After a pretty turbulent flight from Kuala Lumpur to Bali, with incessant images of the fated Air France jet flashing across my mind, I arrived back in Bali. Ignoring the hoards of touts I bought my onward ticket to the Indonesian island of Flores for Tuesday, which I instantly regretted as I realized I am now Challenge Anneka racing against time to make it up the volcano in the central highlands and back in around 36 hours – still no sleep this week then!
I head out of the airport and immediately get followed by numerous touts, I eventually accept one offer to the bus terminal in Batubalam about 15km away as I realize I am gonna have to suck it up and charter to get there today. After haggling he leads me to his ‘taxi’ which in truth can barely be called a ‘car’. But hey, when in Rome and all that. So I jump in and chat with Maddie, as you do. Arriving in Batambalum, I am excited to learn there is a bus to Kintamani but I have to wait until it is full, which could be, er, never. So I do the only sensible thing is this situation, I load my 15kg bag that is the size of a bath tub and jump on the back of a moto for the 60km ride up the mountains! Whizzing through the rice paddies past the Hindu temples feeling the air chill as we race the sunset to the highlands, I have to laugh at myself, everyone who passes does!
We made it to Toya Bungkah before sunset and I was immediately accosted and dragged into various hotels. I declined and went for the classy 5 bucks a night jobby that didn’t even come with a bathroom, well nothing I could class as such. Anyway, when do I ever use the rooms I book!! I headed straight to the restaurant to fill my growling tummy, c’mon when did you ever see Anneka stop for a Maccy D’s? By this point my new stalker for the night and lodged himself in and proceeds to show off his dilapidated and stained photos he’s collected in his 15 years of trekking, these guys start at 15!
I sign up for the medium trek, which turns into the long trek which later turns into the bonus trek for being Chidluk (that’s a beautiful girl in case you idiots don’t know any Bahasa!) With business out the way, Yogi (yeah smarter than the average!) brings out the Arak, localling distilled whisky made from Palm leaves. What he omits to telling me and I find out from a fellow trekker at sunrise the next day is this stuff kills several people a year coz they mix it with Meth. Anyway, it tastes good and comes in a sandwich bag, so who am I to interfere. We neck this and chat for a couple of hours, about the kind of politics that you can only talk about with a complete stranger from a polar opposite culture on the side of a volcano in the middle of Asia. Then around 9.30pm he decides, and maybe the Arak and Bintang has something to do with it, or the fact I introduced him to Soca and Reggaeton, that we should now go to the hot springs. Well, obviously sleep is a good idea but I did what I always do in these situations and said ‘fuck it’ and jumped on his moto to go all of 300ft to the springs.
As we got to the shoreline of Danau Batur, the moon was full and so bright, the whole island could have had neon strip lights tacked to the clouds. The magical landscape was lit up as bright as day, and looked even more sinister and unreal in the clear light. The towering mass of Gunung Agung echoed in the stillness of the lake, showing up the detail of the small villages at its base, even the ridges and lines of its bulk could be seen between the violent jumps from the fish lurking in the grey-black depths. We walked around the shoreline to the hot springs where locals were still splashing about having their daily bath in the steaming water. I just had to sit and gaze out across the moonlit landscape filled with awe and nature and its untamed beauty in a place so accessible yet so wild.
After only a couple of hours sleep I rose and splashed with freezing water to wash away the last traces of sleep and dressed warmly for my trek, it was 3.30am. I was a little nervous about Yogi showing up, but he knocks for at 4am and introduces me to my guide, Putu. I jump on his moto and we wind our way up to the base the cool morning chill in my face. We set of in the dark and of course I remembered my torch, batteries would be too much to ask so I stumbled my way up the ash laden side in about an hour to meet a few people already up the top sipping Bintang to stave off the cold. When the sun finally did show it’s orange hued face the clouds gracefully parted and the sight was incredible and breathtaking. A lighting storm crackled over a nearby mountain and the blanket of cotton wool cloud laid out like a rug across the jungle below. I will upload the pics at my next internet stop.
After we all had our fill of pictures we continued the trek to the caves and to see where some steam vents came through. Then we walked to another summit to see the most active volcano in the region, still steaming away merrily. Since my guide decided I was so Chiduk and he quite liked me, he wanted to show me the vent itself and we kind of half slid half ran down the sandy ash slopes to the crater, which of course I sat in and had to stick my hand over the steaming vents. The yellow green sulphur stains were scarring the sides of the mountain as it hissed and spewed boiling steam into the cool air. So incredible. After getting about as close as possible for some pics, I decided I been a daredevil enough and shouldn’t tempt fate so we made our way back round. All in all a 5.5 hour trek.
Getting back to Denpasar was a mini bemo adventure, same as matatus, tro-tros collectivos, etc, tiddly little vans with 20 people crammed in! I had to change around 4 times coz apparently it is a holiday and no buses, in Bali, every day is a holiday!
Well, signing off coz times up, but will update pics and next adventure very soon!
Love Jenna a.k.a. Anneka Rice
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