A Weekend in Sumatra

560 days ago
	Well, I now can say that I have touched foot on yet another island of Indonesia... Sumatra. I have been wanting to go there for a good while, but my chance came while looking at the map of Indonesia. It turns out that the southern point of Sumatra is really close to Java, the island on which I live. So Kiky and I picked a town close to the entry harbour and then made plans to get there. After getting a rough idea of where we would need to go, the real information about how to get there came from our neighbours. They were able to tell us exactly where to catch the bus, which bus to look for, and what the prices would be. Getting info from people can at times be far more useful and accurate than any book. We left early in the morning by Ojek (motorbike taxi), transferring to Bemo (microbus) and then finally getting aboard a proper bus headed to the far northwest of Java. The bus was full of interesting people, street hawkers selling various nicknacks, and loads of street musicians. The voyage by bus was actually an adventure in itself, hearing all the different musicians and seeing the various wares for sale on the bus. Follow the bus, a speedboat trip followed by another Bus voyage brought us to our destination in a little over 5 hours. Kalianda (the name of the town) is situated just west of an old volcano and looks south to the islands surrounding one of the world's most famous voclanoes, Krakatau. Kalianda has a lovely beach which extends onwards for Kilometres with dark sand a fair surf. There are few tourists here and no foreigners, making it quaint and relaxed. The people in Sumatra are surprisingly rude. Kiky and I are well used to being singled out by local gangs, usually just making comments about our sex life between one another in shouts of bravado. But here it happened far more often than even Makassar, which is well known for its rudeness. Mind you, there are always nice people mixed with those wishing to cause us frustration. Our days there were spent moving at a relaxed pace, from Hotspring back to the beach, then on to another beach, all the time eating Indonesian street food (which in some cases is really delicious). We found a nice beach to chill out on the second day which incedentally was called Pantai Bagus (good beach). The sunsets were very nice, illuminating the mountain to our east and falling over the sea. All in all, a really nice place to visit and I definately will give it some thought for a future weekend trip. But then again there is so much to see around here. Maybe next time I will get a chance to climb up to the top of the mountain, or maybe go out to Krakatau!