A suprise zoo

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Last night me and Suse got a ridiculous amount of sleep, broken up by many different sources of noise during the night. At 4am about 4 mosques began their prayers awaking anyone within a 20 mile radius, this continued for what seemed like an age. At 7.30 a man with a microphone (we think selling stuff) decided to blast out some repetitive message into the streets (which he did every few hours). This of course got all the local dogs barking and made it impossible to sleep.

Despite all this early morning commotion we did manage a great sleep.

Once finally up and ready we left our bags at reception (changing rooms) and headed off for breakfast. After a yummy serving of banana porridge we headed back to Bukitinggi canyon where we scaled the steep steps down towards the river. Along the way we were followed by a nervous group of monkeys and passed what I thought might have been WWII tunnels constructed by the Japanese (using Indonesian slave labour). Im not sure of this but I know the tunnels were in that area.

We walked along the canyon road by the river for a while taking pictures and then turned around and climbed back up the stairs. Over the main road here there is a footbridge that is accessed from a hill in the town. There (we thought) was a fort which you needed to pay into to gain access to the bridge. So we paid (about 35p) to get in and noticed the odd collection of caged birds. We saw what looked like a watchtower and uninterested in it we headed for the bridge. The bridge did offer great views over the town and of the distant volcanoes and we thought was worth the 35p.

The next thing we (or rather Suse) noticed was that at the other end of the bridge were elephants. So we marched across to find ourselves in a small zoo that had tigers, bears, jaguars, orangutans and snakes. As well as what looked like an incomplete whale skeleton? Anywho, we walked round, feeling sorry for some of the animals (especially the orangutans) which appeared bored s**tless. Along the way, as is the tradition to Asian Zoo visits, we found ourselves being the subjects for the locals' pictures.

Walking back to town we were approached by 3 schoolgirls who asked for us to help them with a school English assignment (basically they ask us Q's in English and write our answers in a book then get us to write a comment about how their English was) which we of course agreed too. The people here really are sweet, were followed down the street by an endless barrage of Hello Mister! Hello Miss! Its usually not from touts either, which is refreshing.

So after our walk we got into our new room with its own bathroom, came to the internet cafe to make calls and update this blog. The plan for the night is food (obviously) then popping to a cafe nearby to see if theres any live music on.

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Photos

orangutan
(poor thing)