With the sky looking ominous over Sumatra, I bounced on my toes at Parapat Bus Terminal. It was a foolhardy attempt to regain some feeling in my extremities.

I was increasingly concerned a deserted bus station wasn’t the ideal place to start my voyage down the Trans-Sumatran Highway to Bukittinggi. In the name of adventure, I had taken the ferry across Lake Toba amid a typhoon. However, I was starting to regret the decision intensely. Overhead, storm clouds were belching ominously again.

Ahead lay 500km and 18 hours, weather dependent, of corkscrew hillside trails, dense jungle and treacherous roads.

A snapshot of Sumatra’s untamed and dreamlike terrain waited. I prayed it wouldn’t rain.

As luck would have it, the heavens opened. The man at the ticket office surveyed the deluge: ‘Twenty hours at least now! You leave in 10 minutes!’

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Read more: (Very) Rough Guide: Madura, Java’s Ignored Corner.

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Finally, with a nod to the renowned Indonesian punctuality, we set off, three hours late.

Motor Encounter

My bus was little more than a steel cocoon, people and luggage vying for space in its cramped confines.

Its communal atmosphere was broken only by the smell of kretek (clove cigarettes) permeating the atmosphere. Thankfully, it was infinitely preferable to the myriad sweat, dried squid and oil fumes running riot.

Not so my fellow passengers. The rhythmic Indonesian Bahasa took on the qualities of a machine gun as it was suggested to the perpetrator that smoking in such a restricted space wasn’t the social thing to do.

I casually pocketed my lighter and pretended not to listen.

Instead, I watched the scenery surrender to the encroaching dusk and tropical storm. Lightning flashes momentarily illuminated the countryside, the paddy fields flooding their attendant foothills before expanding into vast walls of cloud. Far away, the mountain peaks of Bukit Barisan eerily overshadowed them.

The bus driver attacked the ascending mountain roads with Exocet precision. He seemed oblivious that the trails were more bog than road. An ever-present kretek hung unlit from the corner of his mouth.

Warm Vision

As dawn broke the roads levelled and we encountered a dramatically changed landscape.

The early morning haze of the sun struck the wet surface of the roads and gave off a vapour that stretched over the vast plateau below.

The effect was one of floating above the skyline, which continued as we careered relentlessly through the countryside.

Gurgling rivers and winding forest roads, details shrouded in black a few hours previously, now sparkled in the mid-morning heat as I finally had a chance to appreciate the calm beauty of Sumatra’s quieter corners.

It was with disappointment and sleep deprivation that I alighted at Bukittinggi, a mere 22 hours after we set off. The sun was shining, and I had the urge to see more of Sumatra’s beautiful natural landscape by bus.

As the creaking behemoth continued down the Trans-Sumatran Highway, trailing feathers and fumes in its wake, I sat contentedly in my seat. Common sense had yanked me into the nearest cab and onwards to the nearest guesthouse. I wasn’t in the mood to argue.