Exploring the sights of Baucau including Venilale and Baguia

Exploring the municipality of Baucau, including Timor-Leste's second city, Baucau, and other places worth visiting including Venilale, Baguia, Laga, Vermasse and Gariuai.

More information on Baucau - https://exploringtimor.com/baucau/

Website - www.exploringtimor.com

TikTok - https://www.tiktok.com/@exploringtimor

YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@ExploringTimorLeste

Books - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0D82D3TBJ

Transcript

Jonty: 0:06

Bondi. Welcome to exploring Tim Este, the podcast that talks about Southeast Asia's best kept travel secret. I'm your host Jte, and I'll share firsthand insights, expert interviews and practical travel tips. Whether you're a traveler, a cultural lover, or just curious about places rarely covered in the mainstream. You're in the right place. Let's explore two more. Less day. Today's episode I am gonna talk about Val Cal. Which is both the second largest city in Timor-Leste, and it's the name of a beautiful municipality, one of the 13 regions within Timor-Leste also home to Ali and Bgea, which also were worth visiting. So I'll talk to you a little bit about the city and then some of the things you can see near Baal. Baal was about three hours east of Dili. It's a beautiful drive through Manto into Baal. It is one of the best roads in the country, both in terms of infrastructure being relatively new and well designed, and also in terms of the incredible views as you hug the coast Baal although it is the second city in Tim Leste, is about one 15th the size of Dili's. It's quite a different experience. Pretty much everything that tourists want to see is in old Baal, which is the northern end of town. New Baal is about 10 minutes drive up the hillside to the south. New Boha is a typical Timor town. There's a large market, there's a stadium, but there's not a lot from a tourist perspective, so you'll probably be spending most of your time downtown. There's quite a lot to see. It's definitely worth at least half a day to walk around and see the sites. My favorite site is the old market. This is a beautiful building built by the Portuguese between 1928 and 1934 as part of a grandma master plan for the town. Back in Portuguese days, Bal was home to the main airport for Timor Lester, not the one in Dili. It still exists. It's still used, but not by commercial flights. The market was partially destroyed during World War ii, before being rebuilt in the seventies. It then fell into disrepair, but within the last 10 years, it's been renovated. It has some lovely formal gardens around the back, and it's just a very colorful and interesting building to explore that may not always be open, but it's worth walking all the way around to checking if the gates are open as often at least one is open. A bit of a hidden spot that I found by accident is calve. This is a collection of shrines on the hillside. About 10 minutes walk from the center of old Bau. So if you head out up the road to the east and then take a little turn off, it is marked on Google Maps. Now this is interesting both for the collection of Catholic shrines. It's a beautiful statue with the Virgin Mary and it also offers probably the best views. Of the town and of the coastline. So you get spectacular views there looking out towards Waterbury Beach and you can see back towards the city center of Auo. So I highly recommend visiting there Back in old Auo sent Anthony Cathedral is relatively new, but it's quite a nice cathedral

3:09

Balco

Jonty: 3:09

is famous, if I can use that word for its swimming pool. It's probably one of the best in the country, although there's not a huge amount of competition. But it is a beautiful Portuguese era pool that was built by the nearby Posada which is quite art market accommodation. Famous for its pastel, pink color that was built in the 1950s. And so they built the posada where you can stay now. And they built the swimming pool, the bassal. It's open five days a week, and it only costs 50 cents to go and swim in this beautiful natural spring fed pool. Just bear in mind that on Mondays and Thursdays they drain the pool, which is quite interesting just to see an empty concrete pool. But you can't swim those days. So best to go on the other days. Now from be cow, if you head north towards the coast, the road is quite winding but reasonable a prominent landmark on the way is, fat Domine, which is an unusual rock arch with a tree growing on top. It's quite photogenic. It's not very well marked, but if you're heading towards water bouch, you will drive past it on the right Water. Bo Beach is a very picture risk, palm lined beach, but it's best to stay on the beach, not go into the waters as crocodiles are often seen there on my. First visit there, there was a four or five meter crocodile happily swam by, and so I'd stay out of the water, but it's definitely worth visiting. Waterbury Beach is a beautiful place. Heading out to the east of Bacao, there is a large military cemetery, which is one of two Indonesian military cemeteries in Timor-Leste. Originally there were 15, but they've consolidated them down to two to make them easier to maintain. So there's about 300 graves there. Quite a lot of those were relocated from other sites around Timor, and it's very. Different to a standard Timor East Cemetery. It's very orderly, lots of white crosses, quite atmospheric, heading south inland from Bacao. You head towards VE on the way. There are some Japanese tunnels. So during World War ii, the Japanese invaded Timor. There was a series of tunnels dug here, probably more likely by the Timorese locals rather than the Japanese. But they're interconnected and they're called either Japanese tunnels or the seven caves because there are seven interconnected tunnels which are worth an explore. Ali itself is a pleasant small town, about an hour's drive south of Baal that also has some nice Portuguese colonial architecture, and there are some very photogenic rice fields and terraces nearby. During the Portuguese era, ven was a popular place for Portuguese to escape the heat of the coast. And there was an old royal school, the Escal do Reno which was one of only two public schools in the country when it opened in the 1930s and during the Indonesia occupation, it was turned into an orphanage. The school is now a school. The building's seen better days, but it is quite atmospheric and definitely worth a visit. Opposite. It is the main Catholic cathedral and there are large local markets held in town on Wednesdays and Saturdays. There's actually quite a lot to do in Seaga around ve There's an interesting lake. There's some natural hot springs. It's a natural bridge. So it is worth some time there if you're having an extended stay in Timor. Couple other towns worth noting in Baal. So Ver Massi is the first town you will enter when you cross into Baal from Manto. That has two main sites. There's quite an attractive church, which has seen better days. And then on the hillside above town, other remains of a Portuguese era of fault. There's not much left of the fort itself, but it does offer great views across the surrounding landscape of the Massi River. Also on the way to Ven is a small town called Gar Ear, which is easy to drive through but it is home to a giant colony of fruit bats, which is about five minutes walk behind the dark yellow church, which is quite an unusual design compared to most TIMOs churches, and it also is home to a vast cemetery, which is probably the most cynically located in the country with great views of matter. BN in the distance matter. BN is the second highest peak in Timor. A bit of an unknown gem. And again, one that's easy to miss if you're just driving through. But the town of lagger, which is to the east of Baal, actually has quite a lot to do if you head off the main road. On the main road you will see the local church built in the seventies, which is very blue, and that's quite an obvious landmark. Across the road from

7:24

it is a monument depicting.

Jonty: 7:25

Tim's being introduced to Catholicism by Portuguese Friar. Now if you take the parallel road up the hillside, there's the Portuguese era Lagger Fault, which is quite well-preserved with a standard square design with two round towers on opposite corners. Then if you head up the road towards Bgea inland, there's a series of 14 white crosses marking the stations of the cross, and you get beautiful views from that short walk. And if you continue up that road, there's a site with many Luli, a sacred Timorese houses, and it's probably the best places I've seen in the country to see them because there are, it's probably half a dozen luli and they range in design from traditional style thatch roof to more modern corrugated roofs. So it's quite interesting to different architecture over time. And if you continue up that road towards bigge, there's a huge and very impressive cemetery dedicated to the martyrs of the struggle for timor's independence from Indonesia. Heading up to Bagge is a very scenic, but quite a challenging drive. Now, when I last visited in late 2024, there was a lot of work going on the road, which will improve things, but certainly as you head further in land, the road gets increasingly rough. You will need a decent four wheel drive or a motorbike with the skills to. Driving motorbike across some very challenging stretches of road, but there's a number of interesting villages you'll pass through on the way And there are very atmospheric ruins of Na Banda Portuguese School, which is about a kilometer before bag year. BGE is quite a challenge to reach, but it is the hub for those who are interested in hiking up mat bien and is also home to one the best faults in the country, which was built by the Portuguese at the end of the 19th century, so relatively new as a double perimeter wall and as an inner wall home to two round corner towers and in 2014, it was turned into hotels. It's quite an atmospheric place to stay. There were beautiful views all around. The fault came to prominence in 1959 when there was a rebellion and least a hundred insurgents. Attempted to take the fault from the Portuguese, but they were repelled by the soldiers, but the fault was badly damaged at the time. So that's a bit of an overview of what you can do in Bacao. It is one of my favorite places in Timor Le State for the variety of historical sites and also the beautiful landscapes. Thank you so much for listening to exploring Timor Less Day. If you've enjoyed today's episode, please consider leaving a rating or review. It really helps more people discover the show. If you have any questions or feedback, I'd love to hear from you. Drop me an email at exploring Timor lessDay@gmail.com. Until next time, or Bodo ADEs.