Forest People and Giant Ants

On Monday, we finally made the trip out to Gunung Leuser National Park to see the orangutans and monkeys and birds and butterflies and ants.  We had been wanting to do this for some time, but couldn't figure out the details of how to do it.  We are not sure that we can take our mission car out on fun outings, so we had to rent a car and driver.  We ended up calling a driver who had driven us in town before, and given us his card. Also, there doesn't seem to be any official information from the park, and we knew a guide was required but not really how to go about hiring one so there was some confusion.

It is about 3 hours away, longer than the distance should take because some of the roads are pretty bouncy and bad. We were picked up at 6:30 a.m. and went to pick up a sister in the branch who was interested--she has lived in Medan for decades but her family is not interested in hiking or picnicking.  Then we picked up two of the young missionaries.  They had gotten up early to email their families before leaving.

Bridge over the river.

When we neared Bukit Lawang, the town that is the gateway to the park, some guys on a motorcycle pulled us over and directed us to their office.  It turned out that they were licensed guides.  The amount they charged was shocking to our Indonesian friends, but they always charge more for bules and they did cut a deal for the two Indonesians.  Fortunately, we had brought enough.

They took us to see some orangutans over a path that was not too unreasonable.  It had rained the day before and was slick in places, but we started at 11 a.m. and were back by about 2 p.m.

Elder Porter was kind enough to let Sister Porter use the trekking poles, because she does not have depth perception.

One of the unexpected pleasures of the trip was the insect life.  There were a variety of butterflies all through the park.

But the biggest thrill for Elder Porter was seeing live Dinomyrmex (Camponotus) gigas ants.  These are among the largest ants in the world.  The little giant in this picture is 3/4" long.  We never did see one of the majors, which have a bigger head and are about 3 times heavier.
We had seen them in museums but never in real life, and the guides were amused at how excited we were.

The park used to have a platform where they fed orangutans twice a day.  That was discontinued about two years ago as the apes have thrived and learned survival skills, and park funding has changed.  Some of them were given names by the park rangers, and our guides were knowledgeable about where we might find them.  Our guides worked in tandem, one scouting out ahead while the other lead us along the established path.

We were able to find two mother orangutans with their babies.  One baby was about 3 years old and liked swinging around in the branches near its mother.   The other baby was only 5 months old and spent most of its time holding on to its mother's hair and peeking out at us.

In bahasa Indonesia, “orang” means person and “hutan” is forest, so these are forest people.  And they do act so much like people that it is not surprising that there is a 97% overlap with human genes.

On our way back, we stopped for a break and the guides cut up several kinds of fresh fruit for us to eat.

There are also six species of monkeys in the park.  We saw one up in the trees and another species that looked like punk rockers.

After we returned to the car, we ate a picnic lunch.  Sister Porter had packed a cooked chicken legs and rice and rolls and apples. Our friend from church brought a nice cake.  We ate quickly on the porch of the guide's office and then headed home.

Our driver had not come on the trek, and was apparently rested and got us back safely although the late-afternoon traffic made us a bit later than we intended.  Our friend from church took a becak the rest of the way to her home.

On the way back, reality hit.  Our branch president informed us that a family in the branch was in need of a food order.  So that is how we spent the evening.

We had a busy week with various visits and English lessons.  On Saturday, our mission president and his wife arrived to look at possible buildings for the new church building.