Get your kicks on Java's northen coast 'Route 66'
Get your kicks on Java's northen coast 'Route 66'
By John Aglionby
THE longest rollercoaster ride at Fantasy World in North
Jakarta lasts barely a minute. The thrills are many and,
thankfully, the spills are very few. However for those brave, or
perhaps foolhardy, enough to want more spills than thrills there
is an alternative very close at hand.
That is to drive along the north coast of Java, Indonesia's
version of Route 66. The 500-kilometer trip to Semarang sounds
innocuous enough, particularly while purring along the smooth
toll road to Cikampek at more than 100 kilometers per hour.
But that is just the calm before the storm, the haul to the
top of the rollercoaster before the first heart-stopping plunge.
And what a plunge it is. At the first corner after coming off
the toll road my driver, Budi, decided there was enough of a gap
to overtake two double-trailer trucks before the oncoming bus'
headlights became imprinted on our windshield.
My right foot automatically went for an imaginary brake pedal
to say no. But there was no response. With the Kijang's engine
groaning at the strain and his body hunched over the steering
wheel, Budi urged the car on, talking to it as a jockey would to
a racehorse.
We made it. Just. And the next maneuver and the one after
that. "If you don't take advantage of even a quarter of an
opportunity it'll take forever to get there," was Budi's defense
of his driving strategy.
After a couple of hours of this real-life amusement arcade of
a journey, where one cannot just put another coin in the slot to
get going again after a crash, I realized he was right.
The slowest vehicles on the road are the hundreds and hundreds
of trucks shifting cattle, timber, cement and anything else you'd
care to mention from one end of Java to the other. It would be
perfectly possible to just sit behind one and turn up safe and
sound at the other end.
But it would take days. Therefore, at the risk of casting a
modicum of discretion aside, I told Budi to use a touch of valor.
Indonesia's bus drivers, however, clearly have difficulty
knowing when a touch of valor becomes complete madness. Many of
them seem to have little use for the accelerator pedal, once they
have put it flat to the floor, that is.
For them the trip is not a rollercoaster but more of a slalom
race, weaving in and out of the vehicles that happen to be in
their way. And as with skiers hurtling down a mountain, one or
two of the gates get hit.
I lost count of the number of wrecks I saw. One would have
thought these burned shells of once proud-looking vehicles would
act as monuments, a reminder that arriving half an hour later is
better than not arriving at all.
Oh no. If anything it seems to be the opposite. The wrecks of
the dead seem to goad the living into attempting even madder
feats of daring-do.
Unlike skiers, the buses do not travel alone. Tailgating is
all the rage, as if it were safer to travel in a group than by
oneself. And there is nothing other roadusers can do than
accommodate the whims of these maniacs.
On more than one occasion I was jolted from a fitful doze as
Budi slammed on the brakes. Coming toward us was a procession of
buses, overtaking a slower convoy of trucks that had the temerity
to delay them.
It seems the first law of the road is that size is everything.
Buses are bigger than Kijangs so Kijangs, despite having the
right of way, have to give way to buses.
Even when buses are not bearing down on one, high speeds are
often impossible because of the state of the road. Rarely more
than one lane in each direction, the highway at times becomes
remarkably like a railway in that there are grooves where the
surface has subsided under the weight of the traffic.
Despite all these impediments I arrived in one piece, although
I had missed enough heartbeats to last a lifetime. And I got home
safely as well. But I am not a cat and I do not have nine lives.
So I think next time I will fly.