Walking on the moon...but with gravity

The next morning I did get to sleep in until 7 ish when I got a van for the long drive to Cemroro Lawang where the tenneger-semeru-bromo national park is. Usually I take public transportation but it sounded just as cheap and much easier to go by tourist transport there and they would have a hotel at a discount price awaiting you. The van driver was absolutely crazy passing with oncoming trucks, passing using the shoulder, etc. I of course was in the front (with no seatbelt) as when you're the single person you're almost always in the front, and the people in the back were screaming and were quite surprised I didn't even flinch on many of the apparent close calls, but in truth after being in asia for 9 months now, I am quite used to it, and just hope that when I return to driving I don't drive like they do here. When I signed up for the tour there were 4 hotels to pick from. THey don't tell you much about them other than show you a picture of the room and tell you they have a hot shower (which was amazing to have not only a real shower, but a hot one as it was quite cold up there). So I picked one with the most meaningful name, Yoshi's, the nickname of my good friend at college. Turns out it was the one hotel that was not in cemror lawang but was 7km straight down hill from there. So when we arrived at the hotel that night I found out I had an extra 7km steep uphill walk just to get to cemoro lawang for the next 6km straight up walk to the top of the mountain and the viewpoint. There were 4wd jeeps you could take there, but they were obviously very expensive. So I set out at 2am, walking fast b/c I was not sure if I would even be able to find the trail at that time in the morning since I was so far from the main area. But after walking past many locals who told me it was impossible to hike to the top (rent a motorbike from them or take them as a guide) or that it was 26km away, I found the trail. At 4am I reached the 1st viewpoint where there was a dutch guy camping out and waiting for sunrise. He was too scared to go higher for some reason, but he told me a few minutes ago two czech guys had gone up. Yes!! I had finally caught up to them. Before 5 I had made it to the top viewpoint and located the czechs. But it was a zoo up there with over 150 tourists who had all come up in jeeps. The czechs had heard from a polish guy of a peak just a bit further that would be empty, so we bushwacked there to meet up with him. On this peak was a little hindu shrine and amazing views of the sunrise. It definitely had to be one of the most impressive and unique views I had ever seen. The czechs said it was number 2 behind the grand canyon. You're way up and you look down on a gigantic crater (tenneger crater) which has two smaller volcanoes (bromo and batok rising out of it or which bromo is heavily steaming) The majority of the crater is this flat deserty, sandy area called the sea of sands and in the morning was covered in mist and fog so that it looked more like a sea of mist. Rising dramatically from the background is the highest volcano in java, mt. semeru, which actually usually erupts every 15 minutes, but wasn't erupting now for some reason. But the view was just incredible and really looked like something you might see on the moon in the sea of tranquility. And the fire of the sunrise made it even more impressive. After watching it for quite some time, we hiked back to the main viewpoint now that all the tourists had gone and had some tea before hiking down. Midway down Lucas had a panick attack b/c his money belt was not on him. We searched where we had been but couldn't find it at all, but luckily it was under his pillow when we got back. Lucas and Martin headed to bali that morning and I walked back down to yoshi's for a hot shower and then packed up to move to a cheap losmen (guesthouse) in cemoro lawang and right on the big crater's rim. While at lunch I was putting on sunscreen for the 2nd time (the sunscreen nazi would be so proud) and this ancient woman who was working in the onion fields came by and pointed at it. I let her dip her finger on my palm and she put some on her nose and obviously loved it smiling a big toothless smile. I gave her a whole big squeeze and she happily applied it all over her face and arms and then went off showing off her greasy arms to all the other old ladies around. That afternoon I hiked down the crater to the sea of sands, which was just like a desert. Reminded me of death valley, though not so hot as we were at such high altitude. But with all the volcanoes and lack of vegetation it did look just like the moon or some distant planet. It was quite nice to be in such a dry and dusty desert. I crossed the sea of sands and then climbed up the steaming mt bromo and then hiked around it's crater. From the other side you could see another crater and mt. semeru so I stopped there for a while and journaled before finishing it around the crater. For sunset I climbed back up the main crater to watch from there. As you get so dusty you need to take a shower at night, so at my new losmen I had the freezing joy of taking a mandi (just bucket style shower) in the cold weather (about 40F). Slept in til 4am that morning as I was closer and also going only to the 1st viewpoint this time to watch the sunrise. Again another impressive sunrise from this vantage point.

Took a bemo from cemoro lawang to the Ijen area stopping along at a beach for lunch on the way. The ijen plateau is a high plateau famous for growing coffee and strawberries and surrounded by several volcanos. It was quite an interesting ride there as it was an incredibly bumpy one lane road through the forest and we were all packed like sardines in the van (bemo), me nearly sitting on a frenchman's lap. I had just paid for transport and was supposed to be dropped off at a cheap losmen or homestay, but of course they didn't feel like driving me there and the fancy hotel that was part of everyone else's tour was far from the village. The hotel was charging 30 bucks which was way over my price range so I asked them how much to just have some blankets to sleep on the veranda. They eventually decided to give me a room where the drivers stay for 7 bucks. As it was really cold there as well, 2 dutch gals on the tour invited me to take a hot shower in their room, which I much appreciated.
The next morning we woke at 3:30 am to drive a bit and then hike up Ijen volcano and to it's crater lake and sulfur mine. The hike up was pretty easy compared to the other volcanoes, or maybe it's just that I was getting really good at hiking volcanoes and in good shape. Anyways, made it to the top and you couldn't see the crater or lake at all b/c of all the sulfur. so i hike up and around the crater rim deciding to have patience instead of turning around like some did. Eventually the sulfur eruptions calmed down and it cleared and I got magnificent views of the crater and the gorgeous turquoise lake. It was such a gorgeous color and one I had never seen before. I also hiked a bit down into the crater where local guys were hauling up bright yellow sulfur rocks, in little baskets with a yoke type device on their shoulders. Obviously, heavy and difficult work made harder by the fact that some were barefoot, some in only sandals, but most wearing boots, but all affected by the often dense choking sulfur smoke. I didn't have time to go all the way down as it would have taken forever since it was a 1 person wide trail and the local guys were going so slow up and down and I had waited past the time I was supposed to already in order to see the lake really clear up. The bemo was supposed to leave at 9:30, and I knew it would take 40 minutes to walk down, but in true Guy Bros fashion I always knew I could extend my time by jogging down, and then even more time by running down. So I left around 9:15 and made it with a couple minutes to spare, all that practice running at dakota ridge always comes in handy on steep downhill runs.

From Ijen plateau, the bemo took us back down to the steam coast to catch a ferry to bali. So Zara, Alex, and Tom (all from the UK) and I headed off to Bali. Once in Bali we boarded the bus, which we knew was supposed to cost 20,000 rp, but of course they were trying to charge a tourist price of 60,000, which I always find rediculous, but after awhile we agreed to pay that. We all paid them with 100,000 notes and were awaiting change when the conductor just jumped off never to return, so then it was obvious there would be getting no change and we had paid 100,000 for a 3 hour ride that should cost 20,000. This is one of the frustrations of travelling in indonesia and although I try to ignore it and realize that I have much more well of monetairly than a lot of them, it can get on your nerves, and just how everything in everyway they try to get money from you like your a walking atm. Ask for directions and they want money. And when you're walking down the street they're often saying photo, photo, but then of course they want a dollar for their photo, and of course a 100 other things that they want money or cigarettes for. And this just sometimes gets on your nerves b/c although I think it's fine to be trying to make money, I also think there should be a time when it's just decent humanity where you help out your fellow humans. Back home we'd never ask a tourist for money for giving directions or when the japanese ask to take a picture with you. Or when I worked for the National Park and was in my full ranger outfit all the kids always wanted pictures with me. I could have been quite rich getting a dollar for that. And whether I was working for the park or hiking on my own if I saw a porcupine or a moose hidden in the willows or something I'd always take any tourists i saw in the area and show them, which would be unheard of here, let alone free hitchhiking or any of that that is more or less accepted in western culture. To me it can just be kind of sad here that we're viewed as dollar signs and not as people or friends. The lonely planet guidebook has an interesting thing about paying to have friends here and to be careful that even guys that apparently want to hang out with you and just practice english or be friendly will then ask for money for being your friend. I do understand that I am often much more well off, but it's also just nice sometimes to just be friendly and humanly to people. I mean it's not too much to ask really if you're sitting on a bench doing nothing and some askes which way to the post office to just point.

So Tom, Alex, and I took a cab from Denpasar to Kuta (zara was going to Ubud) the main budget and surfing area. It was quite a shock really to get here after travelling through java and sumatra. We were all very culture shocked for sure. b/c here in kuta it's just crazy shopping and so many westerners and partying and australians running around with out shirts and in tight shorts (I found out the british quite despise these types of australians) and completely fashionable and all good looking and make-upped and all that, which was like the antithesis of sumatra where you should wear all long clothing, where you're always dirty and mud covered, and where you can't even drink water in public, let alone be trashed and holding beers in the middle of the street half naked. If I had thought this was all bali was, I wouldn't have liked it, but luckily, I had been here before with the carlisles where we stayed at a much tamer area and really got to meet the locals. Of course kuta is fun for it's parties and surf and that's why so many come, but it would really be hard to tell the difference between here and the gold coast of australia or maybe parts of the cali coast. But with 3 of us sharing we only had to pay 6 dollars each for a nice hotel with private bathroom, real shower, and even a swimming pool with a tasty breakfast. But last night we just rented a dvd player and bought a dvd (for 1 dollar) and watched into the wild as we weren't ready to face the party that is kuta yet and were all exhausted from our travels (alex and zara had even gotten sick from all the early mornings and cold weather). This morning, being used to my other schedule, was only able to sleep into 7:30.

Today I pretty much tried to deal with my lost atm card situation b/c it was supposed to have been shipped to bali by now but the system at charles schwaab didn't like the bali address as they don't often use a postal code, so it hadn't been shipped. Also walked just a bit outside the tourist area of kuta where the balinese culture is much more pronounced and the little temples are everywhere and the surf-tude is lacking, which is all very nice.