Manggar is an interesting town to be visited. This town preserve many interesting natural beauty such as beaches, rivers, mangrove, and hills. Beside that Manggar also provides interesting cultural heritage and the most phenomenal one is Laskar Pelangi (Rainbow Troops). This place is where the original story coming from, the Laskar Pelangi movie was also made here, same as the sequeals Sang Pemimpi and Edensor (Laskar Pelangi 2).
Manggar town is second largest town in Belitung with approximately 35.000 population. Manggar is a capital of Belitung Timur regency established since 25 Februari 2003, as result of split from Belitung (West) regency.
TOWN OF 1001 COFFEE SHOPS
The people of Manggar is proudly call their town as the Town of 1001 Coffee Shops. This name is proven by the presence of so many coffee shops in down town of Manggar, very dense compare to the size of the town itself. Those coffee shops mostly placed in the area of Lipat Kajang market.
Even though Belitung is not a producer of coffee, the special mix of coffee from these shops are classy in taste and famously delicious. Having coffee is a tradition for the people of Manggar. These coffee shops are the social meeting points from people of Manggar and Belitung Timur in general from several different backgrounds. If you visit Manggar you must try their coffee.
This tradition already happened since the era of Tin Mining during [orde lama ] until [order baru ] time span. In the past the coffee shops are the meeting point among tin mining labours and the traders from villages surrounding Manggar, taking a break time from their work.
The proud of people of Manggar to the coffee tradition is now monumented into giant coffee cattle and cup metal monument in the down town of Manggar, as you can see at above picture.
SERDANG BEACH
There is no places without beach in Belitung, even in the town of Manggar visitor will find an interesting beach called Serdang Beach, a white sandy beach where hundreds of pine three grown along the beach decorated by hundreds of colourful traditional [katir] fishing boat. If you are a photography hobbyst and interested to capture a colourful subjects, Serdang beach is the destination that you must visit.
Another interesting place in this place is a kind of monuments. The first monument called [Pohon Kata] (tree of words). This is the place where visitor can write any words in a piece of wood and nail it into a wooden frame surrounding the tree. Another monument is a [katir] boat colourful painted and place in the stage of 2 meters high. This monument represents this place as the center of [katir] boats.
NYIUR MELAMBAI
Beside Serdang, there is another beach in the town of Manggar called Nyuir Melambai. This beach is form of a gulf at the foot down of Bukit Samak hill. This beach is quite famous for kite surfing activities. This is the places where the outdoor events usually conducted by people in town. There are also [katir] boat in this beach, but not as many as in Serdang beach.
Every year there is a [katir] boat racing in this beach participated by numbers of traditional fishermans. The big stage is also available for many big events and one of them is Barongsai contest.
SAMAK HILL
If you still do not satisfy seeing the wide open sea from near the beach, lets come to Samak Hill. It is a hill just near the beach, on the above of Nyiur Melambai beach. From the top, you can visit a nice restaurant quite descent facilities where you can have very nice wide open sea view while taking lunch and relax in the restaurant.
In the past Bukit Samak is a residential complex of executives from tin mining company PN Timah, build since Dutch colony. From the landscape it can be seen from nice site plan with wide lot of lands size. There was so many old buildings in this place, unfortunately now the remaining structure left is the foundation only.
BANDOENG LAKE
Other than beach and the hill facing open sea, the beauty of Manggar town is completed by a gulf that almost closed from the sea and form a wide open salt water lake near the down town of Manggar. This lake called Bandung Lake. Along the shore of the lake there are many restaurants where the visitor can enjoy the beautiful view of lake while having lunch or dinner.
One of the interesting in this lake is a floting Marina port, a floating port where some of fibre glass boat parking in the lake. You can rent the boat and take the tour in the sea or river surrounding Manggar. One of the tour program that we recommend you to try is the Mangrove tour at Manggar river.
Comments Manggar Town
Come on when you visit Manggar Belitung Timur for the Sail Indonesia 10-14 October 2015 event there will be many events there. Find the latest information at www.facebook.com/disbudpar.beltim.3
ReplyIt's really impressive that the coffee turned out delicious even though Belitung is not a coffee producing area. But the most important thing is that coffee in Manggar is Art. Really there are so many coffee shops that are the pride of the surrounding community.
Reply