Bengkulu
Bengkulu, historically known as Bencoolen, is a province of Indonesia.
Bengkulu, historically known as Bencoolen, is a province of Indonesia. It is located on the southwest coast of Sumatra. It was formed on 18 November 1968 by separating out the area of the historic Bencoolen Residency from the province of South Sumatra under Law No. 9 of 1967 and was finalized by Government Regulation No. 20 of 1968. Spread over 20,122.21 km2, its land area is comparable to the European country of Slovenia or the U.S. state of Massachusetts or Ivanovo Oblast and it is bordered by the provinces of West Sumatra to the north, Jambi to the northeast, Lampung to the southeast, and South Sumatra to the east, and by the Indian Ocean to the northwest, south, southwest, and west.
Adapted from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Worth seeing in and around Bengkulu
6 places within 25 km that the world writes about, in the order of how widely: the ones a visitor has heard of first, then the ones only a local would name.
- 01University of Bengkulu
University of Bengkulu is a public university in Bengkulu, Bengkulu, Indonesia. It was established on 24 April 1982.
4.6 km · public university in Indonesia · Wikipedia - 02Fort Marlborough
Fort Marlborough is a former East India Company fort located in Bengkulu City, Sumatra. It was built between 1713 and 1719 by the East India Company under the leadership of Governor Joseph Collett as a defensive fort for the British East India Company's Residency there.
2.2 km · Fort in Bengkulu, Indonesia · Wikipedia - 03Bengkulu Museum
Bengkulu Museum or Bengkulu State Museum is a museum in Bengkulu, Indonesia. The museum has a collection relating to historical artifacts and traditional cultures of each ethnicity in Bengkulu.
3 km · museum in Bengkulu, Indonesia · Wikipedia - 04Akbar At-Taqwa Grand Mosque
Akbar At-Taqwa Grand Mosque is a mosque located in Bengkulu City, Bengkulu Province, Indonesia. It serves as the main mosque in the city.
700 m · mosque in Indonesia · Wikipedia - 05Bung Karno Seclusion House
Bung Karno Seclusion House refers to two houses in Indonesia in which Sukarno lived in during his time in exile. On January 14, 1934, he was exiled in Ende, Flores, where he stayed from 1934 to 1938.
500 m · historic site · Wikipedia - 06Thomas Parr Monument
The Thomas Parr Monument is a monument located in Bengkulu, Bengkulu, Indonesia and dedicated to Thomas Parr, the British Resident of Bengkulu who was killed in 1807. Constructed the year after his death, it is considered a cultural property of Indonesia.
2.1 km · monument in Bengkulu, Indonesia · Wikipedia
Ranked by the number of language editions of Wikipedia with an article on each, from Wikidata; the sentences are the openings of those articles, CC BY-SA 4.0.
Where to eat
- 01Bakso Arema Rizki
Serves meatballs soup with noodle and shaved ice desserts.
- 02Warkop Palembang
They serve various Chinese-influenced foods such as stir-fried noodle, noodle soup, chicken porridge, and vegetable stew; as well as pempek dishes Rp12,000-25,000 per dish.
- 03Sembam Ikan Marola
Serves seafood dishes, both traditional and modern.
From Wikivoyage: Bengkulu, CC BY-SA 4.0. Not yet checked by us.
Getting to Bengkulu
- Padang (Katapiang) → Bengkulu400 km · quickest by road, 8h 33m · Rp332,000–442,000
- Jakarta → Bengkulu574 km · quickest by road, 18h 36m · Rp464,000–619,000
- Batam → Bengkulu584 km · quickest by road, 45h 53m · Rp682,000–909,000
- Plan a tripFrom anywhereThe planner compares every way there from wherever you are.
Road and air are today’s quick answer; timetabled trains, buses and ferries load on the results page from the operators’ feeds.
No local-transport research exists yet for Bengkulu
Our researched notes are written from a sourced entry: every shared taxi, boat and village bus with its operator, its rule, its fare and the year we saw it, and what could not be confirmed. Nobody has done that work for Bengkulu. What is above is what we hold from open sources; nothing here pretends to be more.
- Get aroundMinivan (angkot) acts as the city's sole public transport system.
- Get aroundRiding the minivan will also give you insight into the daily life in the city, since its service covers most of Bengkulu, including traditional markets, business districts, and residential areas.
- Get aroundThe minivan is colour- and alphabet-coded, based on which line it's operated in.
- Get aroundEach alphabet actually has suffix to indicate certain route it takes, but in practice only Green and Red minivan follow the convention.
From Wikivoyage: Bengkulu, CC BY-SA. Not yet checked by us; that article was last edited 2026-05.
- 01536 km
- 02553 km
- 03578 km
- 04766 km
- 05814 km
If you know how people move in Bengkulu – the stand, the rule, the fare – tell us, and the note gets an entry.
Next door to Bengkulu
- Ratu Agungdistrict in Bengkulu City, Bengkulu Province, Indonesia1.6 km
- Kebun Geransubdistrict in Bengkulu City, Bengkulu, Indonesia700 m