Back to Pontianak - Indonesia

Side story to my previous post where I mentioned the taxi that brought us to Singkawang. I could use the same taxi company. But I realized that they don't actually have the taxis but they are the middle man who took orders and outsourced it to drivers. The young driver that took us from Pontianak was a bit of a hasty driver. He may be experienced but I didn't like the idea of sitting in the car with a F1 driver. 😅

So after a careful consideration, we asked the receptionist of Grand Mandarin Inn hotel where we stayed. She gave us a business card and pointed to one of the phone numbers printed there. I contacted them to ask for price and then scheduled pick up for the following day.

From our experience with the ride from Pontianak, we would have to share our ride with other passengers. So even though we wanted to leave at 10 am but in the end we were offered a ride at 9 am because the other passenger needed to get to airport.

On the morning we were scheduled to leave, the driver called and confirm our ride. We were taking shower after breakfast when the driver called and asked whether he could come pick us up. It was just after 8 ! Apparently he wanted to pick up the other passenger at 9 so he wanted to know if he could pick us up earlier. I told him I'd let him know when we were ready.

So slightly after 9, we were already on the road. Unlike the previous driver, this driver was calm and careful. Obviously he won't make it as a Fast and Furious driver but he was suitable as a taxi driver. The car he used was bigger and higher like the SUV type of car. It gave us better view of the road with plenty of baggage space for the other passenger who brought one big suitcase.

Traffic was pretty light that day. We were able to make a stop halfway through our trip and it was still too early for lunch. But we ate the snacks we bought this morning and we stayed in the car while the driver and the other passenger went down.

This was the phone number for Palapa Taxi +62 821 4876 8888. At the time we used the service, it cost us IDR 160,000 (IDR 10.05).