EcoTravel Cottages Bukit Lawang

I decided to travel with my teenage son to North Sumatra and had to make a quick decision about our itinerary. The jungle trek in Bukit Lawang was on the top of our list. It’s a village with many guest houses scattered along the bank of Bohorok River. Eco Travel cottages are perfectly situated in the center of the village life. There are restaurants, cafes and market nearby. They offer several different packages of jungle treks and different activities plus transport to some other destinations in North Sumatra. I can say the accommodation in Eco travel cottages has really high standard. Everything is very clean, nice design, bathroom with western toilet and hot water, clean towels and toiletries plus hairdryer. You will get warm welcome from members of the team and all very important information about your activities/trek. Everything is prepared, done and highly organised. Also food ( breakfast) is very tasty and big portions. We came to Bukit Lawang from Pulau Weh with a bit of “disability”. During the snorkelling there we got sunburned. Just on arrival my son developed the really bad reaction and we had to ask Hendra for help. They did not hesitate and gave us ride to the clinic nearby. Everything was solved and the following day we were rested, ready and fit for the jungle trek.. The trek itself is not easy. Don’t expect anything flat. It’s the jungle after all. So, proper shoes and clothing, it is a must. We did only 2D/1N in the jungle. I saw kids going through as people not super fit and not super young. (51 myself).But it’s really rewarding. The guides with really delicate sense of humour and high level of English will help you to mentally deal with it and everybody arrives in the final destination in one piece. ( our experience- nobody got sick, nobody got hurt). There are several stops and they are very experienced, so they adjust the speed to every single one in the group. The groups are small. During the trek you will have a chance to taste plenty of wonderful tropical fruits and Indonesian cuisine. Jungle life is very impressive. This is the opportunities to see many different jungle inhabitants in their homes without such a distraction. The guides are able to tell you and explain many of your questions about jungle life there. It is breathtaking experience. Worthy every single penny. You will definitely see many different type of monkeys. And very precious orangutan. When you reach base camp you can relax and swim in the river. You will be served really nice tea or coffee with biscuits. There are tents already made for you to have a rest and sleep. But before you go to bed there is plenty of good Indonesian food for dinner. Then some fun time playing cards, games etc. Then you will be happy to go to bed. The following day is relax time with the walk to waterfall nearby and more swimming. Then lunch and more fruits. The cherry on the cake is water taxi . Tubing was super cool. You will be delivered back to Eco t

This tour was so impressive. Every detail had been thought through. Our guides kept us fed and safe! I respect that they do not feed the wildlife and made sure that we kept our distance when we saw orangutans. You can tell they care about the jungle and that (especially) Hendra has a lot of experience as a guide. Would 1000% recommend this tour.

We are family from medan. We booked this hotel. This hotel is situated in the really nice place and very suitable for family and young children. The staff are super friendly and very helpful and everything was very well organized as planned, in fact.. exceeded the expectation Room are spacious and very clean so did the the bathroom. We would like to come back again in the future. Thank tou very much..

Before I begin, I want to say that this was one of the most phenomenal encounter experiences I have ever been lucky enough to enjoy. Please let me qualify myself for this review to provide a realistic sense of what you’re getting into. I am an overweight, out of shape American. I am 173cm, 99kg, 30% BMI, with a bad back, a bad neck, 2 bad knees, 2 bad shoulders and a bad right ankle, with renal issues, hepatic issues, and minor bronchial and minor cardiac issues. So, with that being said… This trek was the hardest trek that I have ever done and I have climbed the giant steps at Mt. Machu Pichu to overlook the ruins; I have trekked up part of red Inca valley into Rainbow Mountain and the glaciers above, I have been on the glaciers in Switzerland and the glaciers in Mt. Cook in New Zealand; and I have done a 14.5km trek through the Impenetrable Forest of Bwindi to see the Mountain Gorillas in Uganda. When they said that you need to be prepared to walk for 6-7 hours, I thought that this would be easy peezy, no problem. This was about 13km through the jungle and very similar to Uganda. Except, that the inclines and declines were much steeper slope. There was significant mud for slipping, plenty of roots to catch your feet or legs in and plenty of opportunity for slipping downhill. About 1/3 of the way through the hike, one of our guides asked if he could carry my pack. I messed up with my pack. They said to bring one extra change of clothes, so being prepared I had 2 plus about 8 pairs of chonies. I also brought all of my medicines, that alone is about 2kg. All in all, I had an extra 9kg on my back. My pride would not allow me to allow someone else to carry my pack. However, about 2/3 of the way through the trek, I was hurting and kinda wanted to tap out a little bit, but where do you go in the middle of the jungle? Hendra, our main guide asked if he could take my pack and again, I said “no” as my pride would not allow someone else to carry my pack. But then he said, “please help me. You would really help me if you carry my pack (his pack was maybe 3kg)”. That’s when I realized that very nicely, he was telling me that I was being slow and that we needed to get to camp before dark, so I gave up my pack and carried his. By this time his little pack was digging into my shoulders and felt just as heavy on my back as my pack did. After about 8 ½ hours of being in the jungle (because of me), we made it to camp. These guys are amazing! They picked us up at the airport and after an air conditioned and scenic drive through Sumatra we arrived in Bukit Lawang. We got out of the shuttle and there was a young man with a motorbike waiting to drive our luggage to the inn. We then had a short 10 minute walk through the village and arrived at the inn where they greeted us with smiles and friendly faces and checked us in quickly as they had been expecting us. We then met up with Hendra, our guide who told us to go upstairs and shower and then meet him in the court

Customer service by all the staff was excellent. Rooms are beautifully decorated, spotlessly clean and have everything you need. Breakfasts are huge! And taste fantastic. Cannot fault anything. Staff looked after our luggage while we trekked and checked us back into our room efficiently after the trek. They also met us in village upon arrival and walked us to hotel while our luggage was taken for us on a scooter. Same on check out. Highly recommend

Great experience at this lodge. We spend 2 nights there and we did the one day trek with them ! The crew was very nice and our guide was interesting and funny ! Our room was clean and confortable and the lodge was so beautiful and peaceful. We highly recommend this place !