Quick Weekend Escape : Pangalengan – ipadguides

For weekenders, where is the best place to run if you don’t want to be too far from Jakarta?

Peak? Too crowded and congested. Bandung? Especially. Ujung Kulon? Wow, great idea, but the distance and the road is not good. So, where’s the place that’s not too far from Jakarta but can make your mind fresh?

Well, it’s taste. Everyone is different. But I want to share a place that I usually go to when I’m late. Still near Bandung but not in the middle of the city. Precisely in the south of Bandung, Bandung regency. No, not in Ciwidey where you find Kawah Putih. This place is on a different mountain ridge. Yes, this place is famous for its tea gardens and milk production: Pangalengan!

Why do I recommend this place? First, this place is very quiet. You won’t see many tourists here. This place is perfect for being alone with a partner (unfortunately I’m stuck with three of my friends who are single). Second, the view of the tea garden hill here is really long as far as the eye can see! For those of you who work face-to-face with a laptop screen less than half a meter away, this is a necessity. Third, the road here is nice and smooth. About two hours from the city of Bandung. So if you depart from Jakarta around 1 am like me, you will arrive right at sunrise.

Well, if it’s not cloudy like us… *scratches the ground*

Anyway, that afternoon I started moving from Jakarta to pick up my friend who was in Bekasi. Yes, Bekasi, therefore you have to leave the house in the afternoon. Because I know, sometimes the travel time from Jakarta to Bekasi can be longer than from Bekasi to Bandung. If you know what I mean.

And the first few hours I spent with this:

But luckily, I use a Mazda 2 which has features i-STOP, so it doesn’t get tired quickly and saves gas. So, i-STOP this function will be able to turn off the engine temporarily if our vehicle is stopped a lot like a traffic jam like this (the AC is still on). And when we press the brakes, the engine can start again in about 0.3 seconds.

Then also with the security features i-ACTIVESENSE I feel more secure and helped, one of which is the Blind Spot Monitoring System to warn the driver if there is another vehicle in the blind spot (which is not visible in the rearview mirror, usually on the side) with a lighted icon at the bottom of the rearview mirror plus a “beep beep” sound.

Although the journey to Bekasi is quite long, fortunately it is not too tiring with this car.

After eating, picking up another friend of ours who was stuck on a jammed commuter line, and resting a bit, the four of us drove straight to Pangalengan. Even though the four of us are extra-sized humans, this cute car is still comfortable to use and doesn’t behave like a truck carrying sacks of rice crawling up the Cipularang toll road.

Arriving in Bandung, we stopped briefly at our campus in Dayeuhkolot. This area is just getting crowded. It was the day of the grand reunion, but I wasn’t really interested. Maybe if there is a reunion in 10 years I will come, hehe.

The road to Pangalengan is indeed smooth, there may only be a few potholes on Dayeuhkolot to Banjaran because it is often flooded.

The car continued to slide, it was raining heavily, until 3 am (duh, too soon) we arrived at the mosque in the middle of the Cukul tea plantation, Pangalengan. His intention was to lie down in the mosque, but it was still locked. The back seat of the car was folded to become our bed.

Morning came. One of my friends who slept on the terrace of the mosque on the mat (haha!) was woken up by a father who was going to call to prayer at dawn. Pangalengan is cold, but I stay in the car and turn on the AC. Hey, aren’t you cold? No, the temperature in the car will still be right because there is a Climate Control AC feature that will adjust the temperature outside and inside so that we stay comfortable. Still half conscious, my friend got up and took ablution, then got into the car to continue sleeping…until my other friend threw ‘wind’ in the car and immediately made our eyes aware of it.

Whoops!

Rain stops. But the sun did not show the bridge of his nose. We immediately got ready to explore Pangalengan according to our plan. Want to know the plan? First, arrive at this mosque safely, take pictures of the sunrise, find a fry cook, and go home.

Literally a quick escape.

Okay, apart from following my plan of just taking a sunrise photo of fried food (but, seriously, fried food and coffee plus the morning mist in this tea garden is heaven, friend), what else can you do in Pangalengan? You could have… :

• Rafting on the river
• Camping on the edge of Situ Cileunca or around the foot of Mount Tilu
• Wander the Malabar Tea Gardens, Kertasari Tea Gardens, and Cukul Tea Gardens. Each has a different landscape character. Drinking tea at a roadside shop, while eating fried foods (teteup)
• Bosscha Monument Cemetery Park for those who like history
• Chat with the tea garden farmers, be grateful when you are harvesting.
• Dating, if you have a boyfriend….

Ehm, anyway if it’s not cloudy, you can see a view of the tea garden and a blur like this, I took it a few years ago when I was still living in Bandung *drumroll*

Here are photos of our (unfortunately) cloudy morning in Pangalengan

If you’re on a road trip like this, it’s best to listen to country songs that are hotbeat so I feel like a hipster kid walking on America’s Route 66, haha. Now on the mazda 2 it’s really easy because there are MZD CONNCECT features (this is like a car’s OS, where you can adjust all settings including audio features) and commander control on the touchscreen screen, play button near the handbrake, and on the steering wheel itself. Starting from radio, cd, navigation, plug into smartphone, you can play your favorite playlist right away!

So, have you got any plans this weekend? Instead of going to the mall all the time, it’s better to take a walk like me to Pangalengan hehe. And if you want to try this Mazda 2 car, feel free to go directly to Mazda’s website. You can ask for a test drive of the car!

Terrific greetings!

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