What a nightmare journey!! We got up early aa we wanted to be in Bukit Lawang before the predictable tropical storm at about 4pm. We headed to the bus station in a motorcycle with a side-car which was an experience... the roads in Medan are like real life Wacky Races! There don't seem to be any rules - its every man for himself! We agreed with the driver a price of 30,000 Rupiah but when we arrived at the bus station after about 30 mins he demanded 35,000! All of a sudden a big group of guys were around Han and I telling us to give the driver an extra 5,000. Not a nice situation when it was clear we were two young women who couldn't run anywhere with huge bags and about 9 guys surrounding us. In the end we just walked away and just paid the agreed price. This was the start of a long saga...
We me a Dutch couple who were also going to Bukit lawang and said a minibus was faster than a big bus. We searched for one but ended up paying 10,000 (60p) and got on a big bus. We drove for about 5 mins then the bus pulled over and the driver got out - after 5 mins or so it was clear we weren't going anywhere so lost our money and got out! We then realised there was no ATM in Bukit Lawang and needed to withdraw money - this meant a taxi ride all the way back to where we had spent the night in a taxi that had to be hot-wired as the driver had no key! It was a bit dodgy when he stopped for petrol and didn't turn of the engine...
Anyway, we eventually got our money and a decent taxi back to the bus station and got into a minibus. After a hairy 3 hour ride we arrived in the little village of Bukit Lawang. I'm sure it was no coincidence but two 'guides' got on our minibus and one got out and came with Han and I and the other chap went with the Dutch couple. We got settled into our lovely but pricy room (9 pounds per night!) then had a chat with the guide who had got on our minibus. We signed up to the 2 day jungle trek which cost nearly 1 million Rupiah (50 pounds) and included meals, overnight tent and tubing back to the village on the second day.
It was an early start the next day and we donned on our sexy walking gear (will add pics soon!) and met up with the other people on our trek - 5 girls and a guy. One girl, Carolyn was from England so we spend most of the time chatting to her and she subsequently travelled with us for a few days after the trek.
After about an hour or so of being in the jungle we got our first sight of an Orangutan! He was beautiful and was just chilling out up in the trees. We then saw a mother and baby which was just fantastic and the baby was really small. later on in the day we saw two Orangutans playing together and our guide - Donny - informed us they were about to make love! We never saw that part and i think it may have been rather disturbing so i'm kind of glad we missed it!
Throughout the two days we were shown lots of different plants and told all about their medicinal properties which was interesting. We also saw plenty of enormous ants, millipedes, spiders and leeches. We arrived at our camp about 4pm which was by the river, so we all had a swin which was so welcome after being hot and sweaty all day. The guys cooked a great evening meal and entertained us in the evening with various card games and puzzles. I slept really badly as we were just on roll mats and it was pretty cold in the night - not ideal when we had loads of hard walking the next day.
Day two was harder than the first day - lots of scrambling up and down steep parts and walking through the river in socks hurt my feet! By the time we reached the River to go tubing back to the village it had started throwing it down. It meant the river was more full and the rapids were bigger! It was great fun going down in big rubber rings although I was frozen and soaked to the skin by the time we reached the village. Sadly Bukit lawang doesn't have hot showers so a cold shower didn't really warm me up, but at least i was dry and clean.
We moved from Eco Loadge when we finished the trek as we were offered a room elsewhere for 50,000 (3 pounds) for 3 people! Carolyn had joined us at this point and stayed with us for the following 4 days. All 8 of us that had been on the trek spend the night drinking and chatting and the Indonesians guides and their friends all joined us for the evening - great fun. The only downside was that the Indonesian guys took it in turns to try it on with each Western girl! They just didn't seem to get the hint... can't blame then for trying though!!
We left Bukit Lawang early the next morning, but i will write that up in another story....
