Bandung may very well be known for its mountainous area in West Java, but who knows that in Bandung there is also floating market? Yes, now not only Kalimantan which has floating market in Indonesia. But Bandung, to be exact in Lembang region, has it too as a tourism attraction established just a few years ago. Combined with cool fresh mountain air and great scenery, this artificial floating market has a very unique concept which let you feel like being in a clean, peaceful, and nice-looking village.
An entrance ticket to visit this place is Rp 15.000 per person. When you go inside, you can exchange the ticket with a free welcome drink that is provided, such as coffee late, choco latte, Milo, or lemon tea. This place is big enough and divided into some areas. Indeed, there are some restaurants, but the main point of this place is the “food court” because it’s where the floating market takes place. There are two options from the entrance to go to this area; you can either use the boat service to cross the lake or just walk around the lake which is relatively not too far.
In this floating market area, there a lot of sellers selling their food from their boats, also tables and chairs provided around the lake for the visitors to enjoy the meal. Every transaction made in this place use its own coins, so if you want to buy food here, you have to change your money into “floating market coins”. But I’d suggest you really should mind how much money you want to change in the first place because these coins are non-refundable. Otherwise, you’ll have to end up spending all your coins or bring them home as souvenirs.
Not only doing culinary in the floating market area, there are still a few other things to do. For example, you can hire a paddleboat to go around the lake. If you bring your children with you, they might want to feed the fishes, geese, pick strawberries, etc. If you are interested in trying the ATV, there is also an area track for that.
Overall, this place is great for relaxing with family (especially with kids) or even friends, and recommended place to do culinary, trying many kind of Indonesian street food. Although it’s not anything like the real one, but at least now you can see floating market in Java too.
Written by: Tina P.S, Indonesia
