During the past 11 days so much awesome stuff has happened that it’s hard to know where to begin. We were presented with the amazing opportunity to go trekking into the wild jungle one hour from Bukit Lawang in a jungle called Bukit Kencur – a jungle that people only venture into a few times a year. We saw so many cool things, and just being in the jungle was a highlight in itself. We went to Bukit Kencur with Andrea, a scientist from the UK who now lives in Bukit Lawang and educates people about the forests and Orang Utans – we were extremely lucky to be given this chance so jumped at it and had an awesome time.
We have waded through rivers, climbed rocks, seen wild and semi-wild adult and baby Orang Utans, (even got wee-d on by one Orang Utan!), seen a family of White-Handed Gibbons, some Pig-Tailed Macaques, (5 wild primate species in total), at least 200 different insects and 50 different butterflies. We have been into caves, walked many trails, rafted down the river, eaten so much awesome food and made some unforgettable friends. Bukit Lawang is so far the hardest place we have had to leave – the jungle cast it’s spell on us after the first week or so and we could spend days just sitting staring at the trees, river and animals.
We came to Bukit Lawang to see Orang-Utans and we got so much more than we bargained for. Every day we would see and hear new things, watch the hundreds of dragonflys hover and swifts fly over the river, and be visited by monkeys on our balcony off our little hut in the jungle. Once a Pig-Tailed Macaque even stole Dre’s shorts after raiding our rubbish bin, and put them on his head – then carried them up to the top of the tree before dropping them not too far from our hut so Dre could go and rescue them!
Ultimately we have far, far too many photos to share on this site, and have tried really hard to narrow them down. Here are just a few highlights. Indonesia has caught us a bit by surprise – we had expected to have a good time, but we hadn’t realised just how utterly awesome it would be – to the point where we are quite sad to be leaving tomorrow. (Although also excited to be going to Malaysia.) One thing is for sure: every day that passes, we are falling more in love with Asia.
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