Toba Lake and Brastagi, Medan Indonesia - Part I

13 -16 April 2011. Toba Lake and Brastagi Part I ~ I started to get bored and suggest my travel friend to go somewhere, anywhere as long as I can get out from my hell office (for a while). At first she suggested Chiang Mai but when we both searched the flight ticket it was really, really expensive. Then we tried Jogjakarta, but still the ticket wasn’t really a good bargain. The only cheap flight ticket at the moment was Medan, Indonesia. So we just went “oh yea.. why not Medan??” then we both agreed on that. The last time I went to Medan was in 1996 or was it 1998. I forgot. It had been ages. We planned our trip to go straight to Toba Lake then Brastagi and last trip is Medan. I asked an acquaintance from Medan in my travelbuddy account which is the cheapest way to get to Toba Lake. So he suggested me by trophy travel agency. I don’t really like the idea of “agency” but I guess I just have to trust the local. So when the date come, off we go.


Arrived at the Polonia Medan Airport, we tried to get a cab to this trophy travel agency but we got conned by the taxi driver. He drove us to different place on and on to another different places of agency around the city. We said “No! We want the trophy travel agency!” So at last he drove us to the agency. To our surprise that trophy agency was just like 10 minutes drive from the airport. So he was asking us quite expensive taxi’s fare. We said that we will only give you like we promise, because we only asked you to bring to this agency, we never asked you to bring us to other agencies. So we gave him the money and left. He was pissed off and drove away. Anyway, that Trophy agencies wasn’t cheap at all (I kind of knew it, as I don’t really like the idea of agency before) but we was just trying our luck. So we left the agency and figure out our own way to get to Toba Lake the cheapest way. Then I remember something that I read in the web, about taxi pooling called ‘Raja Taxi’. (I did made a quick research before the trip) So we decided to give it a try.




Raja taxi. Only RP70,000 to Toba Lake

  

we called this man behind this counter Pak Marcell :D







































We got our self a tricycle motorbike (I don’t know what they called that vehicle) to send us to Raja Taxi. While getting there the guy that drove us there were mumbling about the sentiment thing between Indonesia and Malaysia. Actually we couldn’t bear listening to him and all we can do is just putting a smile to him. People keep blaming people on what they did. To me, not everyone is bad and not everyone is good. We are not that perfect.  Like the Taxi driver we met, he was kind of bad to us but when we get to this Raja Taxi, the man was behind the counter was so nice to us. See, there is bad and there is good people.

So when we arrived to raja taxi as we expected that the fare to get to Toba Lake were super cheap than the agency. That was a relief for us. Like I said the man behind the counter was so nice. He helped and take care of everything for us. The Taxi is a MPV (innova). We shared it with some local people and also an Aussie guy along with his Thai’s girlfriend. It was fun to get to know new people in the taxi. We had fun knowing each other, sharing food and stuff.

Try Taxi pooling when you have a chance. The journey took us about 5 hours. We stopped at different small villages out of nowhere to send out some of the local. It was a great experience because we get a chance to see people villages. The last trip left 4 of us in the taxi (my travel friend, I and Mr. Oz and his girlfriend). It seems that Mr. Oz had been to Toba Lake for 6 times.  When we get near to Toba Lake we were making sounds like ‘oooh.. aaah..wow” when we saw the amazing scenery.

 

Mr Oz and Elle the enjoyable people that shared a scary 5 hours taxi ride with us :)




We arrived at the jetty around 17:15pm and we managed to get the last ferry ride. Haven’t got a clue where to stop when we were on the ferry, and suddenly a guy came and give us a photocopy paper.  It was a pamphlet of a cottage. I think he was like a “promoter” or something. We took a chance to talk to him about Toba Lake. So we decided to stayed at Tabo Cottage.


















This view was taken from my room. Amazing, huh?

    

i saw this horsie from my room after i woke up in the morning and quickly grab my camera and took it!


 

Lotus pond



Nice kiddo



with his brother enjoying the last view





my travel friend climbing up the Sapo Tabo




this was taken from above Sapo Tabo

You can do swimming in the lake too. Cool ..





where you hang out with free WIFI



Tabo Cottage Backyard where you can exit to the Island



This is where the exit to exploring the island. There is restaurant 'Rumah'Makan' [halal] nearby.







































One of the Occupant . . the owner dog!



I love Tabo Cottage so much, I could live there forever :) the owner is a German women who is married to local people there. She was really nice and she speaks Fluent Indonesian. My travel friend was so excited and suggests me to get a room near by the lake. I said that will cost us money, but then we found out that the room rate is still affordable for us. So we took it haha.  After check-in we go around the cottage to see things and our photo shooting session [hahaha].

Just behind the cottage there are restaurant (rumah makan) and it is Halal. So we dig in there. Then suddenly rain poured down. That was a cool atmosphere. It was getting late so we went back to room and hang out near by the lake til the night drove us away.

My Dinner for that night. Toba Fish + Rice + Sour Cabbage + fried tempe



started to rain . .



Will continue for the next day . .