Tana Toraja

Find a tourist guide name Sammy if you stay at Hotel Indra II. We like him as he were able to give lots of information about Toraja and brought us to places that we were thinking hard to reach as we only have three days. He is definitely fluent in English and Dutch. I believe he was able to speak a bit italian as well.

If you have lots of time to travel through Sulawesi then take bus from Makassar (around 10 hours travel with bus). It was not at all bad trip with traditional houses of local people. However if you are tight on schedule then take small airplane (10-15 people capacity) on Tuesday and return on Friday or next tuesday from Hasanuddin airport. It was only 35-39 Euro per person for roundtrip flight. Don’t expect any luxury with the flight. Expect only and adventure.

Make sure that you book a hotel beforehand coz they can provide you with bus or car to pick you up (airport to Rantepao is around 45 minutes). We were take Indra II hotel and it was not bad at all for 18 euro pernight with breakfast and already with bathtub. Might be the price is gone up since raise of oil price (we went on nov 2005)

Love being in torajan because people treat you as a normal being and not as a tourist. Make sure you take time for go for their greatest tourist attraction--funeral ceremony—not at all scary at all!! or to their cemetary (again nothing to afraid of except some amazement). Taste the great coffee and go to the highest point of Toraja and stop over at one of the restaurant there. It worth it. Don’t forget to buy the toraja textile and woodcraft. I still regret that I only buy one of the woodcraft, not that I like to have all my house full with it but just buy one that you like most…it never too expensive and hold different exotic value than Bali (at least for me).

its been a long time since i was there…almost 16 years ago, but i still remember. really cool.

It was a bit of an adventure getting there, but definently worth it.