I’ve recently completed the first leg of a Sumatra visit and found a lot of the experiences people posted (especially those from pPamela) very useful so I thought I’d share my experiences here.

A lot of the posts I’d read were from people backpacking or travelling across many countries, and cost seemed to be a driving factor. My girlfriend and I were in a slightly different situation, doing a one-week trip to Bukit Lawang and Danau Toba on the back of my work trip to Penang/Singapore. While we are by no means rich in New Zealand terms, we were looking to make it a great experience and prepared to pay about the same cost as a week’s holiday at home where even a basic hotel would be 600K Rp/night. We are also writing and were hoping that Toba would be a peaceful place to do that. I’d maybe do it cheaper travelling by myself, but long days on hot buses and noisy accom weren’t the kind of romantic experience we were looking for.

My brother runs a surf charter boat out of Sibolga [http://www.surfbanyak.com] and we used his agent Tom [[email protected]]to book our transport and accommodation when we got to Medan. Tom’s Batak and has spent a lot of time in Japan - was friendly and knew the spots and was able to sort out a couple of hitches for us along the way. If you contact him tell him you read a report from Mick’s brother.

There are upsides and downsides to booking in advance, but the decision to get a private car and driver for Medan -> Bukit Lawang -> Parapat -> Medan was a good one for us. Medan is your basic developing economy airport with crowds of people ready to “offer assistance”. Having Akbar waiting to collect us and our extensive luggage made everything easy. We had some lunch in Medan next to Tom’s and then picked up some money from a local money changer who supposedly had good rates, but it turned out to be the same as the airport. Withdrawing your millions at the ATM at the airport is probably the go, though I think there is a 2 500 000 limit. We paid 450K each for the Medan-BL and Parapat-Medan legs including driver and fuel in a spacious aircon vehicle. BL-> Parapat was 900K as we had to go back to Medan to get there.

I wanted to get a prepay SIM card with data for my iphone so I could check email while away, so we visited a couple of mobile centres (the same as in NZ, down to the layout of the offices!). Telkomsel had the best coverage in BL but wouldn’t do prepay data as far as we could work out. So we went off to XL who were very helpful and got me connected thanks to a young woman with good English and great service. They didn’t seem to know the data settings so note the APN: www.xlgprs.net user:xlgprs password: proxl . As far as I’m aware they have to activate the data service for you so you have to either do it in an XL store or I think you could get someone to do it over the phone with some Bahasa if you pick up the SIM at a smaller agent. 3G wouldn’t work with my phone but EDGE data worked fine for my email and basic browsing - 60MB for 50 000Rp. No coverage in BL but great most other places on the way and at Toba. You can buy recharges everywhere.

Tom recommended the Jungle Inn and we were not disappointed. We splashed out for the “presidential suite” at 450K/night which was a very classy combo of pueblo-style and local design with an architect’s eye for the space. Adjacent to a waterfall with beautiful views of the river and jungle from the decks. It was as big as our small house at home and I could have happily stayed there for the week - it is possibly the most peaceful place I’ve ever been. I suspect we could have easily bargained it down as business was pretty quiet in mid-June. The walk from the road down to the Jungle Inn is about 800m along the river, and we had someone bring in our suitcases @20K each (using a motorbike for my 30kG monster - your wheeled suitcases won’t work here). If you were more mobile than us I’d recommend just showing up in the daytime and checking out all the accom nearby - when the guide books say that Jungle Tribe and Sams are next to the Jungle Inn they are RIGHT next to it so you could easily check out the rooms in all three places, let alone the many others on the way in. We saw an orangutan across the river the first morning (it really is right on the edge of the jungle), and the river is great for swimming.

We ate at the Jungle Inn for the two nights but were a little disappointed in the Western orientation of the menu. Doing it again we’d just ask for the food the staff were eating - terong sambal, kangkung and ikan panggang are more my style than the ubiquitous nasi goreng. The staff were super friendly.

We’d been recommended a guide who we met on the way up - it wasn’t a wholly positive experience, but I won’t mention his name as he seemed no worse than many of the others in BL. He had a standard day-trek rate of 35 Euros for forest trek, lunch, and rafting back down the river (min 3 people). We went with just the two of us for a 10 Euro surcharge, about 900KRp all up. He and his assistant were fairly knowledgeable and friendly and looked after us well. However, he seemed to focus the experience around getting good photos of the orangutans, and this included feeding them which is explicitly not recommended by the park authorities. Apparently, a large proportion of the baby orangutans die from human diseases, and touching humans or human-handled food is the prime way they contract them (especially if the humans have a viral or bacterial infection - sick people are advised not to go to the park). Our guide had a heavy flu but that didn’t deter him - couldn’t help but think of Europeans giving smallpox-infested blankets to the natives in the colonial era as the baby orangutan was eating the banana. I don’t really blame the guides who, after all, are only giving tourists what most of us want want and are willing to pay for. But if I did it again I’d spend some time asking around in the village for a guide who was more in line with my ecological values, and one of the locals enthusiastically asked me to spread the word about this so that those in the community trying to make the tourist experience sustainable have some support. You may not get your shot of you holding an orangutan’s hand but you’d be helping keep them alive.

That said, the orangutans and the gibbons (so fast around the trees!) were awesome to see. As we reached about the mid-point of the trek our guide ran ahead then asked us to turn back. It seemed that Meena/Mina?, an aggressive female with a baby attached, was coming down the path. She has apparently attacked many of the guides but not the tourists. Our guide tried to give her a banana (while still keeping a bunch in his pocket - perhaps a mistake). She lunged at the guide and sunk her teeth into his leg, and his assistant had to beat the orangutan with a stick to get her off. Luckily my girlfriend is a nurse and had a basic first aid pack with some painkillers and plasters. The guide eventually needed stitches on the wound, and claimed Mina was sucking his blood. In an ironic twist after the feeding, the guide had some kind of swelling/allergic reaction to the ibuprofen and was not very happy as we walked a few kilometers out of the park. The whole experience was a good reminder that while the orangutans are well-used to people and posing for the cameras, it is still the jungle and those laws apply. The raft back down the river was peaceful and cooling - well worth doing and not dangerous.

The next day, we left BL and took the long, bumpy ride back to Medan then to parapat, for the ferry to Tuktuk on Samosir Island in Lake Toba. We had initially looked at Tabo Cottages, Carolina Hotel, and Silintong Hotel as three options offering a quiet stay. We planned to stay at Tabo for two nights and then look around, although Tom said Tabo was the best and encouraged us to book for the entire stay through him (cheaper and he gets his commission). After checking out the other places in person, it turned out to be a good idea - Carolina was noisy and rooms were dark and run-down (though with a fabulous position), Silintong looked classy but way more expensive. Once again, the density of the accommodation was surprising - you can walk right around the tuk tuk peninsula in half an hour, during which time you’d pass about 30 guest houses and hotels of various types. I’d estimate a capacity of about 1000 beds, with under 100 tourists in mid-June. The place is deserted and again, if you were prepared to land in the middle of the day and look around, you could get something good for very cheap outside of July/August.

The guidebooks encourage you to check the swimming areas of where you’re staying, as weeds grow quickly in the lake and many places have merely a wharf or weedy entrance to the water. But one hazard we hadn’t expected is how close most of the accommodation is to the road. On the Saturday night we arrived (with a boxing match on nearby) there were non-stop cars and bikes beeping and roaring along the road 50 metres from our villa. Quite a change after the peace of Bukit Lawang! However, the rest of the time at Tabo was extremely peaceful - apparently many people from nearby towns come in for the weekend to party. The food at Tabo is excellent even if the menu is more limited than some other places. We rented a Batak villa in a quasi-traditional style at 260K/night and were very happy - Annette and family run a great operation. The balcony with hammock and lake view was a good spot for writing, and the free wifi in the dining area was patchy but great for catching up with emails etc. There’s not really that much to do in Tuktuk but if you want to relax in a temperate climate (my guess is that temperature range has been about 17-28 degrees C, with the lake about 20 degrees) it’s a hard place to beat. Though in retrospect I would have stayed for another night in Bukit Lawang.

Now my girlfriend heads back to NZ and I’ll join the bus to Sibolga for some surfing. Hope these notes are useful to future travellers, and thanks to everyone who has posted their own advice which helped us a lot.