Luckily they didn’t carry their loud music along the trail and I was able to enjoy a quiet nature walk alongside the river, and find some of those elusive giant butterflies, which are attracted to this valley. The trail ended at a series of dark caves and with the aide of a lantern I went on a bit of a hunt for bats and other treasures. The reprieve from the hot sun was a welcome relief.

I continued my journey on the long highway leading north out of Makassar. This road takes you on a timeless journey into Tana Toraja.

Toraja has fascinated people for centuries with their elaborate sacrificial funeral ceremonies and sacred burial cave sites guarded by effigies. The colorful hand painted houses called Tongkonans are beautifully decorated in tribal motifs and buffalo horns from past sacrifices. The origins of Torajan culture dates back in celestial time as the Torajan people believe they descended from the stars and arrived in starships. It is thought that the shapes of their houses resemble these very starships.

That night I stopped in the township of Parepare and slept the night overlooking the Straights of Makassar from a hotel perched on the top of a hill with fantastic views.

The next morning I continued north into the mountains. About 5 hours later I arrived in Rantepao – the heartland of Toraja country. The road winds higher and higher into the mountains and at the summit you reach a place called Butu Kabobong, which means Erotic Mountain. There before you lay two erotic geological landmarks, which introduce you to the gateway of Torajaland. To the local people they are known as ‘Most Holy Penis’ and ‘Most Sacred Vagina’.

This is the point where the Torajan people claim their first ancestors descended from Pleiades in starships. Another belief is that the Tongkonan houses resemble a boat-shaped design to allow for the soul of a dead person to be launched back to the stars.

The tongkonans are built without nails and are simply slotted together with precise accuracy and are built with lifetime strength. Their houses and rice barns stand on stilts allowing for free flow circulation from below and also double as a shelter for the family owned water buffalo. The slatted floors allow for animal droppings to be collected and reused for crop fertilizer.

The next day my local Indonesian (English speaking) guide called into an internet café to check his email. He appeared 5 minutes later with a big smile on his face “We are lucky, Miss, even though the funeral season is usually June and July, there is a funeral in progress only 30 kms from here. It is day 3 of the funeral and will be the most interesting day – The day of the animal sacrificing”.

Torajan funerals are held only when the families have saved enough money to host the elaborate event. It is necessary to build a complete village to house literally hundreds of guests over a 5-day period. The temporary village is then dismantled afterwards. The other major cost involves buying animals for sacrifice.

One healthy buffalo can cost up to 40 million rupiah (US$3,300) and a pig can cost up to 3million rupiah (US$250). It is not uncommon to have over 50 pigs and several buffaloes sacrificed. For this reason, the dead body may end up staying in the house for up to five years or more to await the accumulation of finances.

One of the traditional villages I visited actually had a five-year-old mummified body laying in the lounge. The dead person was an elderly female, whose husband had died previously and the family were still unable to pay for a second funeral even five years later.

Some of the mummified bodies are stored in ornately decorated sarcophaguses. If you are from royal descent, then a royal widow must stay in the same room as the dead spouse until the burial time. It is not uncommon for a widow to stay up to five years or more. The widow must stay with the disintegrating corpse and sympathically “rot” herself, living on a special diet for the entire period, excluding rice products. She must become symbolically dead. She is not permitted to leave her husband’s side. Lesser widows and slaves tend to her needs. To make sure the soul is not neglected, a bowl of food is replenished daily and palm wine poured plus an offering of betel nut or chewing tobacco is made at regular intervals. The Torajans believe it is only through this rich ritual that they will always be a ‘free soul’ and become richer in their next life.

It was around 35 degrees and hot at 10.00am when I arrived at the funeral. Sada, my guide, escorted me along the 1 km rocky trail to reach the temporary bamboo village, which had been erected, for the sole purpose of this burial. I was made to feel very welcome and was told I could take as many pictures as I liked. If foreigners come to a traditional Torajan funeral it is seen as a sign of good luck and in the hierarchical order of status, a foreigner is seen as a dignitary, and thus you are treated as an honored guest. I had many offers of coffee (home grown Torajan coffee, which is famous to the area), cakes and other sweets. The people were very friendly and I was made to feel very welcome and invited to sit in the "family room".

The Torajan society is a highly structured one, with 4 classes of people, from nobility down to peasant class. Depending on your ranking in the village, you must offer a certain amount of pigs or buffalo, which is then slaughtered, and the meat distributed evenly amongst the guests, depending on their ranking in the village society.

An official from the Government, who writes in triplicate, records every animal given for slaughter and a tax is imposed accordingly. I sat in amazement, taking all this in, from the cool shade of the family platform, talking with the locals about their life, their work in the city, their travels etc. Family members come from all corners of Indonesia when a funeral is in procession, and many of the local guests spoke fluent English. In fact, a nobleman’s son or daughter will have an assistant assigned to him from birth to accompany him in his life. This includes attending school in Makassar or further a field to Jakarta or even overseas in some cases.

The animal sacrificing had already begun when I arrived. It took place in a specially designed area where pigs and other animals where hauled in to the “circle of death” and killed with great speed and efficiency. Blood flowed through the middle of the common area and huge chunks of meat were weighed and divided out throughout the day according to ranking and status. A few bamboo pipes went past me, full with animal blood, but I didn’t dare ask what they were for, or where they were going. I checked my tea was actually tea.

I felt very privileged to attend this funeral and in the afternoon returned to the luxury of the Heritage Hotel (previously Novotel). A magnificent 160-room 4 star property, including villas designed in the shape of Tongkonan houses. The hotel had all the finishing touches including a wonderful meet and greet service, on arrival with cold towels and a relaxing head and shoulders massage.

Due to a current downtown in tourism, as in many Indonesian destinations, I was able to visit the villages and interesting sights in virtual solitude. Hotel occupancy at the Heritage was only 10%. Next on the agenda was a visit to a few death cliffs. This is another fascinating aspect of the culture. The Torajans bury their dead in chiseled out coffin slots in cliffs, or on rocks or hillsides. Some have effigies placed in the open doorways to guard the spirit of the dead body. Some are just left open, exposing the bones for all to see.

On day 5 I decided to take a 2-hour drive to a distant village. I arranged, through my guide, to stay in a traditional Tongkonan longhouse in a small village perched high in the mountains.

It was late afternoon when I reached the high road that would lead me to this village. The light was beautiful and I decided to get out of the car and walk the last 4 kms. This gave me the opportunity to meet and talk with the local mountain folk who were out walking along the roadside. Sada, explained the procession of people out walking were on their way back to their villages after a funeral. It was also a school day, so there were many children as well, out walking on the road. It is not unusual for children to walk 8 -12 kms to and from school each day! The children were fantastic, smiling and laughing and having fun posing for the camera.

The mountain people of Toraja have very distinct features. They look different to any other tribal indigenous people I have seen in Sulawesi. They resemble Siamese or Cambodians more so than Malay Indonesians. I noticed that even though these rural people live in basic houses, with very poor conditions they are always happy, smiling and relaxed, seemingly without a care in the world. In terms of materialistic acquisition, which many of us in the West aspire to, the Torajans seem happy to live in a very simple way, not wanting for much. Their most important asset is a large healthy buffalo. When I arrived at the Tongkonan house for the night, I had a choice of which attic I wanted to sleep in. I was told the room rate would be a grand total of USD$4.00 including a pancake breakfast!!

The owners of the home stay cooked a beautiful dinner, and I dined that night overlooking the beautiful mountains of Toraja with a view of the full moon. It was more than enough to make up for the slight discomfort of sleeping on simple mattress on the floor and taking a traditional stand-up cold mandi (bath).

The next morning I awoke to find I was above the clouds. I descended down into the misty valley where the next adventure awaited me - white water rafting.

I had to walk about 1 hour through a series of rice fields and some forested areas to the “put-in” on the riverbank. The mountains views were simply stunning in all directions, and in the distance on the far side of the river was a series of large waterfalls.

The rafting trip down the river was an adrenaline boost and a wildlife extravaganza. I saw several male iguanas sunning themselves on rocks, cruised into a bat cave and spotted around 30 bats, observed several species of bird life, including eagles and passed several towering waterfalls that cascaded down from the steep mountainous terrain. After a pretty exhausting day I slept well in the luxury of the Heritage Hotel.

It was a 7-day trip in total and for anyone who wants to experience a fascinating culture, set in a beautiful mountain environment then Tana Toraja and its riches lay waiting for you.