slosh down the pepper!

The crazy little adventure trip to Mt. Bromo - Part II

Bondowoso - Mt Ijen:

We checked out of Palm hotel at 4.30am for our 3-hour bumpy drive to Mt Ijen. In fact, the journey would have been much shorter if not for the lousy roads which was full of sand, small rocks and potholes.

At Ijen, Bambang initially wanted us to trek up the 3m to the crater lake on our own. But I thought I wanted a guide. So he arranged for Bak-Im to bring us up. This was a tanned and skinny man about my height. He sprouts only a few english phrases and taught us bahasa indonesia along the way up. I distinctively remembered "pelan pelan" (I thought I heard "blan blan") which meant "slow slow". He was quite nice and helpful, finding us walking sticks, pointing to us the good trails to walk on, and holding on to me by the arm when he saw that I had problems going down slopes. He would say "pelan pelan", "no problem" whenever we lagged behind him. Also a very environmentally conscious being, he was constantly picking up rubbish and sweeping away loose twigs off the foot path. We could also tell that he was quite popular among the workers; he was almost always chatting with the continous stream of workers (who were carrying as much as 70kg of sulphur!) going downhill, and greeting foreigners of other groups. One angmoh even offered Bak-Im some cookies.

Ever since I worked the London Shift begining late April this year, I hadn't been visiting the gym often. So even thought it was only a 3km hike uphill, I found it strenuous and taxing on the knees as we treaded down slopes.



As we approached the lake, the sulphur smell got so strong that it was choking. I was quite surprised to see some workers even having their meals and smoking and resting nearby. Frankly, the lake looks better in the pictures. I think 70% of the time, the lake is covered with the sulphurous smoke. So I didn't really catch a view of the full lake without the 'mist'. But luckily Tempest did, and captured it with his canon.



Bak-Im advised us to quickly take a few photo shoots and go back, as the smell is "no good". The trek up took us about 1.5 hours and the downward return took 0.5 hour less. We were glad to stop by the cafe at the foot of the mountain for drinks before returning to the car for yet another bumpy ride downhill, followed by a long drive to Mt. Bromo.



Mt Ijen - Bromo Area:

We had a new passenger joining us for the ride to Bromo - Udin. This is yet one other short little man, muscular, tanned and very cheerful, nonsensical guy. Weird, the shorter guys in Surabaya are always more interesting and funny than their taller counterparts. Udin was a fellow employee from Global Adventure and had just ended his tour on Mt Ijen. He would be starting a tour on Bromo the next morning and thus took a lift from us. This Probolinggo-born local entertained us with his singing, jokes, stories during the car ride. He would point out coffee plantations, tobacco plants, glue trees to us along the way. I had a really bad tummyache midway (probably due to the 3 slices of bread packed by Palm Hotel), and he was nice to buy a bottled drink from a village shop lady so that I could use their toilet as a favor to us. He also advised that Bromo could be quite cold at night, and it was best to have a thick jacket along. Upon learning that Tempest only has a pullover, he assured us that we could rent jackets at the hostel.

Lunch was not as elaborate, but still good and cheap. A grilled whole Gurame fish is only 32,000 rupiah, equivalent to SGD 4.60! This time round, Bambang and Udin ordered their own individual portions, while me and Tempest ordered the fish, kangkung and tahu telor to share amongst the 4 of us. Earlier on, we found out that Edy doesn't take chicken. Now we realised that Bambang likes egg, but doesn't like fish. Hehe.. and Tempest doesn't take vegetables. I also ordered a hot ginger drink which was sweet and spicy - good for the 'injured' tummy. I suspect our entire meal, including the guides', cost less than SGD 20.

We re-traced our route from Bondowoso to Jember to Probolinggo, then to Cemoro Lawang, and past Ngadisari village to Lava Hostel or Cafe Lava, as it is more popularly known.


The road up to the mountains was really scenic, with lotsa greenery, deciduous-like forestation, fields planted with all kinds of food like padi, maize, watermelon, banana etc, and huts and houses built at all types of precarious-looking grounds.


It was almost similar to Dalat, but the bigger variety of plants and long mountainous range add color and magnificence to the picturesque region. Comparatively, Dalat looks a bit ugly with its ruggard slums at hilltops; its huge population of coffee plantations also dull the scenary. What's even more lacking are the mist and intense blue skies that lends Bromo area its fairyland characteristics. Oh, and I forgot to mention about those cobbled stone walls that the Indonesians used to fence their houses. Cute, like some cottage in those fables.


SO we reached Cafe Lava at about 5.30pm, and checked in to Room 209. Again, pretty basic lodging facilities, but it does come with hot water, TV, and thick quilts. No air con is needed since the cool mountain air is chilling enough. The entire lodge seems to be built on wood, giving it a traditional Balinese feel. Room is considerably clean, but maybe the lights were quite dim despite having quite a few of them, so I can't really spot the dirt. Just one thing about the "heater". It uses gas to ignite fire and then boils the water that flows through the tube. So within the heater, you can see the fire burning away! Like those bunsen burner flames we see, albeit bigger. Be sure to wait a while after the first user, for the gas is used up after 15 to 20 minutes of usage, and needs time to be refilled.


I wanted to walk to Lava View Lodge, the higher-end cousin of Lava Hostel. But it was located within the Bromo National Park, and we needed to pay an entrance fee. Thus we gave up that idea and went back to the cafe to take an early dinner at 6pm. We were assigned set meals by our tour agency. There was a bowl of vegatable soup, a plate of palm-sized grilled chicken breast with boiled vegetables and french fries by the side, and mixed fruits which we exchanged for the Javanese fried banana for dessert, and tea/coffee. The the skinless chicken breast was a tad too tough, but the fries and fried banana were good.


We were seated next to the windows, so while we were eating, we constantly see the locals waving sock caps woven with the words "Mt Bromo" from outside the cafe. Since we already have ours, we waved them off :p Then this tall dark muscular looking guy came forth and introduced himself as Tris, our guide to Bromo the next morning. He went through the itinerary and informed us that the cafe staff would provide us with a "morning call" at 3am, so as to prepare us for set-off at 3.30am. Tempest was a little worried that it was a scam and we could be left at the top of the mountain with no transport back; he forgot that Bambang had told us that we would be assigned a new guide to Mt. Bromo. So back to the room, he went ahead to make a call to Edy to confirm this change. He fiddled with the phone numbers for a while before getting through to Edy who assured us of this arrangement.

With all things done and a peace of mind gained, we took a quick shower and shuttle off to bed at 9pm.

Labels: ijen crater, indonesia, mt. bromo, surabaya, travel

posted by slingwoof @ 8/13/2009 04:06:00 PM