Sober in Lake Toba
Trip Start
Jan 02, 2009
1
24
34
Trip End
Dec 07, 2009
Samosir,
Sumatra,
Indonesia
Thursday, August 20, 2009
Medan is the third largest city in Indonesia. It is busy, noisy and polluted with traffic fumes. The morning after our arrival, we went for a walk around the city and found that it is no place for pedestrians. The pavements (when there are any) have huge holes in them, the traffic lights no longer work and there are so many cars and motorbikes that it is virtually impossible to cross the roads safely. Thankfully, our room was at the back of the hotel away from the main road and was windowless (there was nothing we wanted to look at anyway), so it was extremely quiet. For the first time in nearly a week, we both got a couple of nights of uninterrupted sleep and felt all the better for it.
There is nothing of particular interest to see in Medan, but we did pay a visit to the Mesjid Raya, or Grand Mosque. As we entered the grounds, we were both asked to put on the sarongs provided, and Tracey was also asked to put on a headscarf before she entered the building. She looked like she should be begging on the Underground with a baby strapped to her front, or walking down Oxford Street trying to sell lucky heather. As we entered the mosque, we unwillingly acquired a guide, Yousef, who claimed to be the Iman's son. We didn’t mind, however, as he spoke very good English and gave us an excellent tour. The mosque was commissioned by the sultan in 1906 and is a beautiful building with unusual black domes, Italian marble pillars, Dutch ceramic tiles and stained glass from China. Yousef also gave us a really interesting insight into the Muslim religion and readily answered all our questions.
Two nights were more than enough time in Medan and we headed to Lake Toba early the following morning. The journey, which was in a mini-van with no air-con and packed with eight people, took four hours. It was stiflingly hot, so we had to keep the windows open which let in a constant stream of black exhaust fumes. (The trucks in Indonesia appear to run on coal). We arrived at the town of Parapet from where we got a ferry to the island of Samosir. We sat on the ferry and waited for over an hour before it finally left the harbour. During that time, we were harangued by a number of very giggly locals who tried to sell us a hotel room, magic mushrooms and grass.
Lake Toba is inhabited by the Batak people who are the descendants of mountain tribes from Burma and northern Thailand. The Bataks differ from other Indonesians living in Sumatra in that they are mainly Christians rather than Muslims. They are renowned for being party loving people and are also very musical. Everywhere we went, the sounds of guitar playing and heartfelt singing filled the air, no doubt fuelled by a few glasses of the local palm wine.
Lake Toba is the largest lake in Southeast Asia and the island of Samosir, in the middle of the lake, was created by a volcanic eruption around 75,000 years ago. We decided to stay in the village of Tuk Tuk which occupies the peninsula directly opposite Parapet. Tuk Tuk was once a tourist hotspot some years ago, but we had read that tourism is virtually dead now, so the place is extremely quiet and hotel rooms are incredibly cheap. We found this to be true as we checked into Tuk Tuk’s "poshest" hotel, the Carolina, with its stylish Batak buildings, a decent restaurant, lovely gardens and the best swimming area on the island. Our room, which was one of the most expensive and was very spacious with a large balcony overlooking the lake, only cost £8 a night for the two of us and it is possible to stay in a standard room for as little as £4. Many of the hotels in the area are completely deserted and the restaurants sit empty. We found that we could eat a really good meal for around a fiver for both of us and that included drinks. Our favourite place to eat was the “Today Café”. We had to wait quite a while for our food to be served, but as everything was cooked fresh from scratch, it was delicious and well worth the wait.
Lake Toba is a beautiful clear lake surrounded by mountains and is the perfect setting for swimming. On our first morning, we awoke to the sounds of birds singing - such a welcome relief from the busy cities of Yogyakarta and Medan. What we didn’t realise, however, was that our visit coincided with a public holiday in Indonesia, Independence Day, which is probably the busiest weekend in Lake Toba for visitors. On our second day, the tranquility was somewhat ruined by the arrival of hordes of Indonesian and Chinese families (there is a large Chinese community in Indonesia). The lake was suddenly full of screaming children on rubber rings and people zooming around on jet skis. Overnight, our lovely hotel had turned into a Butlins Holiday Camp. We were most disgruntled to find the restaurant so full that we couldn’t get a table. We also couldn’t sleep due to the people partying in the next room until 3am. (We are currently in the middle of a month of no drinking and the sound of people having a good time is particularly galling when we are tucked up in bed with a book by 10pm each night!) Thankfully, by the time we got up on Monday morning, the hotel had pretty much emptied out and we had the place more or less to ourselves again. Once peace and tranquility had been restored, we decided to extend our stay from four days to seven.
We hired bicycles one day and cycled around 5km to the village of Tomok to see King Sidabutar’s grave, the Batak king who adopted Christianity. We then cycled for another 10km to the village of Ambarita to see the 300 year-old stone chairs, which is where village matters were discussed and where criminals were imprisoned, tried and beheaded if found guilty. As we were almost ready to leave, a local guide attached herself to us and started telling us about Batak architecture and the history of the houses in the village. We found it quite interesting so listened intently to what she was telling us. Batak houses are particularly distinctive as they are built on stilts and have roofs that are shaped like upside-down canoes with sharp rising points and gables with very ornate carvings. She then started telling us the story of the stone chairs, which we already knew, but not wishing to appear rude we carried on listening to her politely. An hour and a half later, she was still prattling on in her faltering English and was boring us both rigid. She explained everything in intricate detail and without once pausing for breath so that we could interrupt her and make our escape. She then decided to spice up her talk by reenacting a beheading after first blindfolding herself. When she placed her head on the stone block, Tracey had to forcibly restrain Dean from taking up the machete and going through with it for real. As it was past lunchtime, we were also starting to feel weak with hunger. When she started a new story about the arrival of the first Christian missionaries, Tracey could take no more and interrupted her by saying that we would like to leave it there as it had started to cloud over and we wanted to cycle back to Tuk Tuk before it started raining. She was most indignant to be interrupted mid-flow and insisted on finishing her story. After another ten minutes, there was no sign of the story coming to an end, so we stood up, thanked her, threw her some money and hurried out of the place before she had a chance to protest any further. As we cycled away, the heavens opened and it poured down for the 30 minute ride back. We arrived at our hotel drenched to the skin and starving. We both vowed to stop being so bloody polite in future.
We hired a motorbike one day and drove around the shore of the lake from Tuk Tuk to the town of Pangururan, around 45km away. The road was practically deserted and it was a very scenic drive as we were surrounded by mountains, beautiful Batak houses, ornately decorated tombs, green fields and rice paddies full of grazing buffalo. When we arrived at Pangururan we found that it was particularly busy as it was market day. It was also extremely hot so after buying a few supplies, we got back on the bike and headed straight home.
We decided to use the services of a travel agent in Parapet to book transport to our next destination and also to enquire about some flights. The guy Tracey spoke to on the telephone insisted on getting the ferry over to Tuk Tuk and meeting with us in person. He joined us for lunch at our hotel and proceeded to sell us transport by private car to Bukit Lawang and also flight tickets to Banda Aceh. We didn’t have enough cash with us to pay him and there are no ATMs in Tuk Tuk, so he told us that he would accompany us on the ferry to Parapet and take us to a cashpoint. After a 30 minute ferry ride, he took us by bus to the nearest ATM. Unfortunately it wasn’t working and the next one we went to didn’t accept Visa cards. He then informed us that we would need to travel to the town of Pematangsiantar, which was an hour away by bus and, obviously keen to ensure that he received his money, he said he would accompany us. The whole thing was starting to turn into a bit of a fiasco, but we had no option but to go with him. The public bus was actually a clapped out old mini-van which was full to the rafters and the only room available were the “born again” seats at the front next to the driver (so called because the sight of lorries hurtling towards you head-on results in even the most committed of atheists turning to God). The driver appeared to be extremely short-sighted as he drove with his face pressed up against the glass whilst squinting. He also chained smoked throughout the entire journey and constantly took his eyes off the road as he turned around to talk to the passengers in the back, often whilst overtaking on blind bends. The journey was made all the more exciting by the fact that it was raining and we were driving around winding wet roads with a sheer drop to the side of us. During the two hour journey there and back, we witnessed three accidents which did nothing to ease our nerves.
Our travel agent appears to be something of a “fixer” and can arrange anything from transportation and tours, to full moon parties, drugs and “hotels with girls”. He is obviously a busy man as he spent the entire journey shouting down his mobile phone with great gusto and at deafening volume. He also has an annoying habit of repeating himself and was rather over familiar as he insisted on constantly touching us and shaking our hands. We finally found an ATM that worked in Pematangsiantar and gave our man his money. For some reason, he seemed to have taken a shine to us and enthusiastically informed us that he would be accompanying us on our trip to Bukit Lawang. We found it hard to share his enthusiasm, however, as the journey takes 7 hours and the thought of having to listen to him barking down the phone for the entire time filled us with dread, but we had handed over the money by this point and it was too late to cancel. We took a bus back to Parapet and just managed to catch the last ferry back to Tuk Tuk by the skin of our teeth. The excursion just to visit an ATM had taken us a total of five hours.
We both felt sad to be leaving Lake Toba and neither of us could understand why there are so few tourists here. The place is stunning and the temperature, which is quite cool, is a welcome relief from the heat and humidity in the rest of Sumatra and in nearby Malaysia. Everything is incredibly cheap, the food is good and the people are warm and friendly. What’s not to love?
