The chief drama of Indonesia’s capital city is its contrasts, a fascinating collision of East and West. Great rivers of steel, glass and cinder blocks wind through endless expanses of helter-skelter one- and two-story neighborhoods with far too few parks to alleviate the landscape. But few visitors to the “Big Durian” realize that they are able to relax and keep fit even in a city as teeming, hectic and traffic-tangled as Jakarta. Start by checking out the facilities in the following star-properties which possess many of the recreational attributes of full-scale resort hotels. All of the properties, without exception, offer special and very attractive room rates to KITAS and KITAB holders.
Imperial Aryaduta Hotel & Country Club
Pride of place among Jakarta’s leisure hotel properties must go to the Imperial Aryaduta Hotel & Country Club in Karawaci, West Jakarta. Surrounded by four stunning international golf courses, the hotel boasts 197 guestrooms, 9 restaurants and bars, and proximity to one of the megacity’s biggest shopping malls.
The Aryaduta offers a mind-boggling inventory of recreational activities: huge lagoon-style pool, gymnasium, squash, indoor and outdoor basketball courts, indoor and outdoor tennis, table tennis, billiards, indoor badminton courts and a luxurious sauna and spa equipped with massage, steam room and spacious locker area. For something more challenging, there’s horse-riding, a mini soccer field, a jogging track and even an adrenalin-pumping wall to climb.
The Aryaduta’s unique golf packages are designed to satisfy the most discerning golfer. The Imperial Klub Golf, created British designer Desmond Muirhead, commands excellent views over the 18th green. Electric golf carts and well-trained female caddies to assist in navigating the course.
For more information, contact the Imperial Aryaduta Hotel & Country Club, Bulevar Jend. Sudirman, Lippo Karawaci 1300 Tangerang 15811, tel: (021) 546 0101, Fax: (021) 546 0203, email: imperialkrwc@aryaduta.com, website: aryaduta.com.
The Grand Hyatt
One of Asia’s landmarks, the Grand Hyatt on Jl. Thamrin (facing the Hotel Indonesia roundabout) is a luxurious 455-room hotel in the heart of the business district with several high-class restaurants and a mammoth Fountain Lounge which feels like you’re enthroned in a giant spaceship circling over the city. The gardens, swimming pool area, private pavilions are all very elegant and breathtakingly manicured. The hotel’s security and 1000-member staff are extraordinarily efficient and discreet. Asia Magazine consistently awards the Hyatt “the best business hotel in Indonesia.”
The Hyatt’s high-end recreational facilities include a big outdoor swimming pool, squash courts, five tennis and two basketball courts, 800-meter jogging track that completely encircles the hotel’s rooftop garden on the 5th floor.
The Hyatt’s superb fitness center is replete with beautiful polished wood floors, sauna, steam bath, cold plunge pool, whirlpool, Jacuzzi-style shower heads, security lockers and five massage treatment rooms. A café serving juices and light and healthy snacks is near the entrance and a nearby salon expertly dispenses pedicures, manicures and hair styling.
For Jakarta’s other favorite indoor sport, the Sogo shopping mall is literally attached, with supermarkets, brand-name chic boutiques, several outstanding bookstores, stylish cafes, first-class restaurants, moneychangers, internet cafes and communication kiosks.
For more information, contact the Grand Hyatt Jakarta, Jl. M.H. Thamrin, Kav. 28-30,
tel. (021) 390 1234, fax: (021) 3193 5543,
email: info.jakgh@hyattintl.com
website: www.jakarta.grand.hyatt.com
The Sheraton Bandara
The finest of the city’s airport hotels, just three km from the Soekarno-Hatta International, the Sheraton Bandara is built along the shore of a lake and adjacent to a superb golf course.
Definitely not your typical airport hotel. This international five-star business hotel with an unmistakable resort-like ambience has open-air corridors, tennis courts, kid’s playground, fully equipped fitness salon and leafy open grounds with not a skyscraper in sight.
Comfortable a/c rooms incorporate enhanced sound-proofing, great lighting, minibars, 20-channel TV. A spacious spa, in a separate building on the hotel’s south side, is divided into women’s and men’s sections. The whole environs are regal, well-serviced, functional with tasteful furnishings. The nearby golf course is considered to be among Jakarta’s best, selected twice as the venue for the Indonesian Open golf tournament.
An extremely stress-relieving feature is the promenade-cum-jogging track around the property’s perimeter; at night this leisurely lantern-lit walkway gives the hotel a magical romantic atmosphere and probably the reason why the Sheraton Bandara is preferred place to stay for VIPS, journalists and airline crews to unwind.
For just $20 more, you get so much more for your money in this sweet oasis than at the Quality Hotel in the airport’s departure terminal itself. The Sheraton Bandara is the only hotel in Jakarta with an airport lounge where passengers can pre check-in (domestic flights only) as well as take advantage of the hotel’s complimentary shuttle to and from the airport every 15 minutes.
For more information, contact the Sheraton Bandara, tel. (021) 559 7777, fax (021) 559 7676,
email: sheraton.bandara@sheraton.com,
website: www.sheraton.com/bandara
The Jakarta Hilton International
The property on which the Jakarta Hilton sits is a private leisure and residential estate so large (13 acres!) that it almost warrants its own zip code. It has so much lush greenery and extensive gardens that you can’t hear the traffic nor smell the exhaust or pollution in one of the most crowded districts of the city. Here in the heart of Jakarta’s CDB you can even see rice paddies. Yet shuttles depart regularly for Semanggi, Blok M and Plaza Senayan!
Though the largest hotel in the city center, the Jakarta Hilton has easy access. Once inside its confines, guests can secretly come and go (the hotel has 1001 doors!) and you can get as lost as you want on the sprawling grounds. For an inner city hotel, it offers a truly astounding array of recreational options – 13 tennis courts, 2 swimming pools, 2 children’s playgrounds and 4 internal squash courts.
For a paltry Rp30,000, guests may also avail themselves of a complete spa facility in the basement - sauna, steam, pool plunge, lockers, as well as reflexology treatments, pedicures and manicures. But what really sets the Jakarta Hilton apart is its vast 1,200-sq-meter Executive Fitness Club with handsome teak floors, modern equipment and facilities, juice bar, locker room, steam room, sauna, cold dip, Jacuzzi and private pool in completely natural surroundings. This was in fact the very first health club established in Jakarta (1972) and it’s still going strong!
The Grand Prix Tennis Tournament is held on the Jakarta Hilton’s courts each year. If the hotel’s 500-meter jogging track is not enough of a workout guests can hop over to nearby Parkir Timor Senayan and huff around a big playing field.
For more information, contact the Jakarta Hilton, tel. (021) 570-3600, fax: (021) 573-3055,
email: jkthilton@jkthilton.com,
website: www. hiltonindonesia.com.
E-mail : pakbill2003@yahoo.com
Copyright@2005 PakBill
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