Adventure Things To Do In Indonesia

Indonesia is a wild and wonderful country with 17,000 islands, and many of the best things to do in Indonesia are off the smack track.

Everyone goes to Bali, which is an awesome island (don’t get me wrong!), but has suffered from over-tourism and overdevelopment for years.

Taking a detour to the other islands of Indonesia, you can see smoking volcanoes, sulfur lakes, pink sandy beaches, tropical rainforests, exotic wildlife and much more.

Because Indonesia is my second home (and my wife’s real home!), we had the privilege of exploring many things in this beautiful country, including some of the most remote Indonesian islands.

The best things to do in Indonesia

1. Going to nature

• Indonesia is one of those countries where you make a mistake if you don’t explore nature.
• Don’t waste time in cities, just go to nature as soon as possible! Of course, there are the islands and the beaches, but there are also all kinds of other landscapes in Indonesia.
• From Sumatra to Papua, you will find a variety of lakes, mountains, rainforests, great rocks, sand dunes and much more.
  Indonesia has colorful blue lakes that are absolutely beautiful. These include Lake Paisu Pok in Banggai Sulawesi, Labuan Cermin in Kalimantan and the smaller Danau Kaco in Sumatra.

2. Climbing volcanoes

• Indonesia has 400 volcanoes, of which up to 130 are active, more than any other country in the world.
• Most of the volcanoes in Indonesia are open to tourists for hiking, and in some of them (such as peak Bromo in Java) you can even walk to the edge of the smoking crater!

This is definitely one of the best things to do in Indonesia! In Bali, the most popular volcano for hiking is peak Batur for sunrise, or if you are really looking for a challenge , you can climb peak Agung.

Two other awesome volcano hikes in other parts of Indonesia are peak Rinjani in Lombok and peak Dukono in the Moluccas, although both can be quite challenging.

3. Visit the waterfalls

• Almost every island in Indonesia has at least great waterfalls if you explore a little.
• Many of the best waterfalls in Indonesia are located in Sumatra and Java, but smaller islands like Bali and Lombok also have excellent ones.
• A great place to hunt waterfalls in Indonesia is the Ciletuh Geopark in West Java, a UNESCO World Heritage geopark with beautiful waterfalls. It can be reached with a half-day trip from Jakarta and there are good places to stay near the waterfalls.

4. Observe the wildlife

• Indonesia has almost 20% of the world’s animal species, so there are a lot of endemic wildlife to see here that can’t be found anywhere else.
• You can observe the largest lizards in the world on Komodo Island, beetle-eyed goblin lemurs in the Tangkoko Reserve in Sulawesi, wild orangutans in Bukit Lawang in Sumatra and, of course, the famous macaques in the Ubud Monkey Forest in Bali.

5. See the volcanic lakes

• Where they have volcanoes, they also have many volcanic lakes and hot springs!
• Some of the hot springs are suitable for swimming, others provide fantastic photos. Probably the most famous volcanic lake in Indonesia is the Kawah Ijen crater in East Java, which is located quite close to Bali.

6. Explore a cave

• Limestone mountains are common in many parts of Indonesia, which means that there are also many spectacular caves.
• You can explore a shiny limestone cave in Rammang in Sulawesi or swim in a blue pool at Rangko Cave in Flores. In Tana Toraja, caves of this type are still used as ceremonial tombs to this day.
• In one of the prehistoric caves of Sulawesi, there is even the oldest known rock art in the world, created by man, which we found absolutely fascinating!

7. Go diving and Snorkeling

• Indonesia is part of the Coral Triangle, a tropical oceanic paradise with the largest number of coral and fish species in the world.
• Needless to say, this is a great place for snorkeling or snorkeling, and you can see all kinds of rare fish, colorful corals, sea turtles, manta rays, and if you’re lucky, you can even swim with a whale shark!

8. Relax on the beaches

• When people think of the beautiful beaches of Asia, they think of the Maldives or Thailand, not Indonesia.
• Indonesian beaches are fantastic, but they tend to be underestimated because many of the really good beaches are hidden in remote and hard-to-reach places. On the plus side, this means that you are more likely to have them to yourself!
• During some explorations, you will find the most beautiful white sand beaches, dazzling pink beaches and black volcanic beaches, as well as first-class surf spots and sometimes very photogenic cliffs, rocks and wrecks.

9. Visit a lighthouse

• Lighthouses are probably the last thing that comes to mind when you think of Indonesia, but there are some beautiful ones.
• Two excellent examples are the Dutch colonial lighthouse on the island of Lengkuas in Belitung and the locally built lighthouse in Pulau Karang in Sumatra.

10. Walking along the terraces

Bali is famous for its green rice terraces, but you can also see picturesque harvest terraces on Java, Lombok and many other islands.

A tropical sunrise is hard to smack, and there are many great places to watch the sunrises scattered around the Indonesian islands.

My first sunrise in Indonesia was at Sanur Beach in Bali, where the combination of a cool morning breeze, birdsong, fishermen wading on the reef and the peak Agung volcano in the distance was simply magical.