kutamaya

Papua's traditional arts are not the only attraction for tourists visiting to region. The diverse cultures and landscapes of Papua offer visitors a wide variety of experiences and there are many webpages related to tourism in the province. Here these web resources are simplified into three broad categories: general tourist information; commercial tours, travel agents, accommodation and travel practicalities; personal travelogues and photo essays. PATA or the Pacific Asian Travel Association (www.pata.org) and some other webpages work to promote tourism Papua and the region (www.travelgare.com/explore/IrianJaya). Other sites have pages which promote tourism in Papua, including: the Biak Tourism Office's website (www.infobiaknumfor.com), Petra Christian University in Surabaya (www.petra.ac.id/english/kti/irian/intro/index.htm or www.petra.ac.id/english/kti/tourism/index_irja.htm), the Indonesian Culture and Tourism Centre in Japan (www.indonesia-ctc.co.jp/Indonesia/FrameIrianJaya.htm), Archipela GoPapua (http://goarchi.com/archo/provinces/i-jaya/i-jayahome.html) and the Tourism Indonesia website (www.tourismindonesia.com).

Tour operators and travel agents have conducted group tours in Papua since it was opened to international tourism in the late 1980s. Commercial tourism operators host a range of sites with information about their various package tours to Papua. Examples of these businesses include: Papua Adventures (www.papua-adventures.com), Sawadee (NL: www.sawadee.nl), Hidden Cultures (www.hiddencultures.com), Arcadia Tours (www.arcadia.nl), Immersia Travel (www.immersiatravel.com/ng2.html), Hey Papua (www.hey-papua.de) and Indonesian tour companies like Limbunan (see www.eastindonesia.com/tour/irianwww.baliem.com). Some foreign tour operators with a history of travel in Papua also have detailed websites about Papua with details of tours and Papuan artefacts online (for example see www.irianjaya.de which is the same site as www.harald-melcher.de). You may find more tour operators and travel agents (even ones based in Papua) with a general web search. While tour operators and travel agencies can arrange all travel and accommodation arrangements for a trip to Papua, tourist who desire greater independence will find it useful to visit other sites on the web. or

Transportation services are essential to the lives of most people living in the urban centres of Papua and every year better information about these services can be found online. This includes the websites provided by two major Indonesian passenger airlines Garuda (www.garuda-indonesia.com) and Merpati Airlines (www.merpati.co.id) as well as pages on the Departmen Perhubungan or Department of Transportation website with general schedules (www.dephub.go.id/irja/data/frek_pnrb.htm). PELNI (Pelayaran Nasional Indonesia), the National Passenger Ferry Service also has general information (www.pelni.com) and its schedules are online (see www.onklik.com/ontrip/index_kapal.php3). The only airport in Papua capable of landing a Boeing 747 (Jumbo Jet) is the Bandar Udara Frans Kaisiepo in Biak (E: www.angkasapura1.co.id/eng/location/biak.htm) although many of its coastal towns are well equipped for large passenger ferries and cargo ships, including the ports of: Jayapura, Biak, Manokwari, Fak-Fak, Sorong and Merauke (www.portina4.go.id/ports.htm shows a map of these towns linked to pages with data on these docks). Information about some local ferry services in Papua is available online through PT ASDP (Angkutan Sungai Danau dan Penyemberangan or the Inland Waterways and Ferry Transportation Corporation website (www.ferry-asdp.co.id).

Foreign visitors not arriving from other parts of Indonesia may be able to travel on the weekly charter flight operating between Timika and Darwin (Australia) as an alternative route to Papua (www.timikacharters.com.au). There is also a regular bus service (and irregular light aircraft flights) between Jayapura and Vanimo in neighbouring Papua New Guinea. For these international connections travellers must obtain appropriate visas (which can prove difficult). More detailed information for such travel is available from the Papua New Guinea Consul in Jayapura (refer to www.pngembassy.org/mission.htm), the Australian Embassy in Indonesia (www.austembjak.or.id), the Indonesian Embassy in Canberra (www.kbri-canberra.org.au) as well as the Indonesian travel agents listed above, Darwin-based travel agencies like Northern Gateway (www.northerngateway.com.au) or PNG-based tour companies like MTS (www.meltours.com/index.html).

Accommodation in Papua can range widely according to price and exclusivity. Some of the most expensive accommodation in Papua includes the Sheraton Hotel in the mining boom town of Timika (http://www.greathotels.co.id/contents/sheratontmk.html), the Honai Resort (www.baliem.com/html/honai.html) and Baliem Valley Resort (G/E: www.baliem-valley-resort.de) both near the central highlands town of Wamena and a number of high end hotels in bigger towns like Jayapura and Sorong (see sites like www.regit.com/regitel/indonesi/business/rianjaya/jayapura.htm). The more modest hotels and losmen in the coastal towns of Papua do not have much of a web presence. Information about these places and the opportunities to stay in traditional houses with local Papuans can be found in some of the travelogues listed below. Basic medical supplies may be purchased through local chemists in Jayapura which are listed in the Apotheek Jayapura webpage (ID: www.satumed.com/index.html/lain/37).

Travelogues are personal or group accounts of tourist's experiences in their travels which often contain interesting insights and practical advice on places, conditions, cultural difference (and "culture shock"). They may take the form of brief or lengthy trip narratives, photo-essays or even become the inspiration for entire websites or film projects. Travelogues have been written about Papua for more than a century, but there are still few substantial texts (or essays) in this "adventure" or "explorer" genre available online.

Short travelogues about Papua available on the web may be general reviews of visits to Papua, like: Henry Richardson's trip report (www.geocities.com/hr1975/ij-report.htm); Liono Irian Jaya pages (www.emp.pdx.edu/htliono/irja.html), Susan's Trip (www.websurf.net.au/~susan/Irian.htm), Jean-Philippe Soules's story (www.caske2000.org/stories/irianjaya.htm), one of Martijn Maandag's many trips (NL: www.reisverslagen.net) or Herman Vellinga's recent visit and reminiscences (NL: http://home.planet.nl/~velli026). Others tend to focus on specific areas, including perhaps the only commentaries available online about the villages of Tobati and Engros (www.cs.washington.edu/homes/weld/engros.html). The more familiar tourist destinations like the Baliem Valley, the Asmat and Korowai regions of the southern swamps and the Carstensz glaciers and Puncak Jaya have more webpages.

The Baliem Valley was first discovered in 1938 by Richard Archbold and his team during an expedition for the American Museum of Natural History in New York (www.amnh.org or see http://research.amnh.org/mammalogy/dla/index.htmlIt returned to prominence during World War II with the crash of a US army C47 aircraft in the valley and the subsequent rescue of some of its passengers (www.thedropzone.org/pacific/walters.htm).www.cs.washington.edu/homes/weld/stone-age.html), Dave Hunter's Trek (www.ana.ed.ac.uk/anatomy/staff/HunterD/treks/iriantab.html) how Allan Miller spent his summer vacation (www.pedropoint.com/dani.htm) and other short travelogues about the Central Highlands of Papua (such as http://www-ah.wbmt.tudelft.nl/~jerry/jw2/IrianJaya/Baliem.html). For those tourists with a specific interest in climbing, or a desire for serious trekking, Papua has some of the most spectacular mountain ranges in the world. for information about visiting the Archbold Collection of photographs and documents related to this expedition). Since then, the Baliem Valley has held a special attraction for "adventure" tourists and trekkers. See some of the online writings of recent visitors to this unique place in Daniel Weld's "Glimpse into the Stone Age" (

Carstensz is home to the tropical glaciers which rest on Puncak Jaya, at an elevation of almost 5000 meters above sea level. Although known to local Papuans for millenia, this rare tropical glacier first became known to European geographers when it was seen from the Arafura sea by the Dutch explorer Jan Carstensz in the 17th Century. In the early 20th Century, several European expeditions vied to be the first to reach the summit of this remarkable peak (see www.xtreme.nl/land/beleving/index_lab210600.shtml). In October 2001, the Koninklijk Instituut voor de Tropen, or Tropen Instituut (Royal Tropical Institute at www.kit.nl) presented “Race to the Snow,” an exhibition of photographs from these earliest European expeditions to the summit of Carstensz (www.kit.nl/fotobureau/html/publicaties.asp). The Carstensz massif was studied extensively during the early 1970s by a group of researchers from Australia and their results are now available on PapuaWeb (see www.papuaweb.org/dlib/bk/hope1976/_sampul.html). A few of these researchers also have an article about the glaciers available online through the United States Geological Survey website (http://pubs.usgs.gov/prof/p1386h/indonesia/intoc.html).

Puncak Jaya (the current name for the Carstensz Massif) and its glaciers remains one of the primary tourist attractions in Papua. Puncak is the highest mountain on the island of New Guinea, the highest peak between between the Himalayas and the Andes and one of the "7 summits" of the world (see http://7summits.com). Climbing here requires a special permit from the Departmen Kebudayaan dan Pariwisata or the Department of Culture and Tourism in Jakarta (www.budpar.go.id). In recent years this trip has been offered as a commercial package tour for climbers lasting anything from 6-20 days (see www.alpineascents.com/carstensz.asp), and growing numbers of foreign climbers have used it to complete their "7 summits" (www.adventurestats.com/tables/7sum.htm). Other webpages about climbers' experiences on Puncak Jaya include: a flash animated website which features Carstensz (www.econ.nl), an article in Everestnews (www.everestnews.com/carstensz.htm), a photo essay at the Mountain Madness website (www.mountainmadness.com/gallery/carstenz/carstenz01.htm), a helicopter- assisted ascent (NL: www.demis.nl/poul/x11.htm). Other regions in the highlands are also spectacular and physically demanding to traverse. An extremely challenging expedition (unlikely to ever become a group tour) was proposed for the year 2000 by a team which planned to walk the entire length of the islands of New Guinea - 2400km over the central cordillera (mountain range) of New Guinea from Milne Bay, in the far east of Papua New Guinea, to the west coast of the Bird's Head of Papua (http://members.aol.com/prwiles).

Scuba diving tours and other coastal attractions remain a small but significant part of the Papuan tourism industry. Max Ammer runs a commercial scuba diving business in Sorong (www.iriandiving.com) which features the natural marine life of Papua and underwater exploration of old World War II wrecks (see www.iriandiving.com/Wreck-Diving.html and www.pacificwrecks.com/provinces/irian_biak.html). Many of these wrecks can be found in and around the island of Biak where tourism was being heavily promoted during the 1990s and featured the brand new Marauw (Biak Beach) Hotel (for example see www.jipi.com/inatourism/irian_jaya/index.php3?topik=resort). This hotel is featured in Kal Muller's article on diving in Biak (Muller has written one of the most popular foreign guidebooks to Papua) although it is no longer operational (see www.asiandiver.com/themagazine/indonesia/biak.html). Some other pages provide limited information about Biak and its adjacent islands (http://members.tripod.com/biak-island/welcome.htm). The attractions of Papua's natural environment are also featured in other accounts of diving (www.photocean.com/irianjaya.html) or you can explore the coastal areas of Papua and other parts of Indonesia aboard a chartered tour boat operated by companies like Divex Indonesia (www.divex-indonesia.de/start.htm).

Bird watching should be an extremely popular tourist activity in Papua given the wealth of its endemic species. While groups of ornithologists occasionally visit Papua, only a few operators such as Papua Expeditions (www.papuaexpeditions.com and ID: www.ekonexion.com) and Kris Tindige (www.earthfoot.org/places/id002.htm) run tours specifically for bird watching. If you are fortunate enough to visit Papua, there is a bird sanctuary on Biak Island close to Biak Town (on the main road to Bosnik) and also the new Biak Falcon and Raptors Conservation Center (http://users.belgacom.net/gc559907/intro.htm). The BFRCC is dedicated to the conservation of Papuan and Indonesian birdlife, including the rare Javan Hawk Eagle (which is the bird on the national emblem of the Republic of Indonesia).

Photographic essays are travelogues (like www.whereisevan.com/indonesia00-3.html) but they generally rely more on images than text in their representations. Online photo essays which feature Papua include Chris Ranier's "Where Masks Still Dance" (from his book www.time.com/time/reports/newguinea/home.html), Rob Huibers website (www.photo.nl), Kaj Maurins Papua slideshow (www.indonesiapromo.com/slidesho/irian/ss01.html), Ken Ratihn's photo gallery (www.pcweb.net/kss/irianjaya/index.htm), Jez O'Hare's site (www.jezohare.com), the Eric de Noorman website (http://users.pandora.be/e.rasker/Irian.html). Extensive photoessays can be found at Abentuer Indonesien (www.abenteuer-indonesien.de/iriangal1.html) and at www.photocean.com/irianjaya.html and the "crazy-man" plans to make a documentary film in Papua (www.crazy-man.org). Harald Melcher has already made a film in Papua which is available for purchase online (www.harald-melcher.de/index_dt.htm).