Ujung Kulon National Park

I visited Anak Krakatau (a part of Ujung Kulon National Park) in January 2011 with my brother, my dad, and my uncle. We took a 2D1N tour package that includes a day-trip to Anak Krakatau, a stop at the Anak Krakatau's monitoring office near Carita, and a visit to the historic Dutch lighthouse called Cikoneng on the way back to Jakarta.

We flew to Jakarta from KL one evening and were immediately greeted by our guide (from krakatau-tour.com) and his driver who took us to a nice little hotel in Carita that same evening. Carita was a very small town and not at all touristy at that time. I'm not sure how it is today, but I remember we had to walk quite far from our hotel just to get to the nearest restaurant for dinner. 

The next day, we had a simple hotel breakfast before the guide came to us and brought us to the jetty about 5 mins from the hotel. The boat ride to Anak Krakatau took about 1.5 hours one way, the ride was very bumpy as the ocean waves were very strong, definitely not a ride for those who are prone to seasickness.

We weren't allowed to land on the Anak Krakatau island itself because of the ongoing volcanic activity, so we had to land at one of the islands nearby called Sertung Island. Once arrived, we sat down by the black sandy beach while enjoying the impressive display put by Anak …

Determining how to visit Ujung Kulon was the most complex part of planning my trip to Indonesia in February 2023. In the weeks leading up to my departure, I contacted several tour operators in Carita and even Jakarta to inquire about their itineraries, availability and costs. I was looking for three-day, two-night tours that included Krakatau and the Ujung Kulon peninsula. Several companies answered me, but none with a price lower than 9 million Indonesian rupiahs per person, that is to say more than 800$ CAD, which was considerably higher than the price we were ready to spend for this excursion. It is finally by contacting Sunda Jaya Homestay on WhatsApp that we found the solution. We had to put Krakatau aside, but we could explore the park for three days, including snorkeling, hiking and wildlife viewing, for Rp 8 million for two people. This included a first night at the home stay, a second night on Peucang Island and a last night camping in the park.

But before you can enjoy the park, you must get there. We took a Grab (a local Uber) from downtown Jakarta to the Kalideres bus station, then a bus to Labuhan. From Labuhan, according to Lonely Planet, there is only one bus per day to Tamanjaya. It's a bit of a mystery to me how this part worked out, but I think our guest house had everything organized and the driver was waiting for us. Indeed, in Indonesia, the bus drivers wait …

We visited the Anak Krakatau area in July 2018, and it seems much has changed since Clyde's review below. We accessed the site via the same method: a private 3 hour drive from Jakarta starting at 5am, followed by a bouncing 1.5 hour speedboat ride from Carita Beach. In December 2018, not long after Clyde's visit, the main cone of Anak Krakatau collapsed. A tsunami thundered into the mainland of Java, killing over 400 people and injuring thousands more.

The volcano itself lost about 250m of height, along with all of its trees. The island is now just a barren wasteland of hard-packed ash with canyons riven by rainwater. There's a small beach of ash, but Alert Level 2 means you're not allowed to approach within two kilometres. Around the far side of the island, we could see a large cauldron of steaming sulphur but little other activity, and aside from the waves the whole area was completely silent. Our guide said there are small eruptions once or twice a week, punctuated by the occasional large eruption. After the December tsunami, these have grown less frequent.

The nearby island of Rakata suffered a landslide after the tsunami hit, but was otherwise unaffected. It was still quite green, and we spotted lots of fish while snorkelling and later some large monitor lizards monitored us eating lunch. The other islands that were once Krakatoa had their trees blackened or killed, but are otherwise in the same shapes as earlier.

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I visited this WHS in August 2018. Ujung Kulon National Park is located at the westernmost tip of Java as its name suggests (Ujung Kulon actually means Western Point) and it is made up of Ujung Kulon peninsula low rainforests (home of the last remaining Java rhino) and the volcanic island groups and nature reserves of Krakatoa, Panaitan, Peucang and Honje in the Sunda Strait between the islands of Java and Sumatra.

I visited Krakatoa or Krakatau Nature Reserve as a long private day trip from Jakarta and it turned out to be by far the most dangerous and exhilarating WHS visits so far for a number of reasons. First of all after having booked online well in advance, hell seemed to break loose just before visiting Indonesia with very strong and devastating earthquakes and tsunami alerts all over the country but mostly near Lombok. On top of that, Anak Krakatau or the Child of Krakatau, a volcanic island which emerged from under the sea in 1927 from the caldera formed by the terrible 1883 eruption of Krakatau (which killed more than 30,000 people), got more active than usual and from June till September, molten lava eruptions took place almost on a daily basis with incandescent gases and ash coming out intermittently with occasional 'ballistic rocks' spewing out of the volcano and landing all over the island.

For this reason, we were almost certain that the trip would be cancelled as it involved climbing Anak Krakatau for a …

Despite many trips to Indonesia, I only have seen Jakarta and really wanted to visit this country’s World Heritage Sites especially the nearest one from the chaotic capital, the Ujung Kulon National Park. The inscribed area covered two separate sites, one is the Ujung Kulon National Park which is famous for its mangrove forest and the last place to see the endangered Javanese rhinoceros in the southwest of highly populated Java Island. The other site is the group of volcanic islands of Krakatoa in the middle of Sunda Strait and belong to Bandar Lampung, a city on Sumatra Island. I really wanted to visit Krakatoa since I heard the name of this volcano since my elementary school time, its 1883 eruption story is very well known especially for the Dutch. In October I visited Jakarta again and successfully managed a one-day trip to Krakatoa with the tour company. After some research I found that Krakatoa receives steady number of visitors every day and most of the tour companies are the same. The tour driver picked me up at hotel in Jakarta at 6 AM and drove thru congested morning traffic on the highway to Cilegon before use a small seaside road to the beach town of Carita. The journey was about 2.5 hours, the time I arrived in Carita, I was really hungry. After met tour company manager to make payment, they provided me a breakfast at a restaurant. After meal at 9.30 AM, they took me to the jetty …

Ujung Kulon National Park is one of many Indonesian Beauty. Yet, it takes quite an effort to get there, thus make the park has not been visited as often as it should be.

There are many ways of actually embracing it. Island Hopping, trekking, canoeing & snorkling in and around those small islands. Not to mention spending the night in a simple lodging and have to bring or prepare our own food while there.

Although it is said that the park is the home of the one-horned rhinoceros, but it is not easy to find and see one. Yet many other inhabitants are very easy to find and see.

Ujung Kulon experience is really a great one!

Ujung Kulon is Fantastic! You wouldn't get enough of it in spite the fact that you had everything in it : Rainforest, Corals, Mesmerizing Seaview, vast of biological diversity. All. You name it.

Just back from Ujung Kulon yesterday and my feet's still soaring but my heart is still pounding with happiness. I may didn't go on it's best condition this late December. It's raining every now and then, I hardly get the sunset which supposed to be spectacular. Please come at mid-year, when the weather is quite pleasant.

I went all the places by boat and trekking. Get a bus or drive from Jakarta to Desa Sumur. From Desa Sumur get a 3 hours boat trip to Laban. On the way you could see TamanJaya village, the very west village on Java Island. From Laban go across the rainforest to Pos Karang Ranjang. On rainy season the track might be hellish : thick mud and water to your knees all the way. On dry season it'd be FINE I believe. From Pos Karang Ranjang go further to Cibondawoh beach through another Rainforest. Cibondawoh Beach is astounding with it's high tides,blue water, and pearly beach. That's the end of day 1.

The next day, prepare for a long journey on the seaside. 13 km walking on the seaside from Cibondawoh to Cikeusik. and go further to Pos Cibunar through rocks, rainforest and plain green grass fields. the view along the way is astounding.totally amazing.

at Cibunar, you could go snorkeling …