tigers in Indonesia

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If anyone is consider taking a tour to see Sumatran tigers, let me tell you about our horrendous, nightmarish trip by a Dr. Kimball of SumatraTigertTours.com. He was so disorganized that he picked us up from Jambi airport at 6.30 pm in a car COMPLETELY empty of gas. We went from gas station to gas station queueing for hours and finally gassed up at 11.30 pm! He even had to stop by the road and buy 1 liter of gas from a hawker for US$10! Then we drove at breakneck speed until 3 a.m. in the morning when I insisted we stop and he put us in a filthy hotel and told us to be ready at 8.30 in the morning. We were but he was nowhere to be found. He had not paid for his room and it was included on our bill which we refused to pay. We were just about ready to go to the police and say we had been abandoned when he and the driver returned at 10.30. He denied he had told us to be ready at 8.30. Then we drove into the mountains and all he fed us was one banana and one orange and picked some fruit from a person's yard. He had previously asked us what food we would like for breakfast and we told him eggs and bread. When we asked for eggs he said he had forgotten them. He offered me a slice of bread and when I asked for butter he said "You didn't tell me you wanted butter. He even had me carry a sleeping mat a lantern and a 12-egg container from the US which I did. When we finally got to the mountains it was pouring and he suggested we stay at a homestay. We were expected to sleep on a filthy mattress on the floor in a room with many other people smoking and cockroaches everywhere. The toilet was in a completely dark room with a hole in the floor and a bucket of water with a ladle. He finally set up a tent indoors and we slept (haha) in that and in the morning we asked to go back to Jambi and cut out trip short by 3 days. We had spent $500 each but were prepared to lose $300 each because it was so horrendous. When we arrived back at the hotel the driver came to us and asked for money to gas up the car and money to wash the car. No way. We even had to pay our own hotel room. We really didn't eat or drink anything for 2 days, partly because he didn't feed us which was part of the tour and partly because I didn't want to use the bathrooms or go at the side of the road as he suggested. We are both 72 yeaars old but even if we were 20 this would be a nightmare for anyone. He seemed to know nothing about Indonesia even tho' he lives there and when we asked questions he said "I will tell you on a need to know basis". I am positive this is the first trip he has made and he has been involved in many ventures trying to get something started in Indonesia. When I got back to the US I discovered other negative things about him. If you need any info, you may contact me at - antoniacyrusdds@aol.com

If you haven't done so already, I suggest you send a copy of this to ITN magazine which has a much larger readership than this Message Board does.

I will, thank you