Madang, the Sepik & the North Coast

The Sepik basin is one of the oldest settled parts of New Guinea, and its river and swamp peoples — the Iatmul, Chambri, Abelam and many others — developed dense villages around sago, fishing and trade, along with some of the most elaborate ceremonial art in the Pacific. On the coast, trading networks linked the Madang islands with the mainland through canoe voyages exchanging pots, food and valuables.

The Russian scientist Nikolai Miklukho-Maklai lived on Astrolabe Bay near Madang in the 1870s. Germany annexed the northeast in 1884, and the German New Guinea Company set up at Finschhafen before moving its headquarters to Madang, then called Friedrich-Wilhelmshafen. Lutheran missionaries, starting with Johann Flierl in 1886, and Catholic missionaries shaped the coast. Australia seized the colony in 1914 and ran it as the Mandated Territory of New Guinea. In the 1920s and 1930s gold at Wau and Bulolo made Morobe the centre of an aviation-driven mining boom, and it was from Lae that Amelia Earhart took off on her last flight in 1937.

Japanese forces took Lae and Salamaua in 1942 and made Wewak a major base. Australian and American troops retook Lae in September 1943, including an airborne landing at Nadzab, and the Japanese army's surrender was signed near Wewak in 1945. Since independence Lae has become the industrial hub, while a tsunami struck the Aitape coast of West Sepik in 1998, killing more than 2,000 people.

The Sepik is famous for its haus tambaran, the spirit houses where men's ceremonial objects were kept and clan business was debated. Among the Iatmul, young men's initiation traditionally included cutting the skin of the chest, shoulders and arms to leave scars symbolising a crocodile's bite, and the crocodile remains a central ancestral figure. Carvers produce masks, story boards, figures and hooks for visitors and collectors, and the Abelam around Maprik are known for their painted spirit houses and yam cult.

Madang's islands and coast mix many small language groups. In Morobe, Lutheran Christianity is especially strong, and Kâte and Yabem, once used as mission languages, left their mark on older generations. West Sepik, also called Sandaun, shares a long border with Indonesia's province of Papua, and many families have ties across it.

Festivals are the best window into these cultures: the Sepik River Crocodile Festival and the Morobe Show in Lae. Rugby league is followed passionately, especially in Lae.

Lae is the country's second city and its industrial heart, with the largest port, factories, warehouses and the University of Technology; its population has grown fast through migration from the Highlands. Madang and Wewak are smaller provincial capitals, and Vanimo is a border town. Outside them, most people live in villages, growing gardens, processing sago, fishing and selling copra, cocoa, coffee, vanilla and betel nut.

Mining and processing are important: the Hidden Valley gold mine near Wau, the Ramu nickel and cobalt mine in Madang, and the proposed Frieda River copper project in West Sepik, which has raised concerns about the Sepik's health. Logging and oil palm bring cash and conflict over land.

On the Sepik, life follows the river: canoes carry people to school, church and market, and the rising and falling water shapes gardens and fishing. Current issues include crime and settlement growth in Lae, poor roads, and debates over mining on the Sepik.

Sago is the staple along the Sepik and in much of the lowlands. Women wash starch from the pounded pith of the sago palm and cook it into pancakes, flat bread-like discs or a sticky jelly, eaten with fish, greens or coconut. River fish, prawns and smoked meat accompany it, and crocodile is still hunted in the Sepik.

On the Madang and Morobe coasts, fish and shellfish are cooked in coconut cream with greens such as aibika and served with taro, yam, bananas or rice, and the earth-oven mumu marks feasts. Galip nuts, from the canarium tree, are gathered and roasted in the lowlands, and breadfruit, mangoes and pawpaw fill the markets in season.

Lae's large market sells produce from the Highlands alongside coastal fish and betel nut, and Madang and Morobe grow cocoa and coffee. Town food is rice, tinned fish, noodles and fried chicken, washed down with SP lager or soft drinks.

Around Madang, the reefs and lagoons offshore offer diving and snorkelling around coral reefs and small islands, with Kranket Island a short boat ride from town. The Coastwatchers Memorial lighthouse stands on the waterfront, and further out Karkar Island rises as a large volcano with a crater inside its summit.

The Sepik river runs through East Sepik past Iatmul villages such as Palimbei, where spirit houses and carving workshops can be visited by canoe from Pagwi or Angoram, and the Chambri Lakes spread across the floodplain of the middle river. Wewak, the provincial capital, has beaches and war memorials, and inland Maprik's towering Abelam spirit houses stand in the hills.

In Morobe, Lae has the Lae War Cemetery, where thousands of Allied servicemen are buried, and botanic gardens beside it. The Morobe coast stretches to Salamaua and Finschhafen, and the old gold road climbs to Wau and Bulolo. On the Huon Peninsula, the YUS Conservation Area protects Matschie's tree kangaroo. In the far west, Vanimo draws surfers to its reef breaks and beaches near the Indonesian border.