In the jungle

After our idyllic stay at Danau Toba, we headed up north to Bukit Lawang, a "small tourist village at the bank of Bahorok River in North Sumatra" (wiki) to do a jungle trek. 

#1 Rainforest - A simple home-stay run by the lovely Nora.

#2 Delicious watermelon juice to wean off the heat.

#3 A fast flowing Bahorok River right next to our backyard!

#4 Chrysanthemum in bloom

#5 'Lobby' at Nora's.

#6 These colourful paintings are for sale

#7 A friendly feline at Nora's; turned out that one of my travel companions is scared to death of them.

We did 2-day-1-night trek with some local guides at Gunung Leuser National Park (where an orang utan sanctuary is located) in the hope that we'd be able to catch a glimpse of our shy, red-haired cousins. 

#8 Didn't have to wait too long for our first sighting. 

#9 Was quite excited to spot such a colourful snake in the wild

#10 And another orang utan. They appeared to be doing quite well in the sanctuary; we came across quite a number of them during our trek.

#11 Gibbon, mohawk style.

#12

#13 Soft-shelled turtle. This is one funny-looking fellow who'd swim upstream furiously when it smells/detects food in the water.

#14 Heading for lunch

#15 Our friendly guides preparing fruits and lunch; loved how they arranged the oranges and pineapples.

#16 Lunch by a stream; a well-needed break to catch my breath. 

#17 2-in-1 :)

#18 Love the way the baby is clinging on to the mother's body

We ended half a day of trekking at a campsite where some more guides were already preparing our dinner. We took a dip in the cool waters of a nearby waterfall to wash off all that sweat from our bodies, and also, to be honest, get out of the ways of our guides who were busy cooking.

#19 Friendly monitor lizard who stopped by

#20 Dinner in the making.

#21 'Million star hotel'; our sleeping quarters for the night. 

#22 Masak masak toy cups from which we had some hot tea before dinner was served

#23 One of the few simple and delicious dishes that was served; this should be tempeh

#24

#25 Chicken curry

It rained briefly later in the evening, so we played Shithead and some other card games to pass the time, and I spotted my very first fireflies much later in the night too. Next morning, we woke up to find some unexpected visitors...

#26 Some very naughty macaques decided to pay us a visit 

#27 They must be pretty used to having visitors in the forests since they were totally not shy at all

#28 That's our clothesline btw.

I decided to take a rubber raft back to our home-stay, and we walked for about 30 minutes to reach the starting point of the raft ride. Along the way, we had to wade through hip-deep water with strong under currents to get across to the other side of the river; that was quite an experience.

#29 Some of the most beautiful butterflies that I've seen

#30 Chanced upon them as we made our way to the raft ride start; they remind me of butterfly magnets that Mumsy used to buy for our fridge some 15 over years ago. 

#31 The place where we got on to our rubber rafts. It was a 30-minute ride back to Nora's, and I'm glad that I went for it because it's such a different experience from the trek.

This should be the second time I did a trek while on holiday and though it got really tiring at times, looking at these pictures and recalling all the funny episodes that took place while we were getting badly bitten by the commando mosquitoes in the rainforest, I suppose I might just do something like that again in the future?

Today marks a year since I got back from Medan; I remember meeting up with KH straight after landing in Hong Kong on CNY eve so that we could visit a CNY night market. I had my first 麥芽餅 that night, and called Mumsy to wish her a prosperous new year when the clock struck 12 midnight; it's amazing how quickly time flew past and a year is over just like that. 

And that... sort of sums up this long-overdue entry. 

To Danua Toba

Having spent a day and night at Berastagi, we decided that it was time to set out for Lake Toba (the supposed highlight for this trip). After making some arrangements with the guesthouse where we stayed at, we set off for the ferry point in Parapat - a small town found on the edge of the great lake.

Our driver made a few stops along the way to Parapat; included in the price paid at the guesthouse receptionist. The first stop was a local village where there was a mix of traditional homes and slightly more modern ones; the villagers went on with their daily lives as we walked around to get a slight idea of how they lived their lives, they seemed to be rather used to the presence of tourists like us.

#1 Laundry hanging outside one of the slightly more modern homes.

#2 A slightly more traditional home on the right in the background

#3 

#4 More laundry

At the end of our very brief walkabout, someone came up to us with a logbook and asked for donations to improve the lives of the villagers. I definitely hope the little money that we'd contributed will help the villagers improve their lives in some way, even though I wouldn't be surprised if they don't get a cent of it.

Following, our driver drove us to see a waterfall. There was quite a heavy drizzle when we arrived and the visibility was quite bad. When our driver told us that the waterfall was right across from where the car was, I thought he was making it up to myself. Nonetheless, we got off the car for a toilet break, an guess what we saw minutes later...

#5 Sipiso-piso Waterfall! (I looked the name up)

#6 Completely covered by the thick fog just minutes ago.

A minute later, I felt bad for doubting the driver :x

We took a short (but tiring) walk along a footpath that led to a better view of the waterfall, and took funny pictures like that:

#7 He totally looks like he's been photoshopped into the picture

#8 This waterfall is located on the north side of Lake Toba and water falls from a height of 120metres to lake level. Its name Sipiso, means "like a knife", and that probably is describing the waterfall's appearance.

#9 Lake Toba shrouded in mist. A lot of mist.

As we made our ways back to our driver, some friendly locals who were in uniforms (looked like rangers of some sort) called out to us and offered us some durian/coconut/jackfruit (I can't remember what was it).

It was a short ride from the waterfall to Parapat, where we'd head to Samsosir Island from, a large island (the size of Singapore) in the middle of Lake Toba.

#10 Passengers of another kind

#11 Yvonne and Doris

#12 Doris and me

#13 Lake-front holiday houses on Samosir Island.

#14 More lake-front houses

#15 A view from Samsosir now

There's not too much to do on Samsosir Island itself since most of the people who head there are really just looking for a quiet place to unwind, swim in waterfalls and hotsprings, or just to immerse themselves in the local traditional Batak culture so we went cycling on the 2nd day.

#16 Fresh start

#17 Beautiful rice-fields and rich green hills

#18 It was a very nice cycling experience indeed.

#19 Traditional Batak houses that we passed by along the way. Something interesting about the Bataks is that they used to engage in cannibalism rituals a long time ago; they would eat the flesh of either criminals or war prisoners. Of course, it's long been banned since the 1800s when the Dutch took over.

#20 Toba hound.

#21 Taking a breather

#22 One of the common sights that were seen while cycling

#23 :) Thanks for waiting up!

#24 I was so so so tired from the uphill slopes, but I wouldn't mind doing it again with great company like this.

#25 My lovely new friends.

#26 One of the two lakes within Samsosir Island itself

The cycling left me breathless and perspiring madly by the end of it; it was quite a pathetic sight, me hopelessly panting and gasping for air. But like what I said three pictures ago, I wouldn't mind doing it all over again. Besides, taking a dip in the cold waters of the majestic Lake Toba after cycling made me forget about whatever tiredness or soreness I experienced after the 5-hour cycle.

#27 We had some Bintangs (explaining the flush on my face) in the evening, sang and danced with the performers who performed some traditional dances and songs for us. I did quite badly trying to follow their graceful movements (what's new hur), but it was all good fun and I was happy beyond words to have them extend their Batak hospitality towards us.