Indonesia Discovery Guide

Indonesia is the largest archipelago on earth, seventeen thousand-plus islands strung 5,000 kilometres along the equator, and no two trips here resemble each other. Bali deserves its reputation but is the least representative island in the country. Java has Borobudur, Prambanan and volcanoes you climb before dawn; Sumatra has orangutans and Lake Toba; Flores has Komodo and the coloured crater lakes of Kelimutu; Sulawesi has Tana Toraja and world-class diving.

The main travel issue

It is width. Flying between islands is unavoidable at that scale, domestic seats need booking ahead around public holidays, and low-cost baggage rules are strict. Temperature barely moves on the equator, so the real question is rain.

The solution

Pick two islands and no more, travel between May and September, the reliable dry window for Java, Bali, Lombok, Flores and Komodo, and use Java's genuinely good rail network where it exists -- it exists nowhere else.

• Java
• Kalimantan
• Lesser Sunda Islands
• Maluku Islands
• Sulawesi
• Sumatra
• Western New Guinea

If you have two weeks

Java and Bali together. Yogyakarta for Borobudur and Prambanan, an overnight at Bromo or Ijen for the sunrise and the blue flames, then across to Bali for the interior around Ubud and a few days on a coast. The train down Java is comfortable and a trip in itself.

If you want to dive

Raja Ampat in West Papua has the highest recorded marine biodiversity on earth. Komodo has current-swept reefs and mantas, Bunaken has walls, and the Banda islands have almost nobody on them. Liveaboards are the usual way to reach the best of it.

If you want volcanoes

Indonesia has around 130 active ones. Bromo for the caldera at dawn, Ijen for the sulphur miners and the electric-blue flames burning at night, Rinjani on Lombok for a serious three-day trek, and Merapi above Yogyakarta for the most dangerous of them.

If you want culture rather than beaches

Tana Toraja in Sulawesi, where funerals last days and the dead are kept and later exhumed and re-dressed; Yogyakarta for batik, gamelan and the sultan’s court; and the Baduy of west Java, who have chosen to live without modern technology.

Indonesia is the fourth most populous country on earth, assembled from hundreds of ethnic groups that had never been a single polity before the twentieth century, and the effort of holding it together shows in almost every institution.

Pancasila

The five founding principles — belief in one God, humanity, unity, democracy and social justice — are the state philosophy, taught in every school, and the deliberate compromise that allowed a Muslim-majority country to be constitutionally non-theocratic. Every citizen must register one of six recognised religions.

Gotong royong

Mutual assistance, communal labour, the expectation that a village turns out together for a task. It is a genuine organising idea in rural life and is invoked constantly in politics.

Indirectness and face

Direct refusal is avoided, disagreement is softened, and public anger loses the person expressing it far more standing than whatever prompted it. A smile can mean amusement, embarrassment or apology. Visitors who raise their voice in a dispute have already lost it.

Bali as the exception

Hindu Bali, with its temple calendar, caste remnants and daily offerings on every doorstep, is not representative of Indonesia and Balinese will say so. It is one of the few places where Hinduism survived the arrival of Islam, and it survived by retreating to an island.

Bali carries a load that is visibly beyond what the island can absorb: water tables falling, traffic in the south, and a waste system that cannot cope with what arrives. Going in the shoulder season, staying in the north or east, and using local warungs and family homestays rather than international chains all help. A tourist levy applies on arrival in Bali and funds conservation.

Water is the constraint. Refill rather than buying bottled — refill stations are common now — and be aware that a resort pool and a rice terrace are drawing on the same aquifer.

Orangutan and elephant tourism needs care. Avoid anywhere offering contact, feeding or photographs with primates, and choose rehabilitation centres and national park trekking with licensed guides in Sumatra and Kalimantan. The same applies to captive civets on coffee plantations — kopi luwak produced from caged animals is a welfare problem and is widely sold as though it were not.

Reefs across the country are under pressure from bleaching and from anchor and fin damage. Use operators with mooring buoys, keep off the coral, and take reef-safe sunscreen.

Indonesia sits on the equator, so temperature barely changes and the question is rain. Most of the country runs a dry season from May to September and a wet season from October to April, with regional exceptions that matter.

May to September is the reliable window for Java, Bali, Lombok, Flores and Komodo: less rain, calmer seas, better visibility for diving, and the best chance of a clear sunrise from a volcano. July and August are peak season, with Bali and the Gili islands full and prices at their highest.

October to April brings heavy afternoon downpours rather than all-day rain, and the landscape is at its greenest. Diving visibility drops and some boat routes to the smaller islands suspend.

The exceptions: the Maluku islands and parts of Sulawesi run the opposite pattern, wettest between June and August. Raja Ampat is best from October to April. Check the specific island rather than the country.

What a day costs, by how you travel

Relative cost across the country

Indonesia is inexpensive, and the single largest variable is internal flights: the country is enormous, and crossing it costs more than anything you will do once there.