Denpasar to Bandung - 1st September

Hi Didi! Hi everyone! It's now 4:30 a.m. (two 5:00 a.m. starts in a row!) and I am waiting for a motorcyclist to take me to the airport. The (?-losmen) I'm in is owned by a friend of my aunt's, who has been very helpful. (She's just brought out breakfast, and we are sitting chatting on the front verandah.)

[ I'm now at the airport, waiting to board. ]

To give you some idea of what the temperature is like, it is pleasant at 5-a.m. when travelling on a motorcycle at 60 km/hr wearing a thin cotton shirt! But I'll be in Bundung before it gets too hot, and Bundung is up in the foothills.

My spoken Indonesian is about as good as it was when I was here last, which is a bit depressing as I've been studying the language for two years! But it's improving really fast, and i can *read* it well enough. (Maybe talking to the driver of a motorcycle isn't so easy, especially when you don't want to distract him from the traffic :-)

[ There were tantalising glimpses of mountain peaks looming up out of the clouds on the flight - it's hard to imagine myself crawling up their flanks in a few weeks time! I'm now in transit at Surabaya airport and talking to an Australian businessman. ]

[ I've made it to Bundung; I'll post these cards off and then go buy my maps. The first volcano is Tangkuban Perahu, to the north. ]

Danny