INDONESIA - SUMATRA: TANGKAHAN PART I, ELEPHANTS

 July 1, 2023

What Sumatra lacks in highways it more than makes up for in unusual sites alongside the road. There is a never-ending stream of motorcycles being driven and ridden by interesting folks.

This little roadside stand with laundry on the line behind it was selling ice tea for 20¢ for a "jumbo."

We saw our first Indomaret, a chain of convenience stores much like Circle K or 7-Eleven.

Mosques are even more ubiquitous than Indomarts. Every village has at least one mosque and often more, and everyone of them seemed to be this beautiful. I would have liked to stop and admire a few, but we were pushing onward.

Soon we were out of the cities and towns and passing field after field of palm oil trees, something I knew nothing about. I have since learned that Indonesia is the world's biggest producer and consumer of palm oil, which is used as a cooking oil or in the production of processed food, for the manufacture of cosmetics such as lipstick and hygiene products such as soap, as a lubricant in industrial production, and for the production of biodiesel fuel. 

More than half of the world's supply of palm oil comes from Indonesia, and Borneo and Sumatra account for 96% of Indonesia's palm oil production. Palm oil plantations have contributed to the massive  and disastrous deforestation of Indonesia, to air and water pollution, to land erosion, and to a reduction in biodiversity that leads to species extinction. Bad stuff.

Our destination was one of the outposts that has so far resisted the palm oil craze. Tangkahan is an eco-tourism area that sits on the junction of the Buluh and Batang Rivers and borders the Gunung Leuser National Park. 

When we pulled off-road into a cleared space that functions as a parking lot, we got our first glimpse of the river and a very long suspension bridge that crosses it. What looks like clouds I think was just the humidity gathering together to make an assault on our California desert-friendly bodies. This was one of the most humid places we've ever been.

The endless, weathered bridge rocked and creaked as we crossed it. On the far side of the river we could see a gathering around a few elephants, the main attraction of Tangkahan. Some elephants were on land . . .

. . . and others were in the water.

Tangkahan is famous for this herd of "rescued" Sumatran elephants, which are one of three subspecies of Asian elephants. With only about 2,500 left in the world, they are considered a critically endangered subspecies. The population has declined by at least 80% during the last 75 years because of habitat loss/damage and poaching.

Tangkahan exists to help preserve the species, but also to raise money, whether that be for preservation costs or for the local economy or both, I'm not sure.

We visited Thailand in 2006 and got to feed and ride elephants there, and we visited an elephant "transit home" in Sri Lanka in 2019, but BATHING elephants was a first for us. We joined 30 or 40 other visitors in the river. Each of us was given a scrub brush we used to rub down elephants that were sitting or lying in the shallow water. It was fun to feel the tough, hairy (to a point), leathery hide.

Taking a shower with (or given by) an elephant was also a first for us.

And so was getting elephant kisses.

Ardian had volunteered to take pictures while we worked with the elephants. I get a kick out of how he added himself to some of the photos.

One of the elephants has an impressive pair of tusks. He was very popular.

Each of the elephants has its own handler, who controls his charge by pulling down on his/her ear or pressing his cheek/neck area. It was a bit of a weird mix of elephant rehab and circus training. 

After the elephants came out of the river, we got to feed them. Each of us was given a bag of sugar cane and small bananas. The elephants obviously preferred the sugar cane and would sometimes drop a proffered banana in the water. However, if we picked up the banana and tried again, they'd give in and eat it.

When all the activities were over, the trainers mounted their elephants and posed for photos.  In the past, tourists were allowed to ride the elephants, but now, the only tourists on elephants are children who get to sit in front of the handler. Altogether there were seven adult elephants and two youngsters who stayed close to their mamas. You can see from this group that most of the visitors are probably locals, or at least Indonesians. Tangkahan is pretty out of the way and probably not on the usual American or Western European tourist route. In fact, Wikipedia says only 4,000 foreign tourists visit here each year compared to 40,000 domestic/local tourists.

After the photos, the elephants were taken to a large open pen and chained to spots so that they were out of reach of each other. Several big bunches of greenery were brought in and shared among the elephants. Some bundles were carried in by the workers . . . 

. . . and some were carried in by working elephants.

You can see how the elephants are spaced out. Our elephant guide told us that it is for their own protection, and I'm sure it is, but it still seems a little sad. Okay, there are six elephants here and two babies.  Where is the seventh?

There he is! Still being loved on in the river by his adoring fans.

It was an interesting experience to visit and interact with these elephants. On one hand, the Sumatran elephants have been poached and moved out of their natural habitat to the brink of extinction. This small breeding herd represents a significant rescue effort. Besides the male with impressive tusks, there is one other young male that will soon need to be separated from the herd.

On the other hand, this was also a circus experience. The elephants are well-trained to perform and are chained up. The money paid by tourists for the chance to interact with the elephants is important for helping support the program. The elephants are taken out into the jungle occasionally to give them "real life" experience, but how real can it be? I guess the bottom line is that the elephants are protected and preserved, and right now that is critical.

Looking and feeling like drowned rats, we made our way back over the muddy river on the impossibly long and somewhat shaky-looking suspension bridge.

I'm telling you, it is a l---o---n---g  bridge.

And it has a decent-sized river beneath.

We learned that our plank-and-wire bridge is the "Nini Galang Bridge." I was surprised to see the word "bridge" in English. Nothing else on the sign is.

After the trek across the swinging bridge, we walked through a shop-lined street to get back to the car, where we had left our luggage. 

We had a local guide for our time in Tangkahan named Sucher/Suker (not sure of the spelling), who called a couple of women to take our luggage to our room.

Our room in Tangkahan Jungle Lodge was fairly large and dimly lit but with the important accessory of mosquito netting around the bed. It lacked a mirror and hot water. After a bracing shower I tried to dry my hair, and within two seconds of turning on the hair dryer, the power went out. So much for getting past the drowned rat look.

The toilet was fun too. It didn't flush. Instead, we had to pour a bucket of water in it and hope everything went down.

However, our room did come with a balcony and the view almost made up for the lack of electricity and the lack of hot/warm water. (Actually, no, it didn't.) I did enjoy the beautiful flowers in the lodge.

Down below us on the "beach" (I use that term very loosely), we could see a huge water monitor lizard. Oh what fun. We planned to wade across the river in the morning.

Dinner in the main lodge was not very memorable.

On our way back to our room I tripped and fell in my typical graceful way, scraping my shin and bruising my shoulder. A few days later, my shoulder still looked like this:

Our room was pretty warm and we slept fitfully. Not being to lie on my left side didn't help.