Originally hailing from Northern Thailand and Myanmar, the Batak people were driven out of their homes by invading Mongolian and Siamese tribes. Crossing South East Asia, they arrived in Sumatra and made their first settlements on Palau Samosir, the island which...
The little town of Berastagi in the Karo Highlands of Western Sumatra was to be our final stop before flying to Thailand. The little town is flanked by two volcanos, Gunung Sinabung to the west and Gunung Sibayak to the north. We were here for one reason and one...
Click Here For Part 1 Of This Story After a sleepless few hours, it was time. We left our shelter and climbed the final metres out of the shelter of the jungle and that’s when the fun really started. Climbing Mount Kerinci by the lights of our headlamps, we...
Mount Kerinci (or Gunung Kerinci) is Sumatra’s highest peak, Indonesia’s highest volcano and is still active, with eruptions annually. It’s located in the Kerinci Selabat National Park, which is made up, mostly, of thick jungle and inhabited by the endangered Sumatran...
While we were staying in the town of Bukkitinggi we realised that we were only 60 kilometres from the equatorial line. We’re not sure why but all of a sudden this seemed like something we had to do! I mean, how often do you get to have one foot in the northern...
Renting a scooter in Bukittinggi, we opted to drive the thirty-six kilometres west to the beautiful Lake Maninjau. Unfortunately for us the weather didn’t cooperate as much as we would have liked and so it was a series of incredibly heavy rain showers for the entire...
Bukittinggi is a small town, nestled in the Minangkabau highlands, ninety kilometres from Padang. It is one of Sumatra’s larger towns/cities with a population of more than 91,000 people. Due to it’s location in the Agam Valley at an elevation of 900 metres, the...
Flying into Padang Airport in Sumatra, Indonesia, we were dead-set on getting a little bit of ‘chilling at the beach time’ before embarking on our mostly inland journey through Northern Sumatra. Only four days ago we had gone almost 36 hours with no sleep, climbing...
