Sumatra Christmas Part I: No Elephants in Tangkahan and the Best Mullet in the World

The bus from Medan to Tangkahan: The drapes really class up the bus

My first holiday break came not a moment too soon, and I headed off with fellow PCV (Peace Corps Volunteer) Scott who teaches in Madura. We wanted to get a taste of North Sumatra, a diverse area with jungle, highlands, and sharia law. Scott's plan was to start in the city of Medan and head north through Gunung Leuser National Park and the Goya Highlands, and eventually end up in Banda Aceh. With no set plan, we would just with the flow of things.

Curious kid on the bus

After arriving in Medan on Christmas morning, we went straight from the airport to the bus terminal and off to our first destination, Tangkahan. Supposedly, they had elephant rides, rafting, and jungle treks so we figured we couldn't go wrong.

Driving through endless palm oil plantations to Tangkahan

The bus was rusted out, but had character (I think it was the purple and pink drapes). The four-hour journey passed through endless palm oil and rubber tree plantations. Slowly, the road turned into dirt, towns disappeared, and Scott and I were the last people on the bus. It was dark and pouring rain by the time we arrived in Tangkahan. We ran through the rain to a little warung (a small simple restaurant), and over some mie goreng  (fried noodles) we got a place to stay and called it a night.

The rivers and simple ferry 

We awoke the next morning to see that Tangkahan is a nice little place. Situated at the confluence of two rivers, it's just a little tourist spot in the jungle with a few guesthouses and restaurants. Most of the guest houses are across the river and accessed only by a little ferry made out of rusted oil drums and wood. The ferry is tied to one bank upriver and it just has a single rudder to go back and forth across the river. It was simple and worked great.

Taking the ferry across

After getting a place at a guest house across the river, we tried to get set up with one of the elephant rides through the jungle. But our casual-trip attitudes backfired when we found out all had been booked for the next four days. All we could do was hope for was a cancellation. In the meantime we decided to go tubing down the river. I have no pictures from the river trip, but it was a great lazy trip through the jungle and we got to play around in a little waterfall. Nice.

Scott's a mosquito killin' machine

The rest of our day was spent relaxing, reading, and killing mosquitoes in our little bungalow that overlooked the river. The place only had electricity in the evening when they fired up a generator. It was simple and beautiful.

The porch of our little bungalow. The river is down below.

On the second day in Tangkahan still no one had cancelled, so we decided to head up to the elephant place to see if we could schmooze our way into an elephant ride. We failed. All they would offer is an elephant washing session, which just sounded like a great way to make tourists pay to do work. But we were desperate and wanted some kind of elephant interaction before we left. So we signed up for the afternoon washing session and headed back across the river to our bungalow for lunch.

Elephants: So close, but so far away...

But after we crossed, it began to rain again (it's monsoon season). The rivers rose and turned a muddy brown. We found out that the ferry couldn't cross the river again that day, and we were stuck at our bungalow until the next morning. This meant no afternoon elephant washing and also screwed up our plans to leave early the next morning. The main reason we came to Tangkahan was now clearly out of reach. We spent the rest of the rainy afternoon being bitter PCV's and just wanting to get out of Tangkahan and back on the road again.

Scott takes the walk of shame after being unable to schmooze our way into an elephant ride

The next morning we packed up and took the ferry across the river to take the bus back to Medan. A couple of German girls were also going back across. They happily told us that last night someone had cancelled, so they were going on an elephant ride now. Scott and I looked at each other incredulously. We had definitely arrived before the Germans and told the elephant place to let us know if anyone cancelled. I'm pretty sure we briefly considered throwing the Germans into the river and taking their spots on the elephant rides. But we ended up just leaving Tangkahan in silence with our heads hanging low. The elephant place wouldn't even refund us for the elephant washing we didn't get to do the day before.

Where the hell did he get that sweatshirt from?

We rode back to Medan empty handed and more than a little bitter about the whole experience. I believe the final score was Tangkahan--98 versus Scott and John--0. But there were signs our luck was turning around: The first sign came in the form of a Denver Broncos sweatshirt worn by some random Indonesian on the bus. Both Scott and I are Colorado natives, so we took it as a good sign.

The next sign that our luck was turning was what I can confidently deem the best mullet in the world. We saw it while we were waiting for our new bus to go to our next destination. I was lucky enough to snap a picture of such an elusive creature. It was more than just "business up front, party in the back" but "classy Conan Obrian-esque business up front, and epic Indonesian party in the back." What was more auspicious was that this man, this man, was our bus driver! Wha?!!?!? Suddenly, the pain and bitterness of not getting to ride elephants melted away. All Scott and I could see now were black swoopy waves of epic-ness in front of us. We traveled on and headed north into the highlands of Berastagi...

I believe time stopped and all the Gods smiled when this epic mullet was created