Look’s around

Enggano Island offers many hidden charms for the tourists. It’s said as the ‘hidden charms’  because they’re still relatively rare known by people. The lack of the general transportations, supporting facilities, and promotion makes the tourism obejcts of Enggano Island not so well-known. Enggano Island is a natural island. The island wasn’t so much touched by the construction agendas. But this makes the originality of its nature relatively well-kept.

Enggano Island is the outermost island of Indonesia which is located on Indies Ocean zone. The island is part of the North Bengkulu Regency, Bengkulu Province. It is ± 156 km from Bengkulu City, or ± 96 km as the shortest distance from Manna City, South Bengkulu Regency. This 400 km2 wide island is the smallest Endemic Bird Region in Indonesia. Gunung Nanu’a Bird Park is a conservation area in the island where there’re two endemic bird species, namely Enggano White-eye (Zosterops salvadorii) and Enggano Scops Owl (Otus enganensis). Both of them can also be found occasionally in several forest habitats and agricultural lands, especially coconut plantation, and the open lands around the villages. The location of Gunung Nanu’a Bird Park (10.000 ha) is in the south of Enggano Island.

Besides Gunung Nanu’a Bird Park, Enggano Island has another main tourism object, namely Humo Beach. The beach is considered as the most beautiful beach in Enggano Island by the local citizenries. The beach is located between Apoho Village and Kaana Village. Its white sand was made of the very finely pounded pieces of died coral, so the naked feet still can walk comfortably on it. Besides the wealth of marine ecosystem, the beach has group of corals –or often called as tubiran by the local society– that run out to sea up to 200 meters. The visitors can used this tubiran to walk toward the sea or to fish. The location of tubiran is the habitat of various kinds of sea fish, so the local citizenries often use it to fish.

The shoreline of Humo Beach is facing to the east, so the sunrise panorama becomes the most beautiful landscape offered by the beach. The silvery orange sunlit, combined with the dark-blue sky refracts the violet rays. The small waves from the Indies Ocean reflect the rays. It looks like the violet ripples in the water that rolls toward the shore. The walking crabs and small shelled animals can be found easily along the shoreline. Various kinds of small fish with their various colors can be seen in the shore by the naked eye. The most often found of them are the blue, with yellow and white stripes; and the red, with the variation of white and silver. The mangrove and the coconut and melinjo (Gnetum gnemon L.) trees complete the features of Enggano Island. Various kinds of birds live in the mangrove, such as woodpeckers, Enggano thrushes, mynas, parrots, cockatoos, etc. Their songs add the beauty of the beach.

Unfortunately, the beautiful tour objects of Enggano Island are still rarely visited by the domestic and foreign tourists. Besides the lack of general transportation, the lodging and restaurant facilities are not yet well provided. But don’t worry about it. The Enggano citizenries are open-handed and friendly to the visitors. By visiting the local headman, they’ll give the lodging and foods to the visitor. They usually serve rice and fish, since most of them are the fishermen.

Enggano Island offers another different tour object for the tourists who have a special interest in hunting. There’re wild buffalos live in this island. Being a facility for satisfying the hunting hobby is a unique feature of Enggano Island, especially because the wild buffalo can’t be found in the other regions. Besides hunting tourism, there’s also a unique object at Village Kaana, namely the attraction of snakes which prey upon the fish from the tree. Below the tree is an area that resembles the lake.