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Published: March 5th 2010
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So with an undeniably queasy stomach we decided that Toba had held us captive for too long and it was about time to try our hand at a spot of volcano climbing in Berastagi. So we headed off on the boat to the main road out of Toba where we tried to negotiate a reasonable ride to Berastagi. We ended up getting a taxi for about 4 pounds for a three hour journey, which in hindsight really was too good to be true. The man set off at about 70 mph along these pot-holed roads, he thought that the highway code was an endorsement to drive alongside other vehicles on the wrong side of the road and waiting until blind bends to overtake was pure hilarity to him (and I thought I was a bad driver!?) I think all three of us had our hearts in our throats for at least half of the journey and Ash’s hands were practically blue from trying
to hang on.
After at least one very near miss, we were all fairly relieved to arrive in one piece. We dumped our stuff in the rooms, before sitting down to try and plan what we were
going to do tomorrow, having read through the guidebook I thought it would be a good idea to climb the (slightly easier) 2,212 m volcano without a guide as the L.P stated this was definitely possible...(oh the lies.) Tom and Ashleigh were worried that we wouldn’t be able to find the path alone so we ended up asking these two guys whether we could tag along with them, which they seemed fine about. It wasn’t until two hours later that one of the guys casually dropped into the conversation that he had just sauntered up to base camp alone without guide and porters a couple of months before. This was when the worry started to creep in.
So the next morning nice and early, we were awoken to the loudest screeching that I have ever heard, coming from a woman screaming a song through a megaphone to some poor children at their morning assembly in the adjacent school. After this refreshing start to the morning, we were all set for the day ahead. The first difficulty arose when the guys wanted to walk the 7k to the base of the volcano, rather than catch a bus, this normally wouldn’t
have been a problem but Ashleigh and I weren’t 100% recovered from the food poisoning and were still feeling pretty weak, so by the time we reached the volcano we were already exhausted and still had the unrelenting 900 meter ascent to go. Unsurprisingly, the guys that we had set off with left us after 10 minutes of us walking at a snail’s pace and the rest we had to go alone.
There was a dusty path that zig-zagged three quarters of the way up the volcano, Ashleigh felt nauseous the entire way up and all three of us had to stop on each bend for a quick rest, before hauling our bodies up to the next bend. Nevertheless, we eventually reached a plateau, but this was fairly disorientating as there were no paths out of it and it seemed as if there was no way to climb further up. We explored the clearing for about ten minutes looking for a path whilst Tom and Ashleigh were exchanging smug glances about being right on the guide front. When we were about to give up and turn back, I stumbled upon what appeared to be a disused path which you
had to climb a small cliff to reach, we decided to give this a shot. After about an hour of climbing up and leaping over giant, crumbling steps, we reached the summit with relief. Here we sat down for our hundredth breather of the day and admired the scenery, the ground was covered in white rocks and there were steam vents surrounding the caldera emitting stomach churning sulpher, which was gradually staining the rock around it bright yellow. Rather than being full of bubbling lava, the caldera was full of messages that people had written with the white rocks. Unfortunately we did not have time to compose a message, as all around us mist was beginning to set in, we had no clue as to where the path back down the other side of the volcano was and hadn’t seen another soul on the tracks since leaving the Aussie guys about three hours previously.
After spending about 10 minutes conferring about where the track could possibly be, we spotted an Indonesian man sitting in the caldera, who appeared to be working up here collecting rocks. We made our way over to him and as he spoke no English, we
managed to ask him how to find the trail in broken Indonesian with the aid of our hand drawn map from the guesthouse. Eventually after some suspicious grinning and having a great time trying on mine and Tom’s sunglasses, he pointed to the steep, shingle walls of the caldera, indicating that we would need to climb this to get to the other side. Ok, twenty minutes later, job done, but it looked as if we were at the end of the world; the mist was coming in thicker so that you could barely see 10 meters in front of your face and there was a steep drop-off to the side. At this point I really began to panic that we wouldn’t be able to see anything and get lost or fall of a cliff. Tom and Ashleigh seemed surprisingly calm and Tom went off 10 meters to see if he could see a path, at this point I was feeling quite hysterical as we could no longer see him or much else. But he returned having found the so-called path which consisted of the outline of massive concrete steps with foot deep holes in them. This proved not only hard
work to walk in but difficult as the steps seemed to start and then stop and then begin again 50 meters down but 10 meters to the right/left. In the end we decided to follow the trail of litter that people had left behind - I have never felt so grateful for litter and signs of civilisation. We eventually descended out of the cloud and the panic subsided a bit and turned into vague excitement at having got through it. Now we only had another two hours to get through - but they were hell - we were falling down the steps, slipping in the mud and Tom began to see spots in front of his eyes with dizziness. The difficulties we had overcome made reaching town again so rewarding. The trek in total took us just over 5 hours which was the time that the guide book had suggested it would take, although upon reaching the guesthouse the Aussie guys informed us nonchalantly that it had taken them less than three and to really rub salt in the wound; one of them had done it in flip flops. Great.
In hindsight, I look back on Berastagi with really
fond memories, as it was such a struggle for us but we still managed to do it, but I have definitely learned my lesson - don’t do treks without a guide, even if the lonely planet says it’s ‘possible’ this means ‘possible’ if you are the next Bear Grylls, which apparently, we are not.
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Margaret
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You know that book I gave your mum one Christmas of letters and emails home from gap year travellers....? This entry would qualify, I think! M xx