How to Go to Borobudur Temple with Yogyakarta Local Bus

Yap, this gonna be a simple and often question that I heard from my guests on my lovely-lovely Boma House,

“Boma how to go to Borobudur easily, and yeah we need in a CHEAP WAY”

Looks like familiar with a word EASY and CHEAP so I will tell you how. First thing first, I know that may this gonna be your first time to go to Jogja and you may curious about how is this city looks like, am I save to get around, how is the food, how is the transportation, and bla bla bla. Here you should know that my city is soooo special, better than Jakarta and Bali here we’ve got almost everything are cheap especially the food, so your USD8/day fee of being a barista or supermarket officer in your country will feed you for 1 day, I know you getting surprise and shock but this is truth!

>> also read how to spell Yogyakarta city name correctly

Back to the question How to go to Borobudur Temple with Yogyakarta local bus, here our transportation system is classify into several vehicle that you use such as: Taxi, Becak (3 wheels pedicab), Andong (horse carriage), Local Bus, Trans Jogja, Go-jek (online motor taxi), and car-motor bike rental. Now I’m gonna tell you 2 cheap transportation option that you consider:

• Rent a scooter – renting a scooter is the most efficient and cheap option that you can try, in a low season (January – May) + (August – November) you will get 1 day scooter for IDR50k to IDR60k but price will increase around IDR80k – IDR100k in holiday such as (May – July) + (December – January). With a scooter that you rent for 24 hours you can go to 3 to 4 different places in Yogyakarta even in Gunung Kidul area which little bit difficult to explore by bus, especially the lovely beach like Drini, Pok Tunggal, Ngobaran, and Wedi Ombo than floating with a wire in a Goa Pindul (Pindul Cave). The easy way to go to Borobudur is just find the Jalan Magelang (cause Borobudur is located near Magelang City) than ride it carefully for about 1 hour and see the big sign of “Welcome to Borobudur Temple” | Suggestion – please prepare your international motor driving license or you will get trouble with Indonesian police officer and the last ticket entrance is at 5 pm and everybody should go out at 6pm
• Go with local bus – from wherever you stay just ask your hotel or hostel owner the way to go to Trans Jogja bus stop, through this bus you only pay once even you have to change your bus (costs around IDR3500), ask the bus officer what bus number to go to Jombor Bus Terminal, here I’m not sure that every bus stop officer can speak english fluently but I’m sure they are kind and will help you. When you arrive in Jombor Bus terminal you can go with any bus which is go to Borobudur temple (cost around IDR20k – 25k) | Suggestion – always prepare SMALL MONEY especially for he local bus from Jombor Bus Terminal to go to Borobudur Terminal or they will not give you the change

“If you are a student, bring your student card to get 50% entrance fee discount or you should pay 10x than the local did”

Another thing that you also need to consider when you go to Borobudur are:

• So many old lady will offering you to buy Salak (lovely fruit with dark brown skin), I suggest you to buy this fruit but don’t pay them if they ask you to pay over than IDR10k – 15k/kg
• So many old lady offering you to buy the Bodobudur miniature, when you interesting to buy try them to bargain about 30-40% discount but if you wouldn’t just say “Tidak, Terima Kasih” (Bahasa) or “Mboten, Matur Nuwun” (Javanese)
• Be prepare of getting a celebrity in this temple, the worst season of visiting Borobudur is when the school holiday come cause some student will get a task to interview some foreigner and practice their english. For some of you who not used to it I’m sure they will disturbing you but trust me they do it for some school task. In other case some people also want to take picture with you ’cause we really proud if we can take a picture with a blonde tourist, I don’t know why but this kind of experience that I also feel when I was a kid 🙂

All suggestion above is an option to go to Borobudur after sunrise but when you expecting to see the sunrise the only choices are rent a car/scooter or join a sunrise tours. So many tours operator that provided this services you may browse trough internet which is the best for you but in order you falling in love with my article and trust me you can join a sharing tours that I provided, you can browse what you need on my page Yogyakarta Local Tour

Welcome to Jogja and have a good experience in my city!