Tips for trip to Sumatra
Hello my fellow mammalwatchers,
I am planning a mammalwatching trip to Sumatra for next year. My goal would be to see all the species of Gibbon that inhabit the Island and the nearby Mentawai Islands.
Other species that I would love to see are both species or Orang utang, binturong and of course some of the more difficult bonus species such as Sunda clouded leopard or Sumatran tiger (I do not think it is realistic to go after Sumatran rhinos).
If there are fellow mammalwatchers that are willing to join a part of the trip you can send me a message.
I have already read all of the trip reports on this website, but additional tips or destinations are always welcome.
So far my plan is to do a multiday jungle trekking from Ketambe, followed by a few days in Bukit Lawang. From there I would like to visit the area where Tapanuli orang utang can be spotted. I would continue my trip with a few days to Siberut national park, to look for the Kloss Gibbon and the other rare primate species that this island has to offer. After returning by boat from the mainland, I am thinking about visiting Kerinci Seblat national park as I heard that this might be a good place to see Agile Gibbons. I am also planning on doing some spotting along the Tapan road.
My final part of the journey is still in the making, reading all the trip reports have made me quite enthusiastic to go and visit Way Kambas but I am wondering if it is really worth the high price. Another option is to go and visit the less explored Bukit Barisan National park and maybe Tambling wildlife nature reserve. Apparently in this region it is possible to see re-introduced Sumatran tigers from boat-safaris but the information that I have gotten on this is very limited (Though there is a CNN news article that shows Sumatran tigers from a boat trip).
I was wondering if anyone has any tips or additional information for me that might be useful for my trip? I am especially curious if anyone on this website has ever visited Bukit Barisan NP? It seems to be a large national park but there seems to be very little information available about the ecotourism possibilities. Other good places that I have missed are welcome as well, as I am still very flexible in my planning.
I am also really looking for a good location or region on Sumatra to see agile gibbons, as most people that I contacted did not see them, or only heard them in the distance.
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3 Comments
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Curtis Hart
For Siberut, I’m not sure that Siberut National Park is visitable as a park. As I understand it the majority of the island, including the park, is broken up into parcels controled and owned by a chief. Many do allow tourists, but the majority are for people tourism, tribal rituals and such. They may be able to find primates for you though. When I went we arranged it through Ismael Saumanuk. His uncle is a chief in the south and has a developing village and forests around it. We spend 5 or 6 days there and were able to see Kloss’s Gibbon, Simakobu, Mentawai Lanugur as well as several endemic rodents. The Siberut Macaque is apparently very hard to see there. In general the primates are very skittish as they are hunted with the exception of Kloss’s Gibbon. On the ferry ride over we did meet a guide that said he could find us Kloss’s Gibbons.
For Way Kemabas I visited 14 years ago and it was not expensive. You could stay in the park, although food was a hassle. I certainly saw less than the people paying for a guide, but if you rented a motorbike to take in, you might do ok.
As a heads up, many of the multi day trekking options in Bukit Lawang and Ketambe don’t actually take you deep into the forest. I visited all 7 camps of a 7 day hike in a morning. If you want to go deep in the forest make sure you negotiate this and use the GPS on your phone to confirm where you’re going. Historically some guides in these two places in particular are known to say you’ll have much better odds of seeing some things than you actually do.
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Asanoth
You can read my Sumatra trip (not really a wildlife trip) report here:
https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowTopic-g294231-i9609-k14486808-Sumatra_trip_report-Sumatra.htmlI think tiger chances are near zero. Better guides in Ketambe would offer you a special package, which would not be dirt cheap, but just cheapish, where they hire more assistants which track animals, they have walkies. This would apply for less motile animals such as pangolins, flying lemurs, or possibly civets, not really cats. They also can take you deeper into the forest (not sure if that really helps for any wildlife watching except for elephants).
I did not go to Bukit Lawang, but to my understanding it is sort of a circus. I do not think it makes sense doing Gunung Leuser from both sides, but I did not study the species there in detail.
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Tau Conrad
Hi, Sorry I can’t help with your questions. But I just want to say that reading your post made me really want to go myself someday. Maybe after I retire… Good luck. Looking forward to your trip report.