Rantepao - Tana Toraja - Sulawesi - Indonesia

Another highly interesting and scenic destination where I am heading. At 10 o'clock, the car arrived at the hotel which took me to Poso for the next 4 hours, a small town located directly on the coast. After a short 1-hour stop, which I used for lunch at Warung, the bus arrived much earlier than expected. It waited for me for 10 minutes while I calmly finished my coffee.

Then I got on the bus and realized that it is actually the perfect bus for the quite exhausting tour. It had no air conditioning, which was very advantageous as it kept the temperatures below 20 degrees. Another advantage was that there were only about 8 people on the bus, so there was plenty of space. Furthermore, the air was not as foggy, as I quickly noticed that everyone smoked as much as they wanted due to the open windows. The journey lasted 14 hours in the end, which was exhausting due to the sometimes very bad road conditions. And adventurous as well, as the bus climbed up and down countless serpentine roads, passing by some cliffs that you sometimes preferred to ignore and rather looked out the window on the other side.

But everything went well again (otherwise I wouldn't be writing here now). ;-) At 4:30 in the morning, I reached "Rantepao", the tourist capital here in "Tana Toraja". Fortunately, the host of my really great guesthouse was already awake, so I could quickly move into a nice and affordable room and make myself comfortable on a very comfortable bed for the next few hours.

In the morning, I immediately grabbed a scooter and headed to the northern mountains of Rantepao. Here, an impressive landscape was already waiting for me with incredible views. In addition, there were the artistically crafted local houses that could be found in every village in the region. Each one was a unique work of art with many handmade decorations. On one side, there was always the residential house and on the opposite side, there was always a smaller one that served exclusively as a rice storage.

The next day, I went with my guide to the southern region of Rantepao. And after a short time, it turned out that contrary to my wishes and expectations, we were now heading to a funeral ceremony. Barely arrived there, I had no choice but to witness the slaughter of 4 buffalos during this ceremony, which happens quite publicly in the middle of the yard and primarily serves as an offering. Afterwards, they are directly disassembled into individual parts and then prepared as food for the countless guests. Outside the yard, numerous pigs also had to give their lives. When we left the ceremony, more and more pigs were being brought in.

Later in the day, my guide showed me some interesting things like cave graves, rock graves, and a tree grave specifically for (deceased) babies.

Aside from the slaughtering, this is once again a very beautiful destination, especially if you are already on Sulawesi.