The Orangutans of Sumatra

Maybe you have already heard someone talk about their experience of Indonesia. Possibly the one or the other of you has also heard the sentence: "If you already go to Indonesia, do not go to Bali, but Lombok, Sumatra, Sulawesi and on the many other islands". There are so many beautiful places in Indonesia outside of Bali, whereby I do not want to talk Bali badly with it. I just want to say that Indonesia is more than the famous island of Bali.

Patricia, I and our other 2 friends, went to Sumatra to the Gunung Leuser National Park this weekend and made a 3 day tour. We saw Orangutans, Thomas Langur, Macaques and many other species of monkeys and animals that live in this national park.

Arrival:

We arrived at the airport in Medan relatively late in the evening. There we were picked up by a driver from the company that organized our Orangutan tour for the next 3 days and were then driven to our accommodation, which is located at Bukit Lawang in the national park.  

Day 1:

Here, after a breakfast at Sam's Bungalow, our accommodation, we left for the national park at 10am. First we passed a caoutchouc plantation. For those who don't know, caoutchouc is used to make rubber. This is captured from the bark of the caoutchouc tree. 

Our first day consisted of a 6 hour hike, breaks for food etc were included here. Our two guides for the 3 days, Rama and Andrej, told us many things about the jungle. From the different species of animals that live here up to the plants. The giant forest ant (Camponotus Gigas) for example tastes like lemon. But only the female is edible. This was also demonstrated to us by Rama. 

 

 

The Orangutans for example like to eat pineapple a lot and are rather solitary. We also saw two chameleons. One of the many different flowers with an orange color on its petals is edible. If you suck on the long end of the flower stalk, it tastes like honey. The Thomas Langur monkeys are only found in this national park. One of the big birds, but only the males, makes the sound "wauwau" in the mating season to find a female.

 

 

 

 

Rama and Andrej were always on the lookout for any animals and usually attracted them or could find them by calling. For the ornagutan's lure call, they put their palms flat against their mouths and then make a kissing sound. A sound that the orangutans themselves also make. 

After a nearly 6h hike we also came to a creek/ small river where we spent our first night in small cottages build from bamboo and plastic planes. In the stream we could swim and refresh ourselves. In the evening we ate together with Rama, Andrej and our cook Henry, played cards, painted the faces of those who lost in the card games and told each other about us. During the night it rained exceptionally hard, as the jungle in the north of Sumatra is also a rainforest. 

Day 2:

On this day, we also left at 10 in the morning. After we packed our things, we walked along the creek and then back into the bush. Since it had rained through the night, the earth was very soggy in many places of our hiking trail, so that here caution was required when stepping. Unfortunately we could not discover as many animals as the day before. However, we were allowed to observe some of the Macaques very close and an Orangutan baby with its mother, as well as an Orangutan family with a still relatively small offspring building their nest.  

During the 6 planned hours the weather got worse again and it started to thunderstorm, so we had to continue the last half hour to our next campsite completely wet in the heavy rain. I must say, I have never been so wet and have never seen so much rain as on this day. The water ran in streams down our hiking trail and later we were able to fill a complete bucket with our water wrung out of our clothes. 

To finally arrive at our campsite, we had to cross a wild water river, which of course had increased in current due to the heavy thunderstorm rain. We crossed it with the help of our guides and on rubber rings. Finally arrived, we took a well-deserved bath in the river and polished off a pot full of pumpkin curry from Henry, which had tasted incredibly good. Basically everything Henry prepared for us just tasted amazing. 

Day 3:
On our last day, relaxation was the order of the day. We bathed in the river, lay in the sun, jumped into the waterfall nearby, painted our faces with colored stones dissolved in water and ate fruit. The wild water river had turned a particularly beautiful turquoise color that day after the rain of the previous day. 

As a small souvenir we got a small gift from Henry. He carved for each of us a small Orangutan from one of the colored red stones.

Back to the village where it all started, we went back with rubber tube rings tied up together. Wild water rafting was the order of the day. The view during this was breathtakingly beautiful. From all sides the gigantic jungle walls rose up into the sky, to an estimated 75-100m height. Simply huge. So diverse and exotic. All kinds of plants rose up towards the sun. Here and there we saw some of the Macaques jumping from tree to tree.

All of this did cost us: 

• IDR 1,400,000 (86€) in total for the trip to Bukit Lawang and back (at this IDR 700,000 (43€) per trip per car).
• Return flight per person 150€
• 3 day tour per Person 1.967.500 IDR (120€)
• One night in Sam's bungalow in Bukit Lawang per person 187.500 IDR (11,40€)
• Rubber Shoes for the hiking 50.000 IDR (3€), if they have some of the sizes there, you can also borrow them, but I would absoluty reccomend to get a pair of these.

As a conclusion, I can only say, that the whole tour was a 100/10. And for me personally the absolute highlights were the first Orangutan I've seen and the wild water rafting. Both moments were indescribable. 

However, as beautiful as it was, it also makes you realize how fragile this, albeit gigantic, rainforest ecosystem is in Sumatra and in other parts of the world.

After we made ourselves from the village back to Medan, we passed palm oil plantations. Since Indonesia together with Malaysia are the largest palm oil producers worldwide with 84%, one can imagine the gigantic size of these plantations. For the economy and the profit unbelievable amounts of areas of rainforests like the Gunung Leuser National Park are cut down. 

This park is on the Red List of the endangered world heritage and also belongs to the UNESCO-World-Heritage.

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Until next Time

Love, Kristina