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ThePOP 698,900 / AREA Sepik 79,100 SQ KM

Includes  Why Go? .....125 The mighty Sepik is one of the great rivers of the world. In & Around...... 125 serpentine fashion it flows for 1126km through swamplands, Sandaun Province...... 132 tropical rainforests and mountains. However, the Sepik is more than just a river – it’s also a repository of complex cul- ...... 132 tures, a place where some men have crocodile skin while The Sepik & Its others place masks on yams in celebration, where mysteri- Tributaries...... 135 ous rituals live on in haus tambarans (spirit houses) and Upper Sepik...... 140 master carvers still create the most potent art in the Pacific. Middle Sepik...... 141 As you make your way around one of the endless river Lower Sepik...... 144 bends, the scale of the river, the bird life, the eerie lagoons and the traditional stilt villages make it easy to believe that you’ve travelled clean out of the 21st century and into a timeless, wondrous place. On the coast, the two main towns attract a small trickle Best Places to of intrepid surfers who come to tame the seasonal swells. Stay ¨¨In Wewak Boutique Hotel (p130) ¨¨Naigboi Guest House (p131) When to Go ¨¨Vanimo Surf Lodge (p133) Wewak °C/°F Te mp Rainfall inches/mm ¨¨ Karawari Lodge (p146) 40/104 24/600

30/86 16/400 Best for Sepik 20/68 Culture 8/200 10/50 ¨¨Garamut & Mamba Festival (p128) 0/32 0 J FDM A M J J A S O N ¨¨Sepik River Festival (p143) ¨¨Crocodile Festival (p29) Jul–Sep Festival Oct–Apr Monsoon Dec–Apr The wet time: yam harvests swells bring waves; season is a good ¨ ¨Middle Sepik haus in Maprik, Sepik bring your surf- time to see birdlife, tambarans (p141) River Festival and board to Vanimo. and high water ¨¨Maprik haus tambarans Crocodile Festival. levels make it easy (p132) to get around. 125 The Sepik ESWastiewaghts Skepi & Akr Poruondvince . ------ONT K PAR MEMORIAL WATERFR . There’s a gor . There’s Fourteen kilo Fourteen

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which means fish. barges

pis, Taiwanese fishing junk fishing Taiwanese 7am-6.30pm) (Map p130 peace park marks the mass

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stretching pretty much all the much stretching pretty This

) beach which is perhaps appropriate given which is perhaps appropriate Sights MV Busama MV A short distance coastal the inland moun There’s a ranger at the gates but you the gates at a ranger There’s To get here, catch a Dagua-bound PMV get a Dagua-bound here, catch To Wewak itself is a rather disjointed place, is a rather itself Wewak admission K10; admission On the beach between Kreer Market and theand Market Kreer between beach the On disappearing rust hospital are some rapidly ara. From the turn-off it’s a 3km walk to the it’s the turn-off From ara. memorial park. come here alone. shouldn’t Cape Wom International Cape Wom Memorial Park ( Interna Cape Wom metres of Wewak, west is the site of a wartime Park tional Memorial marks theairstrip that and a war memorial General Lieutenant spot where Japanese documentssurrender the signed Adachi and Major to Australian over handed his sword General Robertson on 13 September 1945. Su to the cape at the turn-off at and get off Near the main wharf the rustingNear lie remains of landing ing Japanese geous Memorial Japanese Park Peace (Map p130 tains of the Prince Alexander Mountains Prince the of tains narrow from the Sepik Basin the separate on headland peninsula land and flat band of built. is Wewak which with most services in the tiny concentrated rest and the spread along the coast, en Town airport.route to the of majority While the arrange only long enough to visitors pause expeditiontheir Sepik and to stockon up charms. its town does have provisions, the 1 Cape to Point Mission Boram way to the airport, with gentle waves, clean to the airport, waves, gentle way with swimming.sand and good Kreer, on the road to the airport, there’s the on the road to the airport, there’s Kreer, hulk of a wooden grave of many troops. The of many soldiers’ bodies grave exhumed later and returnedwere to Japan. you’llHere pond. a memorial and a fish find for peace; a word Pisin doesn’t have Tok sounds like ‘peace’ Thus, most locals refer park as pis to the park, ambivalence pond and the general the fish Guineans New Papua modern many that towards WWII. have ­ ------airbase in mainland , andairbase in mainland New The Japanese held the Sepik region for The Japanese The early 1930s rushes in the gold saw The contact European first came in 1885, Wewak & AroundWewak EAST SEPIK PROVINCE POP 37,800 POP ed. A year later, in May 1945, Wewak fell and 1945, Wewak in May later, ed. A year withdrew theinto Japanese remaining the with the war in its last days, hills. Finally, General Adachi surrendered near Yangoru. The formal surrender took place a few days Point Wom at on 13 September 1945 later troops, Japanese 100,000 Of Wewak. near only 13,000 had survived. Wewak was once the site of the largest Jap the largest once the site of was Wewak anese subject of bombs during WWII. to a barrage

ies. It was here, in 1945, that the Japanese Japanese the that 1945, in here, was It ies. Allies and vari surrendered to the finally of war can still be seen, rotting ous vehicles where they left. were East Sepik Province is much more developedEast Sepik Province and includes thethan Sandaun Province sections populated most-visited and heavily tributar large as several of the Sepik, as well hills behind Wewak and around Maprik, but around Maprik, and hills behind Wewak ceased whendevelopment and exploration WWII started. forces pushed Australian most of the war. along the coast from and and , early withdrew In west. to the the Japanese and the1944 the Americans seized Whenthere. from west moved Australians Hollandia American force captured a huge in April, the Papua) in West (now Jayapura completely were isolat in Wewak Japanese ied local tribes and produced maps of suchof maps produced and tribes local ied accuracy they’re that still referred today. to with the arrival of the Germanwith the arrival Guin New The Germansestablished a ea Company. the coast Aitape on in 1906, and at station ex scientific huge sent a 1913 in 1912 and pedition to explore and its vast, the river Theylow-lying basin. collected insects, stud porated them into late-19th-century women’s late-19th-century them into porated women’s headwear. The Sepik’s first contact first with the outside The Sepik’s bird-of- with Malay probably was world History paradise hunters – the feathers from these from feathers hunters – the paradise popular in Asiawere beautiful birds long before European millinery fashionable incor