 trials is shocking. Several defendants said that they were offered less severe punishments in exchange for massive cash payments to judges. Several commentators are saying that Indonesia's president used the executions to help himself politically. That the smugglers were trying to remove the heroin from Indonesia to Australia doesn't really support the president's stated justification for the executions, that drugs are a scourge in Indonesia that must be stopped. In fact the heroin came from Thailand, and Indonesia was just a way-station en route to Australia. Ironically, Indonesia's president has asked for leniency for Indonesians on death row in other nations. Nonetheless, you have to admit that you're tempting fate if you smuggle heroin in a country where the stated penalty for such a crime is death by firing squad. This doesn't justify the executions, but the whole thing was preventable. Sorry for being longwinded, but I've been thinking about this stuff for a while and I've never really expressed my thoughts until now. On to theme parks! Okay, most jarring transition ever. Indonesia was nice! We enjoyed the food and the people were very nice. They're pretty reserved. But we had a lot of fun! Here's our first park, Dunia Fantasi, aka Dufan! Used our coupons for upgrades to Tokyo. There's the first leg. Second leg was on one of ANA's 787s! Exciting. After a night at the Sheraton, we're at Dufan. There's the weird mascot guy. Dufan is the big amusement park in Jakarta proper. I think our working estimate was about 13,000 Indonesian rupiyah to USD$1, so we're talking about $14 to get in for adults on a weekday. We did not get the premium package with lounge and welcome drink. We never did figure out what this was for. No straws with your apple juice, no guns, no cats, no giant pills washed down with wine, okay to hold hands with children, okay to bring shopping bags inside, but no balancing bicycles on top of scooters. Entrance fountain. And our first queue just before the park opened. Not too bad, but it was really really hot and humid. It's a fairly attractive park, even if the rides were very standard. Some of the nooks and crannies were beautiful. There was some okay themeing. Some more nice jungle areas. We did see workers replacing stones in areas like these. There has to be an "America"-themed section. And there's Rick! Just slap some old wood on things. The food stands were interesting but a littke despressing. Halal. You won't find any pork additives here. Roughly translates to "Planet Meatball". Roughly translates to "Pop Noodles". Avocado is a "sweet" flavor here. I had one. Not bad on a scorching day. Roughly translates to "McDonald's". They even collected for Ronald McDonald House in Indonesia. We enjoyed McDonald's because of the air conditioning. What's this? Indonesia's version of It's a Small World. I did an entire ride through video with the GoPro. Need to see if it's worth showing to Robb. This was closed when we first came by but opened later. It was an extremely weird dark ride. Crazy dark ride troll things. For some reason I don't seem to have a picture of the kiddie. But here's the Boomerang. Surprisingly not too painful. We did not wait for the next scheduled Ice Age 4-D show. Theme park mosque! I know, a little boring. But there's a lot more to come, not mention my fellow stars, Cheryl and RICK! See you for the next installment, when we drive from Jakarta to Bogor! Hope you enjoy it!

Park has announced May 22nd as opening day for the coaster. If someone needs help with Long Island Railroad, I can help. I work at the college across the street from Adventureland. School will be out by then, but I plan to come in to work to get some rides in!

I think this is my first actual IOA shirt. The others just say Universal and/or the attraction.

From our trip last Fall to some of the southern and eastern German parks.

One of several Voyage shirts I have.

The park isn't as great as it used to be, but still with a visit on a Scandinavia tour. Hard to believe that I hit #500 there, which was 600 coasters ago.

This was, oddly enough, one of my first "aspirations" as a coaster lover. When I lived in Pittsburgh and first joined ACE in the mid-1990s (lots of coaster fans in that OH-PA region) and couldn't afford to travel at all, Rollercoaster Magazine ran a great feature on how this had been saved from Crystal Beach and how great it was running. It really made me want to travel to ride!

Greeting from Texas! Here for work.

One of the nicest Six Flags!