Bukit Lawang: Wading in Waterfalls and Rafting on the River

After a tough (but awesome) day of hiking, our Bukit Lawang trekking guides, Simon and Jakka, treated us to a dip in a lovely waterfall.  But first we had to crawl over some slippery rocks and then take a tube ride across the river (thanks to Jakka for dragging us across! I offered to swim, but they wouldn't have it.):

 

The waterfall was completely refreshing... cold, clean (seemingly, at least), fresh:

The waterfall was quite powerful- a good post-hike massage!:

After our dip in the falls, we ate a quick lunch and then headed to the river to tube back to town.  While the guides were prepping our raft ("raft" is generous... it was 4 tubes tied together and topped with our double-bagged backpacks), a troupe of macaques (maybe the greedy, food-stealing ones from earlier in morning?) marched along the riverbank on the opposite side:

Colleen was skeptical about the sea-worthiness of this cobbled together vessel:

But fears were quickly allayed when we took off down the river, braving the rapids... keep your ears open for a full rendition of the Bukit Lawang Jungle Trekking song about halfway through (also note that the song ends with "see the monkey, see the Mina, everybody RUN!"... remember Mina?)

Videography by the lovely Colleen:

Here's my view from the backseat of the "raft":

Selfie! (plus our cook who wore exclusively underwear while cooking but decided that fully clothed was the way to go for rafting?):

All in all, the rafting back to Bukit Lawang was pretty awesome.  Highly recommended!