After yet another horrendous Indonesian bus journey of lateness, freezing cold temperatures, stopping to change buses in the middle of the night and all-night-long music blaring out we arrived in Samarinda a little bleary eyed. Having checked into a slightly more upmarket hotel than we would usually stay in, as most low cost accommodation in Samarinda is known to be diar, we then set about the task of finding a guide to do our final activity in Kalimantan with; a three day trip down the Mahakam River, the second biggest in Indonesia. After ringing around local guides and finding the best price, we settled on a guide named Suryadi; a particularly muscular 50-odd year old local man. We spent the rest of the day wandering around trying to find an Internet cafe, during which time a Chinese local offered to drive us around to find one, then failing took us back to his hotel, wanted photos with us, and invited us to dinner, all in the space of half an hour. Completely exhausted from the previous nights' sleepless bus journey we politely declined and spent the rest of the day finally finding internet, and trying a savoury tuna martabak (which wasn't as good as the sweet one)!

The following morning we were picked up by Suryadi and his driver at 9am from our hotel, and after bashing into the car park wall as we left, which the driver didn't seem overly bothered about, we drove for three hours (with one toilet stop at the side of the road) to the harbour area where we drove onto a barge and crossed a small river. Access used to be by a nearby bridge but it collapsed a couple of years earlier killing dozens in the process (sadly there seems to be lots of infrastructure related disaster stories around Indonesia). After a brief drive we arrived at a riverside harbour from which we would be boarding our boat for the trip; a small motored canoe boat known as a 'ces'. Prior to boarding, Suryadi bought us lunch at a small local restaurant, consisting of a delicious barbecued catfish steak with rice and vegetables. We were finding that having a guide was proving useful for trying our tastiest food yet in Indonesia!

5 minutes after departing on our boat, we stopped in the delta area, where the fresh water of the river mixes with the salt water of the sea, to look for the infamous Irawaddy dolphins. Sure enough, after only a couple of minutes we begun to see their humped shaped heads and fins emerging from the water around our boat. Bopping up for air we could see the water coming from their blow holes and pods of the animals searching around us for food. We were later told that we had been very lucky to see them; even some residents in Kalimantan have never managed to get a sighting. Our wildlife spotting continued down the river as we saw giant stork birds sitting on the river banks waiting to grab a fish with their scarily long beaks from the water. After making our way across a large open lake we begun to enter small villages all built on stilts above the river, housing many fish farms, and also a number of very enthusiastic children who all wanted to gain a return wave from us. Again we had to stop for the toilet, this time at one outside of a mosque on stilts; simply a hole in the decking which went straight into the water! Our ces continued to wind it's way through increasingly narrow passageways, lined with tall reeds, winding through the jungle.

That first afternoon we stopped for the evening at a small village called Muara Muntai built on the banks of the river, with the shops and houses built on stilts to prevent flooding in the rainy season, and the road and walkways on a raised boardwalk that encircled the small town. After leaving our bags at a very basic guesthouse we went and explored with our guide. Walking along the main road of shops and houses, we were again made to feel like celebrities, with children giggling and looking shy as we approached and then shouting "hello mister" loudly after us when we were at a safe distance away. Suryadi bought us some rambutan fruits and bananas to sample, the skins of which we simply threw on the floor as we wandered along! Suryadi showed us a bird in a cage, which was much like a parrot in that it could repeat what you said. Not only that, it could also imitate voice tones, and general sounds that it heard on a day-to-day basis down the street. It's favourite was the tune of the ice cream bike that circled around the village, and the horn on another food cart, which were uncannily similar! That evening we were again treated to some excellent food by Suryadi, this time a massive piece of glazed barbecued chicken with rice, vegetables and chicken soup.

Next morning after breakfast we set off down the river again, this time able to spot a large group of proboscis monkeys jumping around in the trees along the river fighting over food with some macaque monkeys. During the 6 hours on the boat that day we also managed to spot a couple of monitor lizards, more monkeys and a variety of birds. In the afternoon we made a stop at a Dayak village called Mancong, to look at a traditional longhouse they were rebuilding. While most families there now live in individual homes, some of the poorer ones still use the longhouse, which is also used for village ceremonies and occasions, and for refuge when the flood waters breach the lower houses' walls. As we were about to get back into the boat Suryadi explained that he would now have to leave us. He had mentioned something about this earlier but obviously lost in translation we had assumed it was the following day he was leaving. After a bit of a strained conversation, he offered us some extra money back and explained that the boat driver would ensure all our accommodation for that night and transport back to the mainland would be sorted for us. It turned out that a preliminary booking with a group of tourists had been booked with him for the following day many months ago but never confirmed by them so he had assumed it wasn't happening, but after the tourists called him that day and confirmed he couldn't pass on the opportunity...it can sometimes be weeks that these guides go without any work and we understood the importance that he took the opportunity to make some more money. Saying our goodbyes we carried on down the river through narrow jungle passages for a couple more hours, until we reached the Dayak village, Tanjung Isuy, that we would be staying in for our second night. The village was not so traditional as the one we had experienced on our jungle walk in Loksado, with little to see and more just a base to spend the night. That evening, without the help of our guide, we had to settle for a basic nasi goreng for dinner, and spent the rest of the evening chatting to an English family in our hostel. That night, Sophie Facebook called her mum to wish her happy birthday, the conversation for which the whole hostel heard through the paper thin walls!

The next morning we left on our boat at 8am, glad to see the driver hadn't left us in the middle of the night! Returning to the mainland another driver was waiting there to take us back to Samarinda, where we immediately got on a 3 hour bus journey to Balikpapan. Back in Balikpapan we got ripped off by an Angkot driver to take us to the hostel area, during which journey Sophie then argued for the extra money back that we had paid as everyone else on the mini bus paid less...eventually being successful! Exhausted, we wandered around for far too long trying to find a cheapish hotel, grabbed a Big Mac from McDonalds, some doughnuts from the bakery and collapsed into bed in front of the TV! The boat trip had been yet another brilliant trip, and a great way to see some local villages and jungle wildlife, while speeding along on our private ces was wholly enjoyable!

Our final couple of days in Indonesia were spent in the following way:

- Searching an hour down random streets with a Santa Claus type sack for a laundrette to take our huge mound of washing to, only to find one, return four hours later to collect it, to be told that we had paid for a 4 day wash, not a 4 hour wash, and paying more to get it done for the next day!

- Pretending that we were staying at the Swiss Bel Hotel so that we could use what seemed to be the only public computer in the city of Balikpapan, and abusing the free printing facilities and computer for hours.

- Sophie trying and eventually failing to buy a bra in the department store after hers got lost/stolen in one of our laundry trips. Being a westerner buying a bra was big news in the store, and what must have been almost 20 members of staff crowded around her and whispered about her choices as she looked around. Being mainly conservative Muslim girls, a choice of anything but a plain nude coloured bra was extremely exciting and in the end, much to the disappointment of the staff, this all got too much for Sophie, and she decided the search would have to continue in Australia!

- Flying from Balikpapan back to mainland Denpasar and having our last fill of rice. Then flying from Denpasar to Singapore on an Air Asia flight, continually worried about the latest safety issues!

Leaving Indonesia, we decided our visit there had really been in two parts. The more touristy areas of Bali and the islands, whilst relaxing, had come to bore us after a while, and had not in our opinion lived up to similar locations we had both previously visited in Thailand, and nor had the food! The more off the beaten track areas however had provided us with new and exciting sights; Borobudur, friendlier people, village home stays, vast jungle, and of course the orangutans. While not easy to travel these latter areas the rewards for our efforts were fantastic, and more than enough to leave us wanting to explore further Indonesian hidden gems in the future!