Travel to Tanjung Balai Karimun dan Visa Requirents Visa From Singapore

Karimun is a small island offerring a range of tourist activities in the Riau Islands province of Indonesia. It is also the name of a group of islands and regency (kabupaten) to which it belongs.

Karimun is located just off the east coast of Sumatra, guarding the southern entrance of the busy Straits of Malacca. It lies west of Batam and to the southwest of Singapore and is the furthest west of the Riau Islands.

Its proximity to Singapore has made the islands quite affluent and busy. Its main town, Tanjung Balai is a bustling port town with a lot of commerce, boosted by tourists from Singapore and Malaysia. However, like Batam and Bintan, Karimun is also listed as a Free Trade Zone area.

Travel to Karimun & Visa Requirements
Visa

For details on visa requirements for visiting Karimun, please see the Indonesia page. Karimun's Tanjung Balai port is designated as a visa-free and visa-on-arrival entry point.

Karimun does not have an operational airport, so travellers' only option is to get in by boat. Karimun has good ferry connections with Singapore and Kukup in the southwestern tip of Johor, Malaysia as well as the other Riau Islands and the Sumatra "mainland".
From Singapore

Penguin (Tel: +62-777-324300 in Tanjung Balai; +65-62714866 in HarbourFront) and Indofalcon (Tel: +65-62783167 in Harbourfront) ferry companies operate ferries between Tanjung Balai and Singapore's HarbourFront Centre. Between them, they run 3 trips on weekdays (From HarbourFront: 0800, 1420 and 1820. From Tanjung Balai: 0730, 1100 and 1700), increasing to 6 trips on Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays (From HarbourFront: 0800, 0950, 1225, 1420, 1625 and 1820. From Tanjung Balai: 0715, 0945, 1130, 1315, 1530 and 1700). From Singapore, tickets cost S$43 return before Indonesian port taxes or Rp 110.000 one-way before port taxes (Rp 10.000) from Tanjung Balai. Journey time is about one and a half hours.

Please note that the two companies' code-sharing agreement allows you to board any ferry at Tanjung Balai for the return leg to Singapore only if you hold a return ticket that was purchased in Singapore. If you buy your ticket in Tanjung Balai, you can only board the ferry of the company from which you buy the ticket.