My Favourite Parts of Camp Life in Indonesia

To be completely transparent I had 3 clear objectives coming to this forest: gaining good experience, finding myself and most importantly enjoying myself.

I arrived to this camp happy, full of joy and excitement and our guides reciprocated with the same energy. As we felt welcomed and the air was full of peaceful aroma, I truly got the full jungle experience here, from the beautiful river where we could shower in the true serenity of this beautiful jungle of Wallacea.

Photo by Rob Hughes

For the first day I trekked on transect 7 surveying herps. To be completely honest it was tough and wet due to the rain. But what can you expect in a RAINforest! But let me tell you it was highly rewarding, being able to examine and actually see the herps up close was blissful.

The night was peaceful and the food was scrumbdumblumdumptious as it felt like the greatest reward a man can have after a trek. The bat surveying at night was calm, peaceful and felt like a nice change of pace in the jungle.

Photo by Sylvia Munday

The lectures were highly informative and factual. I learnt many new things from mammals to birds, to insects, and finally invertebrates. But instead of learning in the old-fashioned way our guides interacted and engaged with us. It didn’t feel like a lesson yet we were learning.

During our surveying I learnt countless skills such as identifying signs of animals such as their footprints and setting up traps like mist nets. My favourite part was jungle skills where I learned essentials things to survive, my favourite being making a shelter which had to be waterproof strong and stable.

But what truly made this a great experience has been the community in this camp, from the local guides to the Opwall staff team, to the volunteers who persevered, all makes this camp a beautiful place.

Title photo by Eliot Lloyd