Beautiful North Sumatra |
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I was here in 2001. Medan is an ugly polluted industrial city that is the gateway to the region. I advise quickly leaving for one of the three main destinations of region; Bukit Lawang, Lake Toba, or Brastagi. The local buses are very crowded and unconfortable, but there were tourist minibuses also available.
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Bukit Lawang was great. It is a small riverside resort town hugging the border on Gunung Leuser Park. From here here you can take hikes into Gunung Leuser, tubing down the river, or just lazily swim in the river. In Gunung Leuser, I saw orangutan, gibbons, and heard Thomas Leaf monkey. It was hard hiking up and down forested ridges while it rained off and on, but was definitely worth it.
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Brastagi is a small city under the Gunung Sibayak. While here I climbed volcano Sibayak, went golfing, and relaxed at a spa.
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Lake Toba is refreshingly cool clean crater lake surrounded by mountains in all directions. There is nice hikes in every direction, except into the lake. My dislikes were those damn motorcycles with tourists on them. Where do they need to go so fast? Why do the feel the need to pollute the air and make so much noise?
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I do not remember name of places I stayed in Bukit Lawang but had nice accomodation on the Bohorok river for about $3 a night. In Brastagi, I stayed at Losmen Brastagi for about $2 a night. I stayed in three different places in Lake Toba. Bagus Bay (noisy), Liberta (Batak style house expensive at $5 per night), and Elisa Guesthouse which was perfect for $3 a night(surrounded by gardens and lake was five paces from my room).
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I ate at my guesthouses usually. There are number of places in Lake Toba that have dance shows and live music with dinner. I went to one at Bagus Bay.
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Published on Monday August 4th, 2003 by danilbruce
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