Hi Folks,
This is Linda, now in Sumatra and I want to explain the hassles you may have if you take your bike across on the ferry from Melaka to Dumai.
To start with your bike must not be more that 3 feet wide as they have to carry it through the side doors of 2 boats to get it into the passenger department. I was also told that it depends on the tide if they will take the xtra weight, if you miss it it could be another 2 weeks wait.

You may be warned by the boat people about the police regulations the other side and they may not take you because of this as the police were not happy with the shipping company after my experience which is this:
As soon as I landed and took the bike to customs ( I was escorted from the ferry there) the customs phoned the police station to alert them that a foreign bike had landed and I was escorted again to the police station where I was told that it is impossible to ride a foreign bike without permission from Jakarta. I told tham that I had not been informed about this at either the Penang consulate or the KL embassy where I had asked about the procedure having heard about Chris being stopped. Neither of these places could give me any info. They said I had to have police permission but admitted that they didn't know how things worked in situ.
Anyway to cut a long story short I asked the police to help me and they said come back on Monday (it was Saturday) and they would ask the office in Pakenburu, the main station 200kms away. I was not allowed to ride my bike which was impounded at the station. On Monday the chief officer gave me a letter (after hours of negotiations) to take to Pakenbaru which was a 5 hour bus ride away. I caught the afternoon bus, stayed the night and saw the magic man the next day. He is very helpful and explained that because of smuggling , especially in this province of Riah) this police permission is necessary and enforced. However he took copies of all my papers and faxed them to Jakarta and gave me written permission for the whole of my 60 day stay in Indonesia. His name is Mr Aswin A Siregar phone number 0761 29031
Police headquarters are at Jl. Senapelan 10 Pakenburu. Aswin has travelled in Europe, speaks perfect English and is very helpful.

You will need to have your carnet stamped in as they have to have a copy of this too.

So, I advise anyone not to go that way but try the ferry from Penang to Bulawan which is near Medan. As all the good things are up north anyway it makes more sense to go that way. It is easier to ride up to Penang from KL in Malaysia than coming up on the Indonesian side where the roads are bad, the traffic awful and the pollution choking.

I lost 4 days of my precious visa time getting this sorted. I dont know if you can ask the embassy in KL for the Jakarta address. for permission or at least get the embassy to write you a note on their headed paper asking the police to give you permission. Aswin gave me an address but I cant find it at present.

Whatever you do, good luck.

I am about to try and find out if I can get to East Timor. the border was closed for a while but I think the situation has improved since. My main hassle is that it is impossible for me to ride all the way down to Timor in the time I have on my visa and will have to fly out from Bali back to Malaysia to get another 30 days to then ride the bike the rest of the way. Monsoon looms, I have got very wet and its no fun on these roads in the rain.

Any more questions, I hope I can help.
Safe riding

linda