Mt Hagen - Highlands again – Mt Hagen and Goroka

Before our flight from Wewak to Mt Hagen leaves we have some time in downtown Wewak to fix some things. We also visit “The Cacao King of Wewak”, Henry in his office/factory. We can use his PC and sends a short email to our families that we are having a good time in PNG.

The flight towards Mt Hagen in Whagi Valley up in the mountains is very beautiful. The mountains that reach up to 4.700 meters surrounds the valley that are located at approx 1.500 meter above sea level. Before 1933 this part of the world was totally unexplored. Guess how surprised everyone got when they found out that, only in this valley, there where over 1 million people living here!

We are met by Tomas at the airport. Tomas is a Huli and good friend of Steven Wari in Tari so we have a lot to talk about during the transfer up to Haus Poroman Lodge. What a great place!! It’s located at approx. 2.000 meter above sea level with very nice views over the valley and the surrounding mountains. The garden consists of different kinds of flowers including different types of orchids. The houses are built in a traditional style and are decorated on the inside with different artifacts from different parts of Papua New Guinea. They have a DVD room, library, a bar (!!) and a modern kitchen. Maria (also from Tari and a good friend of Steven Wari) takes us to our bungalow. The bungalow is big and very nicely decorated with artifacts and Vow – we have our own shower with hot water!

Before dinner is served we sit down around the open fire in the main building and talks to the other guests, 4 geologists and a mother and son (Francis and Bill) from Australia. Helen, the chef, prepares and serves us a 3-course dinner and we order a glass of Australian wine. 5.40 AM we hear a knock on our door.

It’s our guide Simeone who wakes us up for an early morning bird watch together with Francis and Bill we walk for approx. 2 hours on a muddy and sometimes steep path until we suddenly hear the sound we have been waiting for. In the trees we observe 4 female and 3 male Raggiana Bird of Paradise.

We continue our walk and pass some small villages and well-filled gardens and big plantations of coffee. When we come down to (a kind of!) road we are stopped by a man in his small lorry who offers us a lift. We jump on to the open air back of the lorry and head down to Mt Hagen. Mt Hagen is PNG’s third biggest town. We walk around the city for a while and take the opportunity to buy new toothpaste (!?) before Tomas takes up to Haus Poroman again.

We enter the DVD room and look at First Contact. It’s a documentary by Bob Connolly and Robin Anderson about Michael, Daniel and James Leahy who decided to take their search for gold further inland and journeyed into the unexplored Western Highlands. The mountain range of the interior was so massive and rugged it was believed to be uninhabited. But within these peaks were huge fertile valleys and in these valleys lived one million people, none of whom had ever had contact with an outside civilization. When the “white man” came they though it was their ancestors that came back from the dead!

After dinner Maria tells everyone how it is to be a Huli woman. It’s very fascinating to listen to her and her story about the strong culture of the Huli people. She answers our questions and afterwards Eva has a long chat with her. The lovely Maria has, despite her young age, experienced a lot of things in her life.

Next morning we say bye-bye to the wonderful staff at Haus Poroman and Tomas takes us down to Mt Hagen where another car with guide and driver is waiting for us. The drive goes from Mt Hagen to Goroka and during our drive we make stops at coffee- and the’ plantations and a small village where we watch a Mud Man Show. We take some photos and when we ask the Chief for an address in the village to send the photos everyone in the village gets very happy. Our camera is very good and it has another advantage – the screen is very big so we take many pictures just to show “the object” the photos. This has been a very successful tactic/strategy and we also feels that we can give something back to these wonderful people. No one has ever said “No” to be photographed in PNG and so far we haven’t paid a nickel to get our shots.
The number of people in PNG who has waved to us or said Hello or Good Morning/Good Day are countless and we have shaken hands with hundreds and hundreds of people in the streets, in the markets and in the villages. And not one beggar!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! How many meters can you walk in a European or American city before someone ask for money???

When we arrive at Luthean Guesthouse in Goroka we head out into the city and buy some beef crackers and water for tomorrow’s flight down to Alotau via Port Moresby. Next day we will be in Milne Bay to scuba dive – we are really looking forward to hit some bubbles again!

Kisses EvAnders