Our guides also opine that the Bulldog Track (in either direction) gives trekkers more time to ‘get their legs in’ before tackling the most difficult section between Yanina and Kudjeru. Walking out from Bulldog you get several days of steady gradients along the old 1943 road before you have to tackle any really steep spurs. Starting from the Winima end, you get a full day of hiking through gentle rolling hills before you come up against more serious gradients at Kudjeru. Compare this with walking the Kokoda Track where you get thrown in at the deep end right from the first day whether you start at Owers Corner with the steep descent to Goldie River immediately followed by that real huff and puff up the Golden Stairs, or that killer first day climb from Kokoda to Isurava if you start from the north.

Whichever way you walk, the Bulldog Track is just as scenic as the Kokoda Track - moreso, perhaps, because you can see all the way to the coast a lot of the time - and features a more varied and visible range of plants, birds and small mammals like bandicoots. Interactions with local village people are also more candid along this route as there are few visitors traversing the Bulldog Track and the people are not numbed by tourism. Along the Bulldog Track villagers still stop, stare and greet occasional visitors with amazement whereas locals along the Kokoda Track no longer bat an eyelid at groups of up to 100 people hiking past their window.

That said, please take note that walking the Bulldog Track is significantly riskier than trekking Kokoda, due to the more isolated terrain, the scarcity of airstrips for medevac flights, and the lack of communication facilities – see trip notes at the bottom of this itinerary.

Our 2009 Bulldog Track expeditions
Ecotourism Melanesia has decided to operate our Bulldog Track trekking expeditions “the hard way”, uphill from Bulldog to Winima, because
(i) trekking in this direction more accurately emulates the WW2 supply line, ie this is the direction in which supplies were carried through to Kanga Force in Wau
(ii) there is demand from trekkers who have already “killed” the Kokoda Track for another challenging expedition as a follow-up trip so we don't want it to be too easy
(iii) it is cheaper and more practical for us to mount expeditions from our operations base in Port Moresby rather than from Wau which is just a small town with few facilities.

In 2009 we are offering the Bulldog Track as an open trek once a month from May to November. See our open trek schedule here. The logistics of operating expeditions in such a rugged and isolated area are far more complex than for the Kokoda Track (which is now as crowded as grand central station at some peak periods) and we require larger group sizes to make open treks along the Bulldog Track economical to operate. A minimum of 12 trekkers is required to operate each of the 8 open Bulldog Track treks we have scheduled for 2009. Expeditions for private groups of minimum 12 and maximum 20 trekkers can be arranged on any other date convenient to your group and compatible with our Kokoda and Bulldog trekking schedules.

At 8.30am we will pick you up at the hotel together with your trek baggage and commence the 3-hour road journey to Terapo Bridge. If you arrived too late yesterday to visit Bomana War Cemetery we will stop there this morning for a quick visit en route to Terapo Bridge.
We travel by small bus or open-sided passenger truck with bench seats known locally as a PMV. Our trekking supplies accompany us in a support vehicle. The road is sealed for most the journey with just a few rough patches. We pass first through the Central Province which is fairly dry and dusty. The last township of Bereina marks the last Central Province habitation before we cross the unmarked border into Gulf Province, where the parched light scrub typical of Central Province gives way to the green rainforest and swamplands of the Gulf country. There will be a couple of behind-a-tree toilet stops along the way, and a packed lunch to eat either on the road or in the boat, whenever you feel hungry.
We aim to arrive at Terapo Bridge about midday. Actually there are two Terapo bridges: the first one we come to straddles the Lakekamu River and the second bridge only 200 metres up the road crosses the Tauri Tiver. Downstream from the bridges, the two rivers come within 100m of intersecting but never actually meet before they empty into separate estuaries on the Papuan Gulf about 1km downstream from the bridges. The Lakekamu mouth is adjacent to Kukipi village where supplies were transferred from coastal ships to native canoes in 1942 for onward shipment up the Bulldog Track.
There is also a narrow canal joining the two rivers a short distance downstream from the bridges, which makes the two river systems very useful for moving passengers and freight between the villages in this area using both paddle canoes and small motor boats.
At the first Terapo Bridge, tethered in the fast-flowing Lakekamu River, is our small fleet of motorised fibreglass dinghies known locally as “banana boats”. Also waiting for us here are some of our porters who will carry backpacks of supplies and gear once we start walking.
We transfer our bodies and supplies into the boats, don life jackets and the 40hp outboards commence our push upstream against the 10-knot current. The river banks pass slowly as we make headway, giving time to enjoy the lush virgin jungle with its exotic bird life and the occasional small crocodile sunning itself on the mudflats of the inside bends.
Three hours upstream from the bridge is the small village of Urulau, where we tie up our boats for the night in a quiet tributary creek. Urulau is a family hamlet of less than 50 people living off mainly fish and sago.
Here we will stay overnight, sleeping in large open-sided stilt huts built specifically for visitors, with plenty of floor space for setting up our tents inside the hut, this being the best way to sleep soundly without being bitten by mosquitoes. For dinner this evening our hosts will prepare a traditional “mumu” which is food wrapped in leaves and cooked under hot stones. Foods will include fish and prawns caught in the river, and local vegetables like sweet potato and stewed bananas.
Overnight Urulau Village, Lakekamu River.