Medan Indonesia and travelling to Bukit Lawang

We flew from Bangkok to Medan. You need a tourist visa for Indonesia. You can get one on arrival but you can also get one in advance online. We went the online route to keep it simple. You also need to fill out an arrival card online. You can do that up to three days in advance. We did it from our hotel in Bangkok. You can do it at the airport but there is a lot of detail so I recommend doing it in advance. When we arrived in Medan we scanned our passports on an automated reader and we were in. We got temporary visas by email the following day.

The airport is big and modern. We were able to get SIM cards for our phones. 25G for 30 days for 200,000 idr which is a little under $20. There are bank machines in the airport but we did not use them because I don’t trust bank charges on airport machines. We did exchange some Canadian dollars. Probably not the best place to do it but we had no local cash.

You can take a taxi, a bus or a train into the city. The airport is quite far out. We took the train. It’s clean and efficient but it only runs about once an hour and we read that it sells out. We tried to buy tickets online in advance but failed. The app was only in Indonesian. The website had English and we almost had tickets until we hit the verified by visa wall. It sends an SMS to my Canadian number to verify the purchase which does not work because I am not using my Canadian SIM. We have had this problem before and I know of no easy solution.

The train station is connected to the airport you just follow the signs. There is a bank of machines for buying tickets. We read that you could not use cash to pay but there were people there to help you figure out the machines. When we got there none of the machines were working so we had to buy the tickets from a person and we paid cash. The train was clean and modern. It took about 35 minutes to get into the city. Our hotel was only about 500m from the station but we had luggage, it was 9:30 pm and we did not know the city so we took a cab. They estimated a fare of about $3. The driver actually used the meter and the fare was about $2.50

We stayed at Kara Hotel it’s clean and relatively modern. Well located in the historic part of town. Breakfast was included and they took credit cards. Breakfast was a typical Asian breakfast with fried rice and other dishes. I am happy to eat local food but I have to confess that given the choice I prefer eggs and toast for breakfast. They did have toast and fruit. The coffee was strong and black. Now that we have been here a few days we know that all Indonesian coffee is strong and black. You can fill the cup half full of milk and it’s still just as black. No one puts milk in coffee here. Just sugar.

We went out to check out the city. The area behind the hotel was full of fabric dealers it was hectic and fun. Medan is a  big city of over 2 million people but it’s not really a tourist town. We decided to take a local bus to the central mosque Masjid Raya Al-Mashun. When we got on we discovered that you could not pay with cash. The driver got another passenger to pay for us and we gave him cash. So far everywhere we have been people have gone out of their way to be friendly and helpful.

We were able to go into the mosque but we had to cover up. There was no entry fee just a suggested donation. We started to walk to our next destination when it started to rain we stepped into a nearby park where some people were sitting under a shelter they invited us to come and sit out the storm. There was a big language barrier but we figured out they wanted to know how old we were. Turns out we were the same age so we took a photo.

Next stop was the old royal palace. We took off our shoes and paid about $1.50 to get in. There are only a couple of rooms to see uand most people were taking group photos but we might have learned more if we could read the displays!

We needed a bank machine so we planned to walk to a shopping mall .We walked a couple of km through the city. Lots of traffic some on the sidewalk and crossing the road was a challenge but not as bad as Vietnam.The part of the city we saw had small shops and big modern mega shopping malls. The mall we went into could have been in any city in the world. We tried three bank machines and did not get any cash. We had passed a number of banks with ATMs so we tried one of them. The first one we tried worked but the maximum withdrawal was 1,000,000 IRD which sounds like a lot but it’s a little less than $100 Canadian dollars. We knew there were no ATMs in Bukit Lawang our next destination  and the hotel only took cash. We were able to use two bank cards to make three transactions so we had 3 million. 

On the way back to the hotel we found the central market a more local market with many stalls selling everything from dried fish to cell phones. There is also an attached more local mall where Harold bought a t-shirt for $3 and I bought a head scarf for future temple visits.

At least half of the women we saw in Medan wore headscarves. None of them were wearing shorts. There were very few tourists so we really stood out. I probably had the only curly hair in the city. 

We had dinner at Tip Top, a famous restaurant which just happened. To be across the street from our hotel. Dinner was expensive by local standards it cost us over $20. But there was live music and the service was excellent.

Bukit Lawang is the base town for trips into the jungle to see the Sumatran orangutans. It’s about 80 km from Medan but the roads are rough so it’s a 2. ½ to 3 hour trip. There are three ways to get there from the city. A private car which our hotel offered to arrange for 700,000 IRD, a tourist bus which we did not look for but I expect the hotel could have helped and the local bus. We decided to take the local bus. All the blogs we found recommended avoiding the bus station and catching the bus at the first stop which is a bakery. We located the bakery and took at Grab there for about $3. There was a line of mini buses all in various stated of disrepair. We knew the orange ones go to Bukit Lawang. Everything we had read warned about people at the station loading you on to the bus and asking for payment. You are supposed to pay the driver when you get there so you may end up paying twice. We also read that it should not cost more than 50,000. 

Sure enough when we got out of the Grab we were immediately taken to a mini bus. They put our bags on top and asked that we pay 200,000 each now. Harold negotiated down to 50,000 each and we used google translate to point out we would pay the driver when we got there. They gave in at that point. We noticed that all the locals just got in the mini bus and there was no discussion. 

The van was pretty full, no AC but some of the windows worked. The door closed with a rope. The driver used his phone with one hand and chain smoked with the other.The door closed with a rope.

We made several stops to drop off and pick up people and packages including two large tires. The roads here are very rough in places and they are pretty narrow. Our driver did some passing which I can only call remarkable! It took us over 2 ½ hours to cover 80 km but we made it safe and sound to the bus station at Bukit Lawang