 Freeport Mine cableway / Papuan Highlanders |
by Philip Game
Papua, variously known as West Papua or as Irian Jaya, is Australasia's last frontier: a little-known land where Muslim Asia coexists uneasily with Melanesia; a land which long concealed the world's richest deposits of copper and gold.
 Like a huge prehistoric bird, the island of New Guinea hovers above the Australian continent; and under the bird’s breast lies an ill-explored region where snow-capped ranges fall abruptly towards the trackless forests and the pandanus swamps, down to the Arafura Sea.
This is a little-known land where Indonesia coexists uneasily with Melanesia. And just below those the crests of those snow-capped ranges, at 4,000 metres above sea level, lie mountains of solid ore – the world’s richest and most remote deposit of copper.
In the boom town of Timika you can sleep – in comfort and style – within sight of birds of paradise, and play a round of golf beneath the rainforest giants; or just observe what happens when three cultures collide...
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