Still waiting at Medan airport, I wish I was on that boat. The airline has just re-cancelled my flight, I’ve been travelling for four days already and there’s nothing to suggest it’s going to be over any time soon. Hanging around in the queue, I get talking to an Australian surfer called Marcus. I suggest that we share a taxi to the port of Sibolga on the island’s south coast and catch the night ferry.
Theoretically, it’s not a long way, but with the state of the roads it’s nevertheless a seven hour journey to get there. We decide to take the risk, especially looking at the local newspaper, which is cover-to-cover with the clouds of smoke making all air travel impossible in southern Sumatra. But before we can catch the ferry, we try to get our money back for the cancelled flights. There’s a big queue of disgruntled travellers, more lost time. A young Indonesian guy from Nias asks if we want to taxi-share. He joins our ‘team’, a local with a few words of English could have its uses in this adventure. We quickly deal our way into a taxi and manage to hit the road just before the Indonesian President’s cavalcade closes everything down so he can inaugurate the new airport.
I’d imagined a road in pretty bad condition, but maybe with the odd section of decent surface. But we’re maxing at 50kph here, and our young Indonesian friend, a bit effeminate to be honest, starts squawking his head off to the music on his headphones like some kind of reject from The Voice. At first Marcus and I find it amusing, but after a couple of hours non-stop it’s starting to get on our nerves…
