Debbie also showed us a cast of an orang-pendek foot print taken a few years previously in the jungle surrounding the lake. It was about 8 inches long and did not resemble a yeti or Sasquatch foot print. It was much less human looking. It had four longish toes at the front and the big toe was placed further back along the side of the foot. The toes all looked more prehensile than a human’s but less so than any known ape’s.

Debbie believes that the orang-pendek’s masterful camouflage has developed to protect them from tigers. The creature can freeze and resemble a tree stump fooling a primarily visual predator.

Orang-pendek has also been seen in trees so perhaps the once arboreal, now terrestrial ape is beginning to evolve back into a tree dweller. There is no competition from orang-utans in the west of Sumatra as they are confined to the north of the island.

Debbie also believes that early Dutch explorers may have collected orang-pendek specimens without knowing what they were. Bones and skin from this cryptid may be languishing in the basements of Dutch museums mislabeled as orang-utan!

Outside a massive black eagle flew low over the houses casting an impressive shadow and reflecting in rain puddles.

Debbie then translated for Sahar as he told us of his late father’s encounters with both orang-pendek and the cigau.

In the 1980s Sahar`s father and a friend had been cutting logs to build a house close to were the village of Polompek now stands. The area has long since been deforested. Both men saw a bipedal ape lifting up cut logs and throwing them about. It was covered in blackish brown hair and was about five feet tall. The hair on the creature’s spine was darker. It’s legs were short and it’s powerful arms were long. The face was broad and was black in colour with some pink markings. Both men fled.

Back when Sahar`s father was a bachelor (as Sahar is the same age as me this would have made it some time during the 1960s) he saw the cigau. Kerinci trades with other parts of Sumatra. They exchange rice for goods like silk. Sahar`s father and four other men were traveling a trade route. The path led through the jungle. One of the men had committed a great taboo. He had eaten rice straight from the pot rather than waiting for portions to be given out.

In the dead of night the cigau came from the forest to claim him. It stalked right into their camp and dragged him off into the darkness. It was smaller but stockier than a tiger. It had a silvery lion like mane and golden fur. Its forelegs were longer than it’s back legs like the build of a hyena. It had a short, tufted, cow like tail. The men searched the jungle franticly for their lost comrade but when they found him he was minus a stomach, disemboweled by the cigau.

It would be easy to dismiss the cigau as a piece of folklore, the wrath of the jungle sent to punish transgressors but if you recall similar attributes are given to the very real tiger, for example the tiger becoming angry at those who go naked in the forest.

Sahar`s father also spoke of a cigau who laired near a fallen tree that formed a natural bridge over a river. It would swim out and devour those who slipped into the water.

Debbie also commented that she had many recent reports of the cigau in water. Most of them mentioned it flinging back it’s mane to shake of the water.

It is worth pointing out two things at this point. Whilst on the trail of the naga in Thailand I was told of the popular belief in a golden, lion like cat in the Thai jungles. The city of Singapore was founded after a nobleman saw a golden lion in the jungle were the city now stands. Singapore means “lion city”.

Also as mentioned before, crocodiles are absent from this mountainous part of Sumatra. Ergo a big cat could enter water without fear of being killed by a crocodile.

We were also told of the beliefs of Sahar`s people that the progenitor of their clan was transformed into a tiger. They maintain that shamans of there clan can commune with jungle spirits among who the tiger is foremost.

We were so lost in conversation with Debbie and Sahar that we were too late to catch the mini bus and had to take a larger bus that traveled through the night. At our destination we discovered that the proprietor of the guesthouse in which we were staying, Mr Sapandi was a keen bird watcher. He showed us some impressive photographs of a dwarf frogmouth he had taken earlier in the year. He had heard of orang-pendek but had never seen it.

Mr Sapandi`s guesthouse was very comfortable but I was awoke by a cock crowing at 4 am!

After a breakfast of pancakes and chocolate sauce (by far the best breakfast that we had during our stay in Sumatra) we caught the bus for Ulon-journi. From there it was a bumpy ride by motorbike to a small village (I lost my hat along the way but Sahar rescued it). On the way a black eagle wheeled overhead clutching a snake in its claws. Finally we began our long walk along the mountain trail to the next area we were to study, the jungles beyond the extremely remote village of Sungi-Kuning (yellow river). The village was a two-day trek away but thankfully it was mostly down hill.

Before we got into the jungle pass we had to walk for over an hour through coffee plantations. I was amazed at just how far into the jungle these plantations have encroached. Thousands of acres of rainforest have been lost to grow plants to produce this vile tasting, vile smelling, carcinogenic filth. The locals call the area were the plantations and jungle meet “the garden” I saw several more black eagles here but also several men with guns out to shoot birds. It seemed that the park and garden boundaries were ill defined.

Monster insects abounded here including some I have never seen in any text book. There were black hornets with bright yellow spots. These impressive insects were as long as my index finger (4-4.5 inches!). God only knows what kind of sting they would give but they would certainly liven up an English picnic.

Finally we got onto the pass and followed the path through the jungle. We saw another mitered langur, a pair of three striped ground squirrels, and a small toothed palm civet.

As we pushed on it became clear that Jon was unwell. He looked deathly pail and began to tremble as if struck by the palsy. He was corpse cold and clammy to the touch. He was too ill to continue and worried that he may have contracted malaria. Sahar offered to take him back to Mr Sapandi’s guesthouse and rejoin us the next day.

Parentis, Chris and I set up camp by a stream and hoped that Jon was wrong about his sudden affliction. That night I could not sleep and was treated to a light show by luminous green fireflies that floated ghost like from the jungle and into the bivouac.

Back in Sungi-Penuh we had brought some powdered milk, tomato sauce, and corned beef. These little things make the food far more tolerable. Sahar reappeared and we continued our trek.

At dusk we reached the tiny village of Sungi-Khuning. We stopped in a large (by village standards) house in the center of the village. I was unsure whether it was a guesthouse, village hall, or just some hospitable soul’s home. Sahar said that a man who had recently seen orang-pendek lived in the village and would come to talk with us. That night about 23 people crowded into the house but the witness was not among them.

Sahar asked if we would like to hear some local music and led us to the edge of the village were a wooden stage had been erected. A Sumatran band was playing. They had several electric flautists, an electric drummer, and a trio of singing girls.

They sang a medley of Indonesian songs. They don’t write them like that any more. Chris thought he had seen Hendrix do one of the tracks at the Isle of White in 1970. I was going to ask them if they knew any Joy Division but I suspected that they wouldn’t. Still the idea of the west Sumatran highlands throbbing to the dulcet tones of Ice Age or Colony is one that will remain with me forever.

That night we discovered that our lodgings were indeed a guesthouse and we signed the guest book. We were the first ever to do so.

Next morn we set off through yet more plantations that bordered the village. We came across a tree scared by the claws of a sun bear that had excavated a bee’s nest for the honey. We finally reached the jungle and made camp. The rainforest here was at a lower altitude. It was warmer, damper, and thicker that the mountain rainforest that surrounded Gunung Tuju. It also seemed less disturbed. At Gunung Tuju I had been alarmed at the amount of litter. Some areas looked like urban parks in England. But this jungle, known as Sungi-Rumput (grass river) there was no litter. Oddly there seemed a lot less game.

We had employed an extra guide, a local man who knew the area better than Sahar or Parentis. On our first trek he led us round in circles, up pointless ridges, and into dead ends. In the morass I lost my parang that I had brought back in Sungi-Penuh. Each time we paused and sat the forest floor came alive with leeches. A living carpet of vampiric annelids squirmed and looped towards you homing in on the body heat. It was an eerie sight to see them blindly tumble towards you like tiny living slinkies. Whilst you swatted them aside half a dozen more would have attached themselves to your legs from the rear and be gourging themselves on your blood. Trousers, socks, and boots proved no deterrent.

The only mammal I saw was a long tailed giant rat. Yes it may hearten Sherlock Holmes to know that the giant rat of Sumatra does exist but at about 18 inches it is more of a respectable rat than a giant one.

As we returned to camp the new guide led us up a vegetation choked blind alley. We had to turn back and walk along a crumbling riverbank. A section gave way and I fell five feet into the river. It was not a long fall but on the way down I smashed my coccyx on a rock jutting from the bank. I turned the air blue for five minutes solid.

Back at camp after plucking of the leeches and being besieged by mosquitoes, Chris noted that at this point Sumatra was about as much fun as Stalingrad.

The following day we trekked again. This time all we saw was leeches. We didn’t even hear any birds. The jungle devoured Chris’s parang on this day. The next morning we had to make the return journey.

Back in Sungi-Khuning we brought a chicken and had it cooked. At last a decent meal! That night we were treated to a display of a local dance called Tarri Asic. It has it’s origins back in the time of tiger ancestor veneration/appeasement but it’s proper meaning is now lost. It consisted of a group of about twelve girls in traditional dress moving in a square formation and swapping first flowers, then necklaces, then kris knifes.

The following morning I found that one of the girls (aged about 16) had taken a shine to me. She said I was handsome and she loved my sweet smile. She asked if she could keep my dragon necklace. I gave her the necklace (and now feel naked without it) we swapped addresses and I promised to write to her.

We began the arduous trek back. What had been all down hill going was all up hill coming back. Though not as steep as Gunung Tuju the pass when on for much further and once again I suffered. I was reduced to a staggering pace were putting one foot ahead of the other was exhausting.

That night we camped alongside a group of about fifty men who were repairing the path. They had set up a camp so large it looked like a small village. The evening was raucous but by morning the workers had all vanished. Sahar found an impressive giant centipede the size of my hand. The pass seemed alive with huge insects, sago “worms” in fact the larval form of rhinoceros beetles, and their ponderous adult forms were common.

Finally as we approached the plantations the ground leveled off again. On the path I found the carcass of a beautiful Malayan coral snake. The poor animal was obviously the victim of a human attack, hacked into three by a parang.

We made our way back to Sungi-Penuh to pick up the things Debbie had kindly let us leave in her house. Debbie was not in so we checked into the Aroma hotel again. This time we did not have a VIP suite. The average room was tiny and filthy. Covered in graffiti it had the most decayed, insanitary toilet I have ever seen (and I have traveled).

Luckily Jon turned up shortly after our arrival. He had spent five days at Mr Sapandi’s guesthouse. Fortunately he had been wrong in his suspicions of malaria. It was food poisoning that had struck him down. He had spent several days in a fever and Mr Sapandi had kindly nursed him back to health. We never did work out what had disagreed with him so violently.

Unfortunately Debbie was not in all day and our passports were still in her house. At the Aroma the appallingly camp concierge (who made Larry Grayson look like Geoff Capes) had mad us fill out complex forms asking, among other things, our passport number. That evening he came bursting into our room with a policeman because we had not filled in our passport numbers. We explained about the situation with Debbie and the policeman was very understanding and apologetic. The camp concierge minced off without the slightest apology.

A man from the tiger conservation team was kind enough to drive us the eight-hour journey back to Padang. We stopped off for a meal at a pleasant roadside café at dusk and were treated to the sight of hundreds of magnificent short nosed fruit bats heading out into the forests to feed.

Latter on a large black cobra slithered onto the road in front of our car. Unfortunately despite breaking we ran the snake over. It was hit again by a lorry behind us and killed. I did not get a close enough look to identify the species. As a reptile lover I was upset by the incident. All three of the snakes I had seen in Sumatra were now dead ones.

We checked into the Dippo hotel again. We spent a pleasant night drinking beer in the company of very beautiful women. In the morning we caught the plane to Batam and the ferry back across to Singapore.

Chris and I booked into the Roxy hotel and after a huge meal of pizza in an Italian restaurant we bade Jon farewell. Chris and myself spent the next two days around museums and the lovely Singapore zoo, on which I could write a whole article.

Finally we took the long and uneventful journey back to England were I suffered a delayed train that crawled along taking several times as long to reach Exeter as normal. After the clean, glorious public transport system in Singapore it was a total disgrace.

Within days of writing this my hair samples will be sent to Dr Lars Thomas of Copenhagen University for analysis. The results will be posted on the CFZ website as soon as we have them.

I believe more strongly than ever now that an upright walking primate, unknown to science inhabits Western Sumatra. It think it is a descendent of the Miocene ape Sivapithecus and is related by way of the early Pleistocene Lufengopithecus to both Gigantopithecus (best candidate for the larger yeti) and the modern day orang-utans.

It should be noted that similar creatures have been reported on the Malayan peninsular were they are known as mawas, Borneo were it is known as batutut, and in the valleys and foothills of the Himalayas were it is called teh-lma (a type of small yeti as opposed to the man sized meh-teh and the classic giant duz-teh).

The cigau may once have had a wider range. In Malaya and Indo-China legends of golden lion like cats abound. But as far as I know there have been no recent sightings outside of Sumatra. The nearest true lions are the Asian lions of northwest India. We could postulate a creature related to the Asian golden cat (that, it should be noted has a golden coat and short tail) but far larger and more powerfully built. Intermediate in size between a leopard and a tiger. But this is merely theory.

What is certain however is that both orang-pendek and the cigau may not be around on Sumatra for much longer. Four out of the five sites were orang-pendek have been reported in western Sumatra are now deforested. I visited the remaining two and was worried by the amount of disturbance. Around Gunung Tuju litter abounded and on the road to Sungi-Rumput many people carried guns.

I hope to return to Sumatra sometime in the next two years with a bigger and better equipped party and try again to prove the existence of Sumatra’s cryptids before the last of the wilderness is lost to loggers and poachers.