Papua New Guinea

The great Highlands sing-sing cultural shows are the cultural showpiece of Papua New Guinea. The Mount Hagen Cultural Show (mid-August, Western Highlands) brings 50+ tribes from across the Highlands to the showground for two days of traditional dance, body decoration and song — the famous Huli Wigmen with their human-hair ceremonial wigs, the Asaro Mudmen of the Eastern Highlands with white clay body paint and clay masks, the Chimbu skeleton dancers, the Engan dancers and the spectacular plumed feather arrays of the Western Highlands. The Goroka Show on Independence Weekend (mid-September, Eastern Highlands) is the country's oldest cultural show — founded 1957 — and runs alongside the national Independence Day celebrations on 16 September. The smaller Enga Cultural Show in Wabag, the Sepik River Crocodile Festival in Ambunti and the Hiri Moale Festival on Port Moresby's Ela Beach round out the September festival window. Photography etiquette is to ask before taking close portraits and to give a small contribution.

The 96-kilometre Kokoda Track between Owers' Corner near Port Moresby and Kokoda village in the Oro Province is the central Australian-Anzac historic trek of the south-west Pacific. The 1942 Kokoda campaign — Australian forces and Papua New Guinean carriers (the Fuzzy Wuzzy Angels) holding the Owen Stanley Range against the Japanese advance towards Port Moresby — is one of the foundational stories of modern Australian national memory. Today the trek takes 4 to 10 days (typically 7–8) through cloud forest, ridge climbs (the Maguli Range, Imita Ridge), village stops at Naoro, Menari, Efogi, Kagi and Isurava, and the central Isurava Memorial site. The trek must be done with a licensed Kokoda Track Authority operator (porters, guides, permit, village contributions are part of the package). Best season: April to November (the dry window). Anzac Day commemorations on 25 April are the busiest period at Isurava.

Papua New Guinea sits inside the Coral Triangle and its waters hold around 75% of the world's known coral species and over 2,000 reef-fish species — among the highest marine biodiversity counts on earth. Kimbe Bay (West New Britain) is the headline dive area, with Walindi Plantation Resort the long-standing reference base, pristine coral pinnacles, reef shark and barracuda action and warm 28–30 °C water year-round; Milne Bay (Alotau, the Tawali peninsula) is the macro and muck-diving capital of the south-west Pacific, with mantis shrimp, ghost pipefish, frogfish and the famous rhinopias slopes; Tufi on the Oro fjord coast offers wall and fjord diving from a single boutique lodge; Kavieng (New Ireland) is the big-fish action — barracuda, reef sharks, schools of jacks; and Madang on the north coast carries the Pacific Wahoo dive sites and the famous WWII Japanese Mavis flying-boat wreck. PNG diving is generally accessed via dedicated dive resorts or liveaboards (the Star Dancer and FeBrina liveaboards are the principal Coral Triangle vessels). Underwater visibility 20–40 m is standard.

The Sepik River is Papua New Guinea's largest river and the centre of the great Melanesian woodcarving tradition. Reached from Wewak (East Sepik) by road and boat to Pagwi or Ambunti, the Middle Sepik villages — Tambanum, Kanganamun, Yentchen, Palembei — carry the haus tambaran (spirit house) tradition: tall, sloping-roofed ceremonial houses fronted by carved ancestor masks and decorated with painted gables, often accessible by male initiates only. The Iatmul people are the principal carvers; ancestral masks, crocodile-form drums, story boards (sometimes called Kambot boards), shell-and-cowry headdresses and ceremonial hooks are produced for both ritual and the international art market. River travel is by motorised dugout or guided river boat; dry-season access (May–October) is the standard window. The Sepik River Crocodile Festival in Ambunti each August is a substantial cultural event in its own right.

Papua New Guinea is home to around 38 of the world's 42 bird-of-paradise species — the famous Raggiana (the national bird, on the PNG flag and 50-toea coin), the Blue Bird-of-Paradise, the Lesser Bird-of-Paradise, the King of Saxony, the Superb Bird-of-Paradise, Wilson's Bird-of-Paradise (Raja Ampat) and the Magnificent Bird-of-Paradise. The principal field sites are Varirata National Park 40 km from Port Moresby (the Raggiana lek), Kumul Lodge near Mount Hagen at 2,860 m (the Ribbon-tailed Astrapia, the King of Saxony, the Brown Sicklebill — birding from the lodge feeders and gardens), Tabubil and Kiunga in the Western Province (the lowland birds-of-paradise), and the Crater Mountain Wildlife Management Area in Eastern Highlands. PNG also holds the world's largest butterfly — the Queen Alexandra's Birdwing of the Oro Province — tree kangaroos (Tenkile, Matschie's), cassowaries, the smallest parrot in the world (the buff-faced pygmy parrot) and the spectacular Goldie's Lorikeet. The Port Moresby Nature Park is the most reliable single-stop wildlife collection.

The Trobriand Islands — Kiriwina, Kitava, Vakuta and the smaller atolls — lie north-east of mainland Milne Bay province and carry one of anthropology's most famous study cultures: the kula ring trade circuit documented by Bronislaw Malinowski during his 1915–1918 fieldwork at Omarakana, which produced the foundational text Argonauts of the Western Pacific. The kula expeditions — clockwise red shell-disc necklaces (soulava) and counter-clockwise white shell armbands (mwali) circulating between island communities — remain a working ceremonial trade system. The islands are also famous for yam gardens (the harvest is celebrated with the months-long Milamala festival each summer), cricket matches in elaborate body paint, and the matrilineal descent system. Access is by Air Niugini and PNG Air to Losuia airfield on Kiriwina from Port Moresby via Alotau.

East New Britain's Rabaul-Kokopo region, on the Gazelle peninsula, sits inside one of the world's most active volcanic calderas — the 1994 simultaneous eruption of Mount Tavurvur and Mount Vulcan buried much of old Rabaul under ash and shifted the regional capital to Kokopo. The Tavurvur volcano is still active and is one of the most accessible active volcanoes in the south-west Pacific. The region is also the heart of the WWII Japanese South Pacific theatre — the Japanese 8th Army headquarters tunnel network at Rabaul, the submarine base, the Japanese Yamamoto memorial, the Bita Paka war cemetery near Kokopo and the Bismarck Sea wreck-diving (the largest concentration of Japanese WWII wrecks outside Truk Lagoon). The Mask Festival (Warwagira) in July is the great regional cultural event of East New Britain, with the Tolai Tubuan and Duk Duk masked dancers in the Kokopo bay. New Ireland (Kavieng) and Bougainville add further volcanic and cultural depth.