The Dieng Plateau is about 150 km from Yogajakarta in central Java. Being 2093 metres above sea level it is a unique part of Java, where everyone wears jackets and woolly hats, and chillies become an even more important part of the diet than at sea level.

The Karimunjawa islands are hard to get to, and very hard to leave. Not just because they are beautiful, sparsely occupied and teeming with sea life, but because the Java sea often puts paid to ferries being able to visit, particularly in the rainy season. I was lucky in getting out to the islands, with a very calm and sunny sailing from the north coast port of Jepara, but I had to return early, on a very choppy voyage, with warnings of bad weather and likely ferry cancellations likely to strand me there for up to a week. The locals told me that two weeks of isolation were not that unusual!