There is no denying the beauty of Danau Toba, known to backpackers as Lake Toba.  A 1707 sq km, 450m deep lake, set in a collapsed caldera of an extinct volcano, is surrounded by mountains ribboned with waterfalls and terraced rice fields.

The perfect place to chill-out for a few days among the fun loving Batak people, a way of life and culture we both hold in high regard.  We have not come across many places where we felt we could live, but Danau Toba certainly ticks all the boxes.

We stayed in Tuk Tuk, a backpacker haven, which was simply beautiful and very relaxing.  We caught up on some much needed reading, swam in the lake, rode round the many villages, visited the hot springs (which were shite) and ate in some beautiful restaurants – what more could one ask for.

We hope the photos give you an indication as to how chilled out this place is.  It has to be, almost all of the locals we met seemed to smoke weed all day long, very amusing.  If weed wasn’t your thing then almost every shop advertised ‘the best magic mushrooms in town’, with a few spelling and grammatical variations – hilarious.

Our batteries are now fully re-charged and ready for the big smoke Jakarta. As usual there are far too many photos to pick from so you can check out the rest on the picture tab, no. 45.