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Published: November 11th 2016
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My plan, or lack thereof, to meet Fahmi’s friend Risti did not work out. I showed up at the Malang train station at 4am after an eight hour ride from Yogyakarta. Never a good time to call someone for a pick up. So after little or no sleep on the train I decided to sleep on a bench in the train station. Not my finest moment of travel but not my worst either. Three hours later I was woken up by security and was told without a ticket I would have to leave the building. Shoving the taxi mafia aside outside the gates I found a payphone and for the next hour was unsuccessful in getting an answer from Risti. Without a plan or any options I cut ties with Malang and took the local minibus to the main bus terminal and bought a $IDR14,000 ticket to Probbolingo. Three hours later in Probbolingo I jumped into another minibus for a two hour ride to Gunung (Mt.) Bromo for the purpose of an all out assault to the top of the caldera the next morning.
Gunung Bromo is an active volcano and one of three lying in the caldera of a
massive super volcano that makes up the Bromo-Tengger-Semeru National Park. I value my sleep so my sunrises are few and far between (unless I’ve not gone to sleep at all) and Mt. Bromo fit the bill for sunrise viewage. Many people opt for a jeep tour that will take you up to the viewing point opposite Bromo. Me being cheap, I opted to hike. Up at 3am I made the two and a half hour trek and weaseled my way through the crowd to a sweet little spot to watch the show. As the sun crested above the mountains of Java and cast its light onto the smoking Bromo I had one of those “this is why I travel” moments that make all the sacrifices and hardships worth it.
After viewing the sweeping panoramas of the park I wanted a closer look but was tired of walking everywhere. I bit the bullet and hired a motorcycle to drive me across the sand plains of the caldera to Gunung Bromo for a closer look. I hiked to the top of the caldera and stared into the steaming guts of the great mountain. It was a neat feeling to be looking
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Gunung Bromo is the caldera on the left with a touch of steam rising up with Gunung Batok in the foreground and Gunung Semeru - Java's highest peak - in the back. into a deep abyss of which you know at its bottom lay the Earth’s core. I was memorized watching the steam and ash plume upwards and outwards and was aware of the power inside our planet. After about seven hours or so in the park it was still very early and other than hike around the park there is nothing else here to do. I made the decision to leave on the next minibus for Probbolingo and head for yet another one of Earth’s natural wonders, one I had seen a few years back on the “Human Planet” documentary series.
The Ijen Plateau Once back in Probbolingo as usual I was harassed by bus touts trying to sell me a “tourist” bus and the tactic is always the same. I’m told there is no public bus to whatever city I am trying to get to. Sure the “tourist” buses are nice with A/C and are direct, but they cost about 5x as much as the public bus and are by no means anywhere near as fun. Shoving these guys aside I did indeed (or what I thought) find a public bus bound for Bondowoso for $IDR9,000. Bondowoso is
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Maybe a little to close, one false step here and I was done for. a good jumping off point for the Ijen Plateau and the famed Kawah Ijen crater where a massive lake of sulphur resides and an army of miners dig the stuff out and carry massive loads of the stuff back down the mountainside in what has to be the world’s worst job.
About an hour into the journey the money guy on the bus came around I told him I wanted Bondowoso. He said this bus is not going to Bondowoso. Panic came over me. I said (keep in mind he of little English and me of no Indonesian)why does the sign on the front read “Bondo”? All he kept saying was Situbondo to which I took as the city to which I was now headed. Freaking out I took out my map and it wasn’t so bad. I knew we were going East which was the direction I needed to go and Situbondo was close enough to Bondowoso (about an hour) so I knew I could get a bus from Point A to Point B which was indeed the case. Minor catastrophe averted. Once in town I hailed a pedicab to take me to a cheap hotel and the
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My moto driver. It was a little chilly but not that bad. He's just Indonesian. place was decent enough at $IDR100,000.The only way to get to the Ijen Plateau is DIY with a car or motorcycle. I wasn’t comfortable navigating the mountains by myself so I hired a motorcycle driver for $IDR175,000. We were to leave the next day at 5am.
The morning ride (I’ve been on the back of more motorcycles in the past two days than I have ever or have ever wanted to be in the last 32 years) was nothing short of spectacular. The road was rough and winding through the valleys of Java and up into the rainforest covered mountains. Incredibly green and fertile rice patties were around every bend with oxen plowing the fields just like the great beasts have done for centuries. These were the images I have always had of Asia and now here I was cruising through them on the back of a bike. Priceless. Two hours later I had arrived at the foot of Kawah Ijen and began the 3km ascent up the mountain.
The hike up was seriously steep and tough going. As I went up many miners were coming down, their baskets full of up to 80kg of massive yellow chunks
of sulphur. The miners are in phenomenal condition to be able to haul their quarry in elements like these. Working at the bottom of the crater which is full of noxious sulphur gas cannot be good for your health and walking down step mountainsides with heavy loads in primitive baskets will certainly take its toll on anyone’s body. For all of the efforts these guys go through they are paid $IDR900 per kilo of sulphur they are able to dig up and carry down. So for a 70kg load they get about $6.50USD. One of the miners was nice enough to let me try on his 60kg load on for size. I could lift it up on my back and shoulders but no way could I walk any distance with it.
The natural wonder of this place was something really special. I felt awful for the miners and the conditions they work in, but just like the miners in that terrible silver mine I went into in Bolivia, these guys love their work and are happy to do it. It’s a shame that the money does not let them see that they are slowly killing themselves.
After a
long hike down I talked Oon (my driver) to let me drive the first part of the way back before the road got to gnarly. He was very skeptical and I’m certain he was very frightened but he said OK. I had a blast! It was so awesome to be riding a bike in this scenery and terrain. Something I will never forget and I hope to do so again in the near future. Back in Bondowoso tomorrow I hop onto yet another bus and then a ferry to my next island here in the archipelago. I’m Bali bound baby!
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