Travel Logbook

Torajaland, Togian Islands and Bunaken, Sulawesi, Indonesia: 2nd-20th October.

A brief stop in Ujung Pandang - not much to see there - then onto an early morning bus for the 12 hour trip to Rantepao. The town of Rantepao is right in the middle of the region of Sulawesi known as Tanatoraja. This is a beautiful area of rivers, hills and pine forests, and the people have retained a distinctive culture. The most striking sign of this are the traditional Torajan houses. Always built aligned noth-south, the houses are intricately decorated and have huge roofs that sweep up at front and rear in imitation of buffalo horns.

Even more unusual than the houses are the Torajan burial sites. The dead are buried in small chambers cut into the area's limestone cliffs. Lifesize wooden effigies of the deceased, called tau-tau, are placed outside the grave. At the village of Lemo there are whole galleries of tau-tau looking out from the cliff, staring in impassive boredom like spectators at an Arsenal game.

After a couple of days in Toraja I moved on to the Togian Islands. Getting there involved a gruelling 14-hour bus ride to Tentena on Lake Poso, another torturous 8-hour minibus ride to Ampana (follow this in your atlases please) then a 6 hour boat journey out to the islands. I stayed on an island called Kadidiri, along with, among others, a German couple called Kai & Eli. They had a terrible time on the island for reasons I won't go into, but I quite enjoyed my stay on Kadidiri. I borrowed a canoe and paddled to a secluded beach where flocks of lime green parrakeets flew among the palm trees and kingfishers dived for their dinner. I did a fascinating dive on a WWII B-24 bomber, a nice wall dive and some good snorkelling off the beach. The only problem I had on Kadidiri was a rooster that began crowing every morning at 4.30am and didn't stop until 6.00. I've never felt such fury towards another living creature and I swear if I could have caught the damned thing we've have had chicken instead of fish for dinner one night!

It was then a 16-hour overnight journey on the world's slowest ferry as Kai, Eli & I headed for Manado. The ferry took us to Gorantalo, where I bought my first durian. The durian is a fruit, famous because it stinks! It has a smell that I can best describe as being similar to the stuff my mum used to put in my hair when I had headlice as a kid. It's certainly powerful but maybe not completely unpleasant...no, it is completely unpleasant. But it does actually taste nice; it's very rich but strangely addictive.

Next morning we took an eight hour Kijang ride to Manado. I planned to spend 2 or 3 days in the town but events transpired to drive me out after half a day. Like the Filipinos with their "Hey Joe", so in Indonesia it's "Hello Mister". Except that they roll their rrrrrs to produce a particularly irritating "Hello Mister-r-r-r-r-r". I felt like there was a big crowd of people following me, bombarding me with "Hello Mister-r-r-r-r-r". One particular person was so persistent that I looked round to see who it was. As I did so I failed to see a solid concrete bus shelter that connected with my head hard enough to draw blood. At this point the last thing I needed was somebody laughing at me; so when some arse sat in the shelter burst into fits, I lost my cool. I've never lost my cool before. Ever. But it was all I could do not to hit this guy. I realised that Manado was doing bad things to me. I went straight back to my hotel, checked out and got on the boat to Bunaken Island.

On Bunaken I stayed at a place called MC Homestay, and like Lestari on Kadidiri, the deal was you payed 2.5 quid and got accomodation and all meals provided. Not bad eh? The snorkelling and diving around Bunaken are world-renowned. Snorkelling out from the beach you passed over a seagrass bed full of picasso triggerfish and banded sea-snakes (highly venomous but their mouths are so small they can only bite you on your ear-lobes and the little bits of webbing between your fingers). Then there was a rocky stretch before coming to a shallow, healthy reef full of fish. This reef was maybe 10 metres wide then it dropped sharply off out of sight. Snorkelling off it felt a bit like floating over the edge of a skyscraper. There were plenty of big fish and I saw a couple of small sharks.

Back at MC's I met a South African gent called Rick who taught me a couple of cool tunes on the guitar. He tried to get me to perform to the crowds but didn't realise just what a challenge he'd taken on. He tried to get me to sing, for crying out loud!

After 3 days on Bunaken and a night in a village called Tomahon in the hills above Manado, I took a flight back to Ujung Pandang to meet the Pelni ferry that would take me to Maumere on Flores.

In UP I watched on TV as the Indonesian parliament elected the blind and ageing Abdurrahman Wahid (a.k.a. Gus Dur) president. This was something of a travesty as the people's choice was clearly Megawati Sukarnoputri. Throughout Sulawesi I had seen fake banknotes with her image in place of Suharto's, and the Raging Bull emblem of her PDI-P party was everywhere. In my first class cabin on the boat to Maumere I watched the vice-presidential elections and thankfully Indonesia was spared mass civil unrest when Megawati duly won.

Keli Mutu, Flores, and Rincha, Indonesia: 21st-29th October.

Once on Flores I travelled to Moni and climbed the extinct volcano of Keli Mutu to see the famed coloured lakes. There are three lakes within ancient volcanic vents that are coloured by minerals dissolved in them. Two of the lakes are currently black, the other turquoise. Apparently they change over time so maybe in a few years they'll be a bit more impressive.

My next target was the village of Labuanbajo at the western end of Flores. This was a 20-hour ride over twisty, bumpy roads in cramped, overcrowded buses full of people throwing up. The people of Flores seem to have some genetic flaw that makes them chuck as soon as they set foot on a bus. Each bus has a little bundle of plastic bags hanging from the roof, and the urgent cries of "plastic!" would bring a flurry of activity as bags were passed rapidly through the bus to prevent catastrophe. I used to enjoy journeys like this, thought they were all part of the fun of travelling in Asia. But by now I was tired of it and longed for some civilized transport, where I could have my own seat, for my bum and no-one else's.

Labuanbajo is the jumping-off point for the islands of Komodo and Rincha, home of the Komodo Dragons. I chartered a boat to Rincha instead of Komodo as it was a shorter journey. From the landing jetty on Rincha it was a short but hot walk along a path built through the mangroves to reach the park HQ. I immediately saw two dragons wandering around the huts. I also saw a huge dead dragon laid out over a piece of wood. He must have been a fearsome beast when alive; 3m long with huge claws and powerful tail. As I got within a metre or so of him for a closer look, two things happened; (1) my guide cried out in alarm & (2) the dragon opened his eyes and looked at me. He wasn't dead at all! I backed slowly but steadily away to a respectable distance. After this my guide led me on an hour's walk through the hot, dry Rincha countryside. In addition to two more dragons, we saw wild boars, buffalos and snakes. It was a great day but with hindsight I should have spent the night there; the dragons are most active during the early morning and late afternoon when it's cooler.

I wanted to leave Labuanbajo the next day to make my way across Sumbawa island, to Lombok and then Bali. I bought a bus ticket to Denpasar on Bali but the first leg of the journey was to take the ferry to Sape on Sumbawa. Trouble was, there was only one ferry, which made the journey each way on alternate days. The day I was ready to leave it was doing the Sape-Labuanbajo run, so I had to wait a day in LB. By the next morning there were quite a number of travellers waiting for the ferry; a German guy I'd met on Keli Mutu called Maik, a couple of Austrian blokes and a whole crowd of people who had taken a cruise from Lombok to LB and were now looking to get back. All these people had also bought bus tickets through to Bali but they all had tickets with a different company to me. They had "Langsung Indah", I had "Surabaya Indah". Anyway, the following morning we were all up early ready for the ferry, which was scheduled to leave at 8.00am. But it hadn't yet arrived from Sape. We waited all morning in hope of that ferry. It eventually arrived at 1.00pm and sailed off at 4. At Sape eight hours later we were met by minibuses and transferred to Bima. All the Langsung Indah passengers boarded their waiting bus, at 12.30am, and off it roared. As the dust settled I looked around for my Surabaya bus. "Sorry, already left", I was told. It hadn't waited for the delayed ferry. I asked when the next bus would be leaving. Seven o'clock, I was told. It was now one a.m., and after a long day of waiting and travelling I was worried that if I took a room I would never get up in time. So I lay down on the tarmac of the bus station using my backpack as a pillow. I dozed there until 5.30 am, at which point somebody came up to me and asked where I was going. I showed him my ticket.

"Surabaya Indah", he says.

"Yes," I say, "it goes at seven a.m.".

"No," the guy says, "seven p.m."

Well I tell you, if there'd been a roof I would've hit it. I couldn't spend a whole day in Bima; all I wanted to do was get to Bali - it didn't seem like too much to ask. I was dying to check my e-mail - it had been over a week and I was getting withdrawal symptoms. So at six a.m. I paid again for another interminable ride on a cramped local bus. This reached the western end of Sumbawa at nightfall; a short ferry ride and another hour on the bus and I was in Mataram on Lombok. Next morning I made the final leg of the journey to Kuta on Bali, where I eventually arrived three days later than planned.

Kuta, Bali & Yogyakarta, Java, Indonesia: 30th October-17th November.

The bus from Mataram took me as far as Denpasar, the capital of Bali. From there I planned to take a bemo down to the beach resort of Kuta. Elsewhere in Indonesia you would pay about 500 rupiah for a similar journey. As I stepped off the bus in Denpasar I was immediately accosted by someone offering to take me to Kuta. I asked how much. "40,000!" So this was Bali, land of the tourist transport. I ignored this bloke and walked over to the public bemo stand. Here I was offered transport to Kuta for 20,000rp - better, but still 40 times the local rate. I found a bemo that would take me across town to the Tegal terminal, from where bemos left for Kuta. At Tegal there was a bemo nearly full and I asked if it was going to Kuta. "Yes, but it's full already." It clearly wasn't full because they leave as soon as they are. The man pointed me to another, empty, bemo and said it would be going next. I asked the price and he said 5,000rp. This was still too much but he wouldn't budge so I had to agree. I watched as four more people got into the bemo he had said was full, and when another bemo pulled up behind the first and someone got onto it, I realised their game. They were hoping that if they kept me waiting at the terminal long enough, eventually I would get impatient and agree to charter a bemo for 20,000 or more. I wasn't going to give these buggers that satisfaction so I left and hailed down a taxi.

I had a feeling before I arrived that I would dislike Kuta, and I was right. Once over the novelty of catching up on my e-mail and eating steak & chips instead of chicken & rice, I quickly grew tired of it. Tired of all the hawkers coming into restaurants trying to sell me a watch. Tired of all the arseholes on street corners asking me if I want "Transport? Yes? OK?" No, I don't want a watch, I don't want a Jakarta Post, I don't need to change money and I sure as hell don't want any goddamn transport!

I got stuck in Kuta though for four days as I tried to change my flight to Australia from Bali-Sydney, to Bali-Cairns. In the end this turned out to be not possible. So after four days I took a night bus to Yogyakarta (just say "Jogja"). I arrived early in the morning and went looking for a place to stay in the backpackers enclave, called Sosrowijayan. I had an accomodation tout latch onto me and I tried all I knew to shake him off. In the end I upset him and he got angry. He threatened me saying "I'll remember you". I got a bit scared so, in an effort to make peace, agreed to look in some place he'd recommended. It turned out to be OK so I stayed there.

After a day in the town and a visit to the world's largest Buddhist stupa at Borobudur, I left on a sleeper train to Jakarta. I arrived there the next morning and found a cheap place to stay. I e-mailed my friend Maik who I'd first met on Keli Mutu and then again in Labuanbajo and Jogja. We went for beers in surely the cheapest pub in all Indonesia - 5500rp (50p) for a big Bintang - that's more than a pint. In the pub I was talking to a grizzled old English teacher called David and he invited me to go with him to an ex-pats' bar to watch the Rugby World Cup Final between Australia and France. I did and although the game was pretty dull, it was interesting to get a look at the ex-pats' scene. Both of the bars we went to had waitress service, and in both we simply strolled out without paying for our beers! I also visited Indonesia's national monument, the tall column officially known as the Monas, and unofficially as Sukarno's Last Erection. The entry fee to climb to the observation deck near the top was 3100rp - 3000 to get in, 100 for insurance. Insurance against what? Sukarno running out of steam after all this time and his Erection collapsing? After visits to Kota, the old quarter of Jakarta, and to Sunda Kelapa, home to an impressive fleet of traditional Makassar schooners, I returned to Yogya.

After visiting the Hindu temples at Prambanan I wanted to go to Mt. Bromo. There were various tours on offer from Yogya but I thought I could save money by going there on public transport. But I was conned, lied to and cheated at every turn and ended up paying double! The Bromo area is very impressive; it's an old volcanic caldera 10 km across, inside which are several newer volcanic cones. One of these, Bromo itself, is still active and you can make the short climb to the rim and look down into the smoking crater.

From Bromo I travelled back to Bali with a Dutch guy called Victor. When we arrived in Denpasar we tried to get transport to Kuta. The first offers we got were up in the 40,000rp bracket but we laughed at these. We eventually haggled some guy down to 15,000rp for the both of us. We got into his minibus and waited, but the driver showed no signs of leaving. I asked what we were waiting for and the driver pointed to a group of Indonesians assembling outside - "Once we have 10 people, we go". This guy was going to fill the van with Indonesians paying 500rp each, and us paying 7500rp each! You had to admire the sheer audacity of the man. We got out and tried to hail a taxi but none would stop for us. No doubt due to subtle persuasion from the minibus drivers.

Anyway, enough moaning. I watched the England vs Scotland game the next night, then left Kuta and went to Ubud, the so-called cultural centre of Bali. Actually just another tourist centre. Sorry, moaning again. From Ubud I visited the Batur volcano and the huge Besakih temple. At both places I was astounded yet again by the efforts of the Balinese to part me from my money. At Besakih they spun all kinds of lies to try and force me to take a guide, and this in the grounds of their holiest place. Nothing is sacred when money is at stake.

The highlight of my stay in Ubud was definitely the Kechak dance. This is a traditional Balinese dance performed by a large group of men sitting in a circle, while the dancers take the stage in the centre of the group. The dance gets its name from the chants of the men, meant to evoke the chattering of monkeys, while the dancers act out scenes from the Hindu Ramayana in elaborate costumes.