Friendship Guesthouse & Restaurant Ketambe

Good place for a base when going on a hiking tour, all can be arranged through here. Stayed a few years ago, will visit again. Long trip from Medan, but preferable to Bukit Lawang as the orang utans are fully wild and not dependent on (or kidnapped by) humans. Beautiful experience

+Food is really deliciousn+One of the few places in Ketambe with Wifin+Rooms are simple but with everything you neednn-Staff was not unfriendly but not friendly either as the previous reviews of guests described it. They appeared to us as they are not really motivated and did not show any effort. We asked for basic information on jungle trekking and they just referred to another guy we should ask. Moreover, we asked to leave our lugagge at their place while we are on the jungle trek with a couple from another guesthouse but they said it is not possible which was really akward. It appeared to us that they did not care if they have any business/guests at their guesthouse.

We did a 4 day/3 night trek in the jungle with Friendship and had a fantastic experience. It was easy to organize and communicate with Ahmad and all the staff working there are some of the friendliest people I've met in Indonesia. The guesthouse is lovely with various accommodation options surrounding a lush garden (concrete rooms with shower, wooden bungalows with nice porches) and you can walk to the river out the back through the banana trees. The food in the restaurant is cheap and really good! As for the tour, they have numerous guides and porters available; we hiked with Bunyung and Rasman (and I forgot the other porter's name - sorry! :D) and they were all so fun - top-notch guides! We saw so much wildlife including many orangutans and Thomas leaf monkeys. I have a special diet and they were easily able to accommodate me but make sure you give them plenty of notice in advance so they can buy the correct foods. The route and pace of the tours are more or less at the discretion of the guides; nothing is planned out beforehand. But this made for a more relaxing experience as we didn't end up walking too many km's in the end (I heard from a friend in Bukit Lawang they walked much more). Whether you do a 2 day or 4 day trek you basically go to all the same places; it just depends on how quickly you walk and how much time you spend in the area.nnAll in all I would recommend trekking with Friendship Guesthouse if you are coming to Ketambe.

Relaxed, quiet, great swimming out back in the river, good food. Ahmed does a great job of organizing appropriate guides for jungle tours.

Natural, clean, great place