Sumatra First Days

Welcome to Sumatra!

We headed for Sumatra today and were met at the airport by 2 guides and a driver. They explained later that this was the longest tour they had done so had doubled up.

The guides were really friendly as we drove to our hotel giving us a lot of detail. The roads started decent but soon got as bumpy as we've got used to. The first hotel is really impressive although arriving in the dark meant wasn't until the morning we appreciated the jungle setting.

Mountain Trekking

The next morning we set off for a mountain trek, with the hope of seeing orangutans. The trek was from 9am until 4pm and up and down mountains. The path was full of tree roots and slippery rocks. Except for James we all fell at one time. We did survive but we're all completely exhausted by halfway round we did make it to the end and we cooled down by laying in the river. The trek was great just more demanding than we expected due to the humidity heat and terrain, because of the alleged paths being so precarious much of our time was spent looking at our feet. We all felt pretty proud to have finished it. My watch suggested around 10km and definitely the hardest walk of that length I've ever done.

We saw some orangutans early on and then later in the walk an orangutan came charging towards us. The guide told us to run out of the way (I've never seen Karen move so fast) and our main jungle guide tried to usher the orangutans out of the way. Instead it realised there was food in his rucksack. A man v beast tussle occurred with them both tumbling into the ferns and the orangutan claiming the bag. We didn't see this guide for about 40 minutes when he did come back he explained he had to wait for the orangutan to finish the fruit before getting his bag back! The orangutan had eaten the fruit at the top of a tree and then left the bag there. The guide had to climb the tree to get it back especially as his phone was in the bag as well! This was a bit too close encounter for us all.

Jungle Accommodation

After the active day we were hoping for nice accommodation however it was very basic, a cabin in the jungle next to the river with 2 mattresses and a mossie net for the 4 of us. It didn't really matter as we were all so tired and asleep by 8pm. By then the weather had changed and it was a thunderstorm with lightning flashing through holes in the ceiling and the gaps in the walls. Considering the location where we were they served amazing food. During lunch today we were ambushed by a monkey who nicked a banana.

So far so good for Sumatra, we're looking forward to more but did decline a second day of hiking