INDONESIA - SULAWESI - SENGKENG - 13 TO 14 JUNE 2014- 'AMIRA, LAKE AND ROAD TRIP'

Info

Eriq Shanty – Salassa guest house - 08124265672 - salassaguesthouse@yahoo.com

The Amira hotel, Sengkang– 085298343824 – jln a.malingkaan no.3. – anton.mandela@gmail.com

Boat ride on Danau Tempe - 150 000R.

The journey

We loaded up the car and drove out of Bira and on our way to Sengkang.

 

We stopped at heaps of places along the way – lots of photos, lots of chats. Some of the highlights were:

Chatting with Eric – 3 kids, married late, would like a house by the sea.

Sweet potatoes being cut and dried on the side of the road for 3 000R per kilo, which is 9 000R per day.

Four high school girls who practised their English with me and when I left they shook my hand and touched it to their foreheads.  Sopan sekali! So polite!

Bridge crossings.

Lush jungle sections.

Rice fields.

Stilt houses built over the waterways.

Driving across a flooded road.

Talking with students in stilt house.

Finally, we reached Sengkang and the Amira Hotel. My German fiends Pascal and Julia were waiting there and had organised a boat trip on Danau Tempe. I put my gear in my room and then we walked to the boat area.

The boat was narrow with a very noisy motor with a long shaft. It was decked with three built in comfortable seating areas with cushions.

The boat noisily skimmed over the lake and through the water weeds. At times, the driver had to negotiate the maze of water plants rather than go through them as they were so thick and dense.  

We moored at a silt house over the lake and on the edge of a village and had fried bananas.

The bird life was teaming and looked especially magical as dusk approached.

On the final leg of the return, the driver turned off the engine and paddled through his water village. It was so surreal with the engine off and the sounds of the real world dominated again – people talking, water lapping and the stroke of the paddle in the water.


 

We paid the driver and sat in the nearby market for mixed juice.

We walked back to the hotel. The Amira hotel was an imposing building of three storeys. The bottom floor was the restaurant. The other floors we connected by stairs and doorways that lead in various directions. There were a number of sitting rooms on each floor. My room was large with air con and bathroom.  The owner, Anton was fit, healthy and friendly guy.

After a good sleep, we journeyed towards Rantepao, Toraja. Pascal and ? had joined me in the car.