PNG Trip Report 18 October to 17 August 2008.

PNG Trip Report 18 October to 17 August 2008.
Flew into Port Moresby, on the day there was a domestic strike by the airport staff, so my flight was delayed. I flew in from Brisbane via Air Niugini. Air Niugini had just changed their flight itinerary 2 days before I left - lucky I confirmed my flights, which I recommend all travellers to do on Air Niugini, because I heard from other travellers that there are so many flight changes and cancellations and Air Niugini is very whimsical with sticking to its schedule (though I had no problems and was probably extremely lucky).

LAE
Didn't stay in Port Moresby more than a night, but flew out to Lae the next morning. Lae is apparently just as dangerous, if not more so, than POM. The locals were always warning me to be really careful, but that tended to happen everywhere in PNG. I wonder if the locals were just super concerned for foreigners, because nothing happened to me. Anyway, Lae was a real hole, and I was surprised how small the 2nd biggest city in PNG was. It's called Rainy Lae, because it rains ALL the time. It's a horrible city - I only saw the Rainforest Habitat, which was nice, but it's not worth going to Lae just for that. I was trying to get to Salamaua and maybe do the Black Cat Track, but I tried getting there on a Sunday, and nothing runs on Sunday, and the wharf area is quite dangerous. So, I had to make a quick executive decision, and caught a PMV to Madang instead, because I didn't want to get stuck at the wharf with no transport to go to Salamaua, or to get back into town.
The road to Madang is the only "Highway" in PNG, and it's a pale imitation of a Highway. It's riddled with potholes and corrugations, because it rains so much in Lae, and there are steep mountains, so all the roads turn into rivers. It took about 5-6 hours to get there, but there may be some waiting time in the PMV for it to fill up - they'll drive around Lae looking for passengers - some travellers had to wait 5hrs for it to fill up!

MADANG
One of the good things about the PMVs was they dropped everyone at their destination, not at a bus station (there are none!). So, I stayed at Madang Lodge, which is a truly awesome place. It's great! I stayed in the budget room (88K for a single) which was always so clean and tidy (surprising) and the toilets and showers were clean. The English garden was so picturesque, on the shoreline, and the pool was nice as well. The restaurant was good and reasonable for PNG, though more expensive than I wanted to pay. I recommend the pizzas! Check out the eels in the bay out the front of the restaurant as well.The coral reef on the shore was only ok - being so close to the city and shore, it had a bit of litter on it, and it was quite hard to get into the water at Madang Lodge, so I wandered down towards Smugglers Inn (about 50m away). Anyway, there isn't that much to do in Madang town itself. It is small anyway. But, Eden Restaurant is indeed worth the massive wrap given to it in the LP. All travellers I met said it was great. It's a Malaysian Restaurant, and the food is cheap and plentiful (K14 a main).
I do recommend using Madang as a base to explore PNG, because it is safe and clean, and Air Niugini has changed its flight route to use Madang as a hub. Most flights to the New Guinea Islands go via Madang, and flights to Wewak as well. Though, it is hard to get up to Goroka and Hagen, though you can catch a PMV there, but you virtually have to go to Lae to get there.

RABAUL
So, I met a Swiss Traveller at Madang Lodge, Simon, and he was on his way to the New Guinea Islands, so I tagged along. There were very few independent travellers in PNG, I met only 6 in 4 weeks, and they were all in Madang. We were trying to get to Kimbe, but with the new flight itinerary, there were no good connections - they've drastically reduced the number of flights there. So we went to Rabaul and Kavieng instead. I got a round trip for about K900, but Simon went back to POM, and had to pay K1500. Round trips are much cheaper with Air Niugini.

We flew to Rabaul, and you could see the belching volcano through the window, and it was unbelievable. The whole horizon was smudged. We got a PMV to Kokopo, which is quite a busy little town, then another to the Rabaul Hotel (previously known as the Hamamas (pidgeon for Happiness) Hotel). I think we visited at a bad time for ash, because there was ash falling constantly. The street gutters were piled high with Ash. We got to the Hotel, and there were so many staff there, cleaning and sweeping the ash away. It was such a queer place, because there were no guests, but so many staff, and the bar and restaurant were so opulent. It was like it was waiting for a tourist boom that would never happen! Crazy! It was my idea of what Hotel California would be like. Our rooms were ok (again overpriced, but that's PNG) but they were dark because the windows were all blotted out with ash. I was wondering how this place could be kept open, but then all these workers from the Tuna Fishing Boats and Oil Tankers came in for lunch and also stayed in the rooms. But, Rabaul Hotel was a great place to stay, and the owners were cool - such Ocker Australians! Rabaul Hotel organises all the trips, pretty cheap as well. You should check out the submarine base, and the Japanese Tunnels there, and the lookout place - it was pretty amazing! Snorkelling was good along there as well, and George, the owner, was nice, and gave us coconuts to drink. We had to like pay K5 or something to snorkel, and K5 for him to show us the tunnels.

The next morning, we went to the volcano Tavurvur - first to Matupit Village, where they paddled us across the glass-like bay in canoes, and jumped onto the lava flows, with ash raining down on us, and the volcano spewing up rocks. We were about 500m away from it, and it was still pretty intimidating. There are also these birds called Megapodes, which lay eggs 6ft under, in the lava flows, and the locals go and dig them up. Seems like a lot of effort to get a chicken egg! On the way back, we checked out the old airport right near Tavurvur, and saw some Japanese aircraft wrecks, and then went to some hot springs (springs were quite boring).

In the arvo we went to Kabaira resort for a snorkel, and it was a great place, and probably cheaper than I expected. If I went back there, I would stay there for a while, and do some diving. The Aussie owners were great as well. Snorkelling was good, and there are meant to be some undiscovered reefs nearby, which they are still exploring. Apparently, divers say Rabaul is better than Kavieng.
The next morning, we got up early again, and hiked up Mt Mother. This was again, all organised by the Rabaul Hotel, godbless em. Our guide was bloody good, and we set off at about 5.30am. It was about 2hr up, I think. Maybe a bit less. We got so dirty going up there though, because we were walking through jungle and grass, so every branch or blade would spill ash on you. Probably wear hiking boots if you go up there (we went up in flip flops). The views were pretty spectacular, really good of Tavurvur.
We then tried to catch a PMV to the airport, for a flight to Kavieng. Lucky we left quite early, because, although there was only a little rain, a huge flood wiped out the road. It was crazy! So we were waiting there for a while, for it to clear, but the driver just drove through it in the end - the water was like mid-thigh height!

LISSENUNG RESORT (KAVIENG)
We arrived in Kavieng on time (amazing) and Dietmar from Lissenung Resort picked us up - we pre-arranged this. Dietmar is a pretty cool bloke - you'd think he would get sick of talking to tourists, but he loves it! We hopped in his boat for the 20min ride to Lissenung Island - a beautiful, idyllic island. Though, the island has a forest on it. It's probably about 200m in diameter, with trees in the middle, and a fringe of sand. The huts are really nice, and were built by Dietmar - he was a construction manager in Austria. They're all mosie proof, which is a good thing, because there are tonnes of mosquitoes, since the island is situated near mangroves. There are mosie nets on the beds as well, but you don't really need them if you keep the door closed. Toilets and shower were outside, because we were tight on cash - a twin cost K285 per night, per person, which included food - very good food - much better than the stuff you'll find in Kavieng, and cheaper in the end. I have the prices here:
Nights Twin Standard incl all meals - K285
Transfers - K62.50 one way
Softdrink - K5
Two tank Dive - K365 (but you get free shore dives in arvo)
Night dive w/out guide K80 (on house reef)
Enviro and Safety Fee K10
Equipment Hire K65 (But I negotiated, and got it free of charge).

The house reef was surprisingly really good - there was a crocodile fish right where the boat was, a little white tip reef shark was hunting in the shallows at dusk, and an octopus was right there by the shore. During the night dive, there were heaps of crabs, and there were large moray eels, but I missed them - I copped a jelly fish in the neck which wasn't fun though! Sometimes there is too much fish life.
Lissenung was really nice, but I was a little disappointed by the diving. There were some really rare things down there, but on average, the dives were a little boring. I'm not the biggest fan of muck diving (diving in low vis shallows, looking at critters)! We did see some good things though - ghost pipe fish, harlequin ghost pipe fish, pygmy sea horses, png-endemic clown fish, a school of bait fish in the shallows that you could swim in, eagle rays (I missed these), reef and grey sharks... But the reefs were not that pretty, and I expected more fish - so I was a little disappointed. But, maybe I just don't appreciate the little things enough - the divers I was with were photographers, who loved seeing all the rare things, but agreed with me, if you missed the rare things, it would be very boring diving.
After about 5 days of diving, we went to Kavieng, and stayed in the Kavieng Hotel. We stayed in the cheapest rooms, K100 for a twin, and these were pretty shocking - worst value I've had. Toilets and showers were filthy. If you pay double that, though, they have nice rooms out the back, A/C, which Air Niugini staff stay at each night - the plane is left on the tarmac. The only good thing is the Rabaul Gurias (Rabaul Earthquakes) Rugby Tshirt, which costs K40, because the Kavieng Hotel sponsors them - the Aussie owner loves Rugby.
We were going to try to hire a car, but it was prohibitively expensive, so we got Ronnie at reception to hook us up with a driver. We paid K250 for his mate Shaun to take us down the Boluminski HIghway. (We probably should have made a beeline for Kontu, because the shark calling festival was on, but we didn't know) We saw the treehouse guesthouse, which was quite amazing, then Kathy's eels, which was good, but we brought the wrong type of fish - not tuna, you need the mackerels in oil, not tomato - and bring 2 cans. We bought a can at the local shop, and saw Kathy feed these massive eels about as thick as your arm. We drove on and went to Libba, to check out Ben Sissia's carvings, but he'd sold most of them, and then had lunch at Fissoa, which was well worth it. There is a massive clear fresh water river/pool, and a big swing rope, which the local kids jump off, and the bigger kids do flips and somersaults off. Very relaxing.
Anyway, we flew out the next day - don't expect to send any postcards from Kavieng either - there are none, well only crap ones from say 1984. There is simply no tourism industry there.

SIMBAI
I returned to Madang, and went back to Madang Lodge. Although I will laud Madang Resort's professionalism, they still forgot to pick me up from the airport, so I hitched a ride with Madang Resort. There is no public transport to the airport, so all the hotels pick you up. Yep, Madang Lodge was far and away the most professional place I encountered in PNG (not saying much, I guess). It kicked Air Niugini's fat butt, let me tell you. The staff are well trained, and what's more, heaps of them are from Simbai - where I was going. I had organised with Esron Dotch (who's name is in the LP) to take me up to Simbai. He works in the restaurant there. He has a mobile phone on Bmobile. The network is important, since Bmobile and Digicel networks don't talk to each other. I've lost his number, but you can get him at that number in the LP - it's his Uncle Brodney's home, actually. If you want to get a hold of him by email, contact Brodney (email me for his email address) - he checks it everyday. Anyway, all these fellas are in cahoots with Dickson Kangi (Dickson is Esron's uncle) and he's the brains of the operation in Simbai. He's a real entrepreneur, actually. He's been in country Victoria as well, so he was telling me about Geelong and Ballarat, and how he was amazed by the sheep dogs in Oz. Anyway, the community in Simbai, well Nukunt Village, have built a beautiful guest house up there, in the Coastal Highlands. It's a fantastic place, so tranquil and peaceful. The only way to get there, is to go by light aircraft (K300 one way) to land on a grass airstrip (which scared me a little - check out foreign correspondent http://www.abc.net.au/foreign/content/2008/s2335266.htm - I saw this report just a few days after I got back - thank goodness!)
Nukunt Village is a 20 min walk from the Simbai airstrip, and is much nicer than Simbai itself. You walk there along a windy mud road, worn smooth by countless bare feet, so your shoes will slip everywhere. You have to cross a few single stick bridges, where you need your balance. This is to keep pigs in or out. The village is small, I forget how many people live there, but, there are satellite villages on the other side of the Bismarck Range, so the numbers can be puffed up a bit. The village puts on a welcome sing sing when you first arrive, and I hadn't seen anything like this before, so I was impressed. They storm down the path, to the beating of Kundu drums, the men with feathers and grass and face paint and body piercing while brandishing bow and arrows and spears, the women barechested with grass skirts and face paint. They ran back and forth, up and down the path as we walked to the village.
We got to the guesthouse, which has spotless rooms, which they decorate with flowers in the walls, and a beautiful common room. Everything is made from bush materials, and they get more eco-tourists than backpackers. There is no running water nor electricity - water is brought in via a bamboo aqueduct, and there is some solar power for lights at night. I had fresh passionfruit, bananas and green vegetables from the garden, and played with the 2 pet parrots. The food was great, so no complaints there. The toilet and shower were basic, but really, really clean. Dickson puts a lot of effort in, and pays great attention to detail - he's really solicitous to your needs, which was unexpected, but I guess he deals with ecotourists from Ecotourism Melanesia, who pay big coin, and are much more demanding. I was surprised by how cold it was up there - I had to put a jumper on for the first time in PNG - a welcome relief from the heat and humidity of Madang. There were heaps of blankets on the bed, so no worries there. I can't quite remember the costs, so ask Dickson or Brodney, but it's less than K100 for food and accom.
So, on the first day there, the flight from Madang to Simbai left at about 8.30am, and after stopping at Joseph's Stall (another village) I landed at around 9.30am. I had some lunch, and then had another sing sing, after the welcome sing sing. That was great as well, and the guys really go to a lot of effort to do this stuff. We then went down to Simbai, and had a look around, which was nice. There were the missionaries, who lock themselves away from the locals in their Western homes and 4WD and quad bikes behind barbed wire and attack-dogs. We had a look at the school, and everybody we passed shook our hands - this must be a custom up in the Highlands - they're really friendly.
The next day, we hiked up into the Bismarck Range, to check out some archaelogical sites, and beautiful views. My friend Alice is an archaeologist, and she told me about this place. She lived up there for 4 months before she busted her elbow, looking at all the ancient artifacts in the area. The Bismarck Range had the best views of Simbai. It was great to see all the tiny houses scattered through the hills, and the people were great. The third day, we walked down to Kenenj, which is a long day's hike/march - about 8hrs, but it's going downhill, and the temperature is beautiful. We stayed at my porter's house - Phil was 46y.o. and put me to shame - the blokes in PNG are all ripped - he was carrying my bag all over the hills, while I wandered along. I got another welcome sing sing as I walked in - I was knackered though! The setup was a bit more rough and ready than Simbai, but still good. The roof of the common room was great as well - just a swirl of leaves.
The last day was a walk down to Aiome, which was much easier than the day before. We had to cross some rivers, which was great, because it was getting hotter as we walked lower. The last river was a beautiful deep pool of fresh running water, which I soaked in for about 30min. This was not far from our resting place on the last night - the Melanesian Brothers Camp. This was another beautiful place, with large sweeping lawns - they even have a lawn mower!
The next morning I caught my flight from Aiome to Madang, which I pre-arranged. There was no one else in the 6 seater Cessna, so we stopped at Joseph's Stall again, and picked up 6 massive bags of Coffee, which must have been about 50kg each, the way the blokes were carrying them. I was bit worried about taking off with this heavy payload, but we were fine.

MADANG
Back in Madang, I stayed at Madang Lodge again. I went diving at Jais Aben, but it was an ordeal to go diving there, because they are fighting with Aquaventures, so stay tuned. Jais Aben is under new Canadian management, and they want to get rid of the scuba operation, and replace it with North American canoes. huh? Go figure! I don't get it either. So, Aquaventures is moving out, but they're still in business. To contact them, call 853 3123 (if Bmobile fix their bloody line), or 72545654 or 6757232 - both mobile phones. They have free pick up from Madang Lodge. They're gear is pretty old though, but their service is great - much better than stinky Madang Resort (they're lazy there). Diving was good in Madang, and, it suited my tastes a bit better - massive schools of trevally and barracuda, devil ray, shark. But still, I think I prefer the diving in the Philippines - just a personal preference. It cost K290 for 2 dives including equipment.

WEWAK
Next, I flew off to Wewak. Originally, I had hoped to go from Aiome down to the Sepik, but being by myself, chartering a canoe up the river was way too expensive. But it would have been good, I think, because, from the plane, I saw this massive smoking volcano you'd have to pass if you went by land/river. So, Air Niugini to Wewak, walked out the airport, and right across the road is Airport Lodge. I visited most of the hotels in Wewak (about 6) to look for other tourists to do a Sepik tour with (there were no tourists) and this was easily the best (though I didn't check out Ralf's or SIL). Still, it was expensive for what you got, which is par for PNG, I guess. Beach outside is quite nice. The best part of Airport Lodge, is probably the old lady owner - who's name I forget. She knows Michael Somare, and was filling me in on all the under-handed affairs of the PNG PM. He's so corrupt - Interpol want him for some bad sh1t! Interpol even called her to get the inside word.

Anyway, I organised my Sepik tour with Seby Mai, who does most of the medical students who are on rotation in Wewak Hospital. I met some medstudents in Madang, who recommended him, and he was pretty good. Friendly chap. He can be contacted on 6933007 or his email is seby_mai@yahoo.com.au (he'll check this once a week, but it's so expensive to check emails there!). He organised things for the next day, so don't believe other tour guides who say it takes ages to arrange. He lives in Wewak. I initially asked for K2600 for a 5 day tour (2 days were taken up transitting to the Sepik), but I bargained him down to K2000 (which ripped into my budget, let me tell you). We went via a shopping truck, not a PMV, which was buying groceries for various people, so we went to a lot of the shops in Wewak before we left. We did leave a little late, but Seby had prepared me for this, well, PNG had prepared me for this! We got to the river at 6pm, so on dusk, and jumped in a canoe for the ride up to Kaminabit, Seby's village. Took about 3hrs to get there.

SEPIK
The setup here is very rudimentary, and nowhere near as good as Simbai. Seby is building a guest house, but it is not complete. We stayed in his brother's house, and his sister-in-law, Sarah, is great. But, like in most Third World countries, she does all the work - gardening, fishing, sago making, cooking, cleaning, while the men do jacksh1t except chew betelnut and smoke homemade tobacco. Anyway, the tour was mostly riding around in canoes - I saw Chambri Lakes (day 2) and Blackwater Lakes (day 3), and Palembei and Kanganaman. The best Haus Tambarans for me was at Kanengara on Blackwater Lake, and it was a long canoe ride to get there, let me tell you! It was ok though, because Seby put a wicker chair in the canoe, and I cruised around like a Raja.
The river was chock full of wildlife - birds everywhere, and the fish were literally jumping out of the water. We threw a net in there, and immediately caught fish - I was impressed. Because I went in the dry season, there were few mosquitoes - there were more at Lissenung - but in the wet season, it is meant to be horrid. The river floods, and goes right under the village houses, so they can fish from their bedroom window, but their gardens are destroyed, so all they eat for 6 months is Sago and fish - erk!
Don't expect a shower on the river, only a wash in muddy water, so you end up smelling of mud and fish. Toilets are rudimentary drop toilets. Food is fish and sago, or you eat your 2min noodles, rice and tuna. The locals don't see much rice, so bring a bit extra, and share it with them. Mosie net and thermarest mattress are good to have as well out here.
We caught an early morning PMV from Pagwi, after staying the night at Yenchenmangua, and it still took about 5hrs to get to Wewak - I think 3hrs is optimistic by the LP - maybe in a 4WD. What else? You have to buy your own drum of petrol in Wewak to take with you. They say 200L is needed, but I don't think we used all of it and we covered some distance - the rest is used by the village, so I was fine with that. And what am I going to do with 50L of fuel?
Again stayed at airport lodge, and walked across to the airport to catch my flight. As for buses down to Wewak Town Centre, they're not as frequent as I thought, and I never figured out where to catch it from Wewak town to airport.

POM
Flew into POM, and after booking with comfort inn, I waited 2 bloody hrs for them to pick me up. Not sure what happened there, but it also happened with my friend from Rabaul, so it's quite frequent. You can get the staff at the domestic airport to call for you, but it's better if you do it yourself - there's a telikad phone between the domestic and international terminals (They're right next to each other). I asked one of the guards to call Comfort Inn, but he didn't do it in the end, so it would have been quicker for me to do it myself, or shell out for a cab.
Comfort Inn was nice and clean, the food was alright, but I would have preferred to eat out, except POM was too scary for me at night. I got a free pick up and drop off to the airport from Comfort Inn, and didn't have any time to see POM. Not sure if there is much to see there anyway. Flew out the next day, back to Oz.

My highlights:
1. Rabaul
2. Simbai
3. Madang
4. Lissenung Resort (Kavieng)
5. Sepik River
6. Lae

To give you an indication of the costs of PNG - NOT cheap. I spent 6500 Australian Dollars in 4 weeks, including all flights to and from Melbourne (though these were on Frequent Flyer Points - tax wasn't). I was trying to spend as little as possible, like eating raw 2 min noodles for meals, when I could. But, it was tough on your own - you had to pay all the costs by yourself. Diving is expensive, because there is no competition. There are no roads, so you have to fly everywhere. And they import a lot of their goods from Oz, so it's Oz prices, plus some. And, because there is no tourist industry, only an expat industry, the hotels are all expensive.

But don't let that dissuade you from going. The people are so fabulous, and you really do get a sense of a country that is really primitive. But don't expect everything (anything?) to work - it's not called the Land of the Unexpected for nothing! If you would like more information, please email me at a1k2a3p4a5c6k7e8r@yahoo.com (just remove the numerals).