Our online travel guide for Indonesia has been updated with an all new guide to Tana Toraja. Find out about the fascinating funeral rites of the Torajan people, many of whom still live in traditional villages.

I’m well rested for day two in Toraja. After all, there wasn’t much to do after we finished the first day except sit around the pool and read. My hotel, like most of the accommodations around here, is removed from the main cities, and there doesn’t seem to be enough to do in Rantepao to make it worth the effort of getting there. It’s not often I actually get to relax on these research trips, so a little down-time is not such a bad thing at all.

Today we head to the south to explore another aspect of the Torajan ‘obsession’ with death, their tombs. I saw a lot of rock tombs yesterday, but these are mostly for the ‘common’ people, or at least those that can afford them. Today we’re going to see the tombs of the former royalty and upper classes. The big difference is that these royal tombs are accompanied by manikins called tau tau. These statues are placed in balconies carved out of the stone cliff faces next to the crypts - that’s another big difference between the tombs of the common people and the royal tombs - the royal crypts are chiseled out of big cliffs instead of boulders.

The most well-known ‘royal’ cliff tombs are at Lemo. At Lemo there are several balconies carved into the cliff, all filled with the tau tau dolls. Each doll represents one of the people entombed within the cliff. Originally, the statues didn’t bear any likeness to the person at all, but the trend now is to give them an appearance similar to the real person. I’m told that all of the tau tau at Lemo are relatively new. The originals were purchased by European collectors many years ago, so the ones you see now are recent replicas. The wooden statues are clothed, and there is supposedly an annual ceremony to replace the clothing, money permitting.

We take a break from the tombs to visit the weekly market in Rantepao. Held every six days, the market features a huge area where buffalo are traded. It’s interesting to see how much care and attention is lavished of these beasts, especially considering that those bought at the market are most likely destined to be sacrificed at some funeral. You’ll also see a lot of coffee on sale in the market, since it’s practically a local institution.

Our next stop are the caves at Londa. The cave openings are in a huge ‘gash’ in the face of a limestone cliff. The face of the rock around the caves has a balcony with several lifelike tau tau statues on one side. On the other are stacks of coffins. On platforms built beneath the overhanging cliff face are several more coffins. At the entrance of the first cave are several skulls set in niches in the rock. Further into the cave, coffins and bones are spread about in a seemingly haphazard fashion. We have to crawl at one point to get further into the cave, where there are still more coffins.

At the entrance to the second cave are more skulls. Just inside the entrance, you can see the back of the wall of coffins you can see stacked up on the cliff face. I’m told that the coffins are simply allowed to rot in place, and at the base of the stack is a huge pile of bones. I’d be a little worried about avalanches! Opposite to the coffin wall inside the cave, a rock ledge just a few inches below the ceiling is lined with more skulls. The same family has used these caves for around a thousand years, which accounts for all the coffins.

Outside the caves, a path leads uphill and around a small rice terrace. Once you get to the opposite side, you have a good view back towards the caves. From here, you can also see there are some niches carved high up on the cliff, which hold more graves. These are of very important people.

Our last stop is at the woodworker’s village. We actually don’t go right to the village, which is something of a tourist trap. Instead, my guide and I get out of the car and walk through some rice fields a short distance away. This is where most of the woodworkers really live and work. Unfortunately, since it’s a market day, most of them aren’t home. It doesn’t matter since it’s a really enjoyable walk through a wooded area. We end up cutting through some more fields, and even a few people’s yards, to end up at the woodworker’s village of traditional tongkonan houses. There are several shops here where you can see the craftsmen at work, and of course buy their wares. I must say that the quality of workmanship here is much better than in the souvenir shops that sell the same things elsewhere in Indonesia.
Just past the shops is another cliff-face grave area. There are no caves or crypts carved into this cliff. Instead, most of the coffins are on platforms built on to the cliff face. Over the years, many of the platforms have obviously rotted away and the coffins have fallen down, spilling their contents around the base of the cliff. Apparently, someone occasionally comes along and gathers the bones into a huge pile, or collects them into one of the coffins that’s still in one piece.

From there it’s back to the hotel for another quiet evening, then tomorrow I head back to Makassar and on to Bandung.

I'm finally in Tana Toraja – one of those places I've wanted to see but thought I might never get around to. Business bought me to Makassar, so I thought I might as well see Toraja.

I arrived last night after a seven hour car trip from Makassar. There's a small airport here, but only two flights a week, so it was impossible to arrange the schedule for flying. It's a scenic trip, but still a long time to spend in a car. There was a lunch stop in Pare Pare which was quite scenic from the hilltop restaurant, but apparently it's not so nice close-up.

So today my guide and driver are taking me up into the hills to see some traditional villages and other sights. One of the many unique things about Tana Toraja is that people still build the traditional, uniquely shaped tongkonan houses. You've probably seen pictures of these, even if you didn't know where they were. The houses are raised high off the ground and have these odd saddle shaped roofs where the gable ends shoot way up into the air.

One of the other things Tana Toraja is well known for is the funerals, which can take a year or more of planning and saving, and can go on for days. The 'season' for funerals is August and September. One of the reasons I've scheduled my trip for early October is in the hopes of avoiding a funeral, since visiting a funeral as a tourist seems rather gauche. Unfortunately, as we travel up into the mountains, my Torajan guide talks to some people at the side of the road and finds out there is a funeral in progress along our route. He assures me that I'll be welcome, but does ask me how I feel about the sight of blood, since the main activity for most days of a funeral is the slaughter of pigs and buffaloes in honor of the deceased. I have to admit I'm rather squeamish.

Fortunately for me, if not for the four buffaloes, they've already been killed and the butchery is well under way – with an ax of all things - before I get there. For this funeral, the spaces under and between the stilted houses have been filled in with covered platforms to form an enclosed courtyard for the funeral. The animals are slaughtered in the center of the yard while the gathered crowd watches. This goes on for up to five days, and people will stay there the whole time. At one end of the courtyard is a high platform on which the coffin of the dead person is placed to 'watch' the proceedings.

My guide and I stand at the entrance to the courtyard for a while, then a young man comes up to us and tells my guide that the head of the family would like us to join them up on their platform. We go up to the platform where the old man and his son are presiding. Thick, sweet black coffee is served. Not many tourists are in Toraja right now, so I'm the only white westerner that's in the area, and they're curious. The Torajans are very friendly and wonder why more Americans don't come to see their land. After all, most of the are Christian! In fact, I've found that the people I've met on Sulawesi are among the friendliest you'll find in Indonesia.

I’m just back from my first trip out of the new Bangkok airport. As you may have heard, the opening was accomplished with only a few minor glitches, most of which were cleared up by the end of the first day. I found out a few things that those of you familiar with the old airport may want to know, so here they are:

Thai check-in is handled a bit differently than at the old airport. Instead of separate queues for each counter position, they now have just one queue for the entire row (H & J for international economy). This makes the queue look rather long, but I’ve seen more people waiting at the old airport. It did seem like they could have had more people working the counters, but they probably are still short staffed.

If you want to avoid the queue entirely, then use the internet to check in 2 to 24 hours before your flight at Thai Airways’ web site. Then you can walk up to the "Internet Check-in" counter, check your luggage and get your boarding pass.

One thing to note is that at present there’s no queue for ROP/Star Alliance gold card members. I asked and they said there wasn’t. That may change, but for now there’s no way to avoid standing in line except to use the internet.

Check-in, immigration and duty free shopping are all on level 4. This level only extends a short way up the concourses, then you have to go through security and down to level three to access the gates. There can be a big line at the security checkpoint, but I found that there are escalators at the intersections of the concourses that allow you to go down to level three - where there are a few more duty free shops as well as the airline lounges. You can go through security on level three and there’s almost no queue going that way.

On returning, immigration and baggage claim were no problem. After getting your bag, they unfortunately still allow people to crowd around the exits from customs, sometimes blocking the exit. Immigration, baggage claim and customs are on level 2. I went down to level one to get a taxi, where there were certainly a lot waiting. There was a bit of a line at the first queue, but then one of the Thais working for the airport pointed out there was another queue just a short walk away. There are in fact at least three taxi queues (essentially, one domestic and two international) at the airport. The next one down was no waiting, and I arrived at a time that’s usually difficult to get a taxi from the old airport.

A few other notes: Driving up to the airport is quite an experience at night, with the blue lights in the roof enhancing the gem-like quality of the main terminal.

There’s a lot more food in the airside departure area than at the old airport, but it is pricey, since the duty free operator takes 25% of the sales price for rent. Land-side, most of the restaurants are on the third floor.