Sumatra Island
North Sumatra now receives more tourists than any other place in Indonesia except Bali and Yogyakarta, and the main interest lies in the rugged Central highlands, the highlands of tile Batak who arrived over four thousand years ago and evolved almost completely in isolation from the rest of the island, developing languages and cultures that owe little to any outside influences. The Batak are divided into six distinctive ethno linguistic groups, each with its own rituals, architectural style, and mode of dress and religious beliefs. Many Batak have been exposed to Western education since Dutch missionaries arrived in the early 1800s, and as a result, tile Toba Batak people, in particular, are amongst the most educated, powerful and richest minorities in tile country today.
The hill station of Berastagi, part of the Karo Batak territory, and tile many waterside resorts around beautiful Lake Toba - Southeast Asia's largest lake and the spiritual home of the Toba Barak - throng with tourists every summer. The province also features the hugely popular Orang-Utan Rehabilitation Centre at Bukit Lawang, just a couple of hours’ drive from the provincial capital of Medan, an entry point from Malaysia, as well as the surfer's mecca of Pulau Nias (Nias Island) . Bukit Lawang, Berastagi, Lake Toba and Nias form such a perfect diagonal route across the centre of Sumatra that most tourists bypass Aceh province - now troubled by violence - to the north, but here you'll find Mount Leuser national park, the largest in Indonesia, and the picture-perfect beaches of Web Island.
Major gateways into Indonesia arc also provided by the west-coast port of Padang and the islands of Batam and Bintan in the Riau archipelago, between the Sumatran mainland and Singapore. Travelers entering Sumatra through the Riau Islands Call transit in the prosperous city of Pekanbaru before heading north to Medan and Lake Toba, south to Bandar Lampung, or west to picturesquely located Bukittinggi, the heartland of Minang culture and a major tourist destination with a thriving travelers' scene. Nearby, Lake Maninjau is developing plenty of low-key lakeside guesthouses. Most travelers rush between Bukittinggi and Java, with perhaps an overnight stop in the city of Bandar Lampung or, better, in smaller, quieter Kalianda nearby, but in between sprawls the Kerinci-Seblat national park, with plenty of scope for trekking and the isolated Mentawai Islands, 100km off the west coast of Sumatra, and home to some very traditional groups of people.
Getting around Sumatra on public transport can be grueling - distances are huge, the roads tortuous and the driving hair-raising. There are plenty of road connections on to Java from even the smallest towns, but if you intend to use sea or air to make your trip less stressful, you'll need to plan carefully as only the large cities have airports, and ferry connections are generally irregular.
