The climb up the mountain was all hill. Not zig zag; pure incline; Libe slope style; for 3km. It was pretty tough! Halfway up the mountain, a sulfur miner came to walk with me. I've heard about them before - the poor guys carry baskets up the mountain, down into the crater, mine chunks of sulfur, bring basket of solid sulfur rock back up the crater, and down the mountain. Twice a day. All for around $8 USD a day.
So I gladly chatted him up, and was happy when he offered to guide me down into the crater on the miner's path - way less people than the tourist path. Soon we approached the sulfurous blue flames - the only one of its kind in the world! My camera failed, so here's national geographic:
Strong sulphur fumes were coming from the flames, and the miner guy who was with me forced a gas mask on me. He then led me very close to the flames. "To take photos", he said, and demanded money. I was really upset - if he had made it clear right from the beginning, I would have happily accepted his tour and tipped him. But this was a matter of principle. When he demanded 100000rps and I gave him all the change I had (20000rps), he angrily walked away and took the gas mask with him.
So here I am, at a dangerously close location to the fumes, suddenly without a mask. A sudden gust of wind came, and blew the entire monstrous cloud of fumes right in my face, burning my skin and all my orifices.
Now on the way up the mountain, I had already been feeling kind of sick from the weird banana bread thing I had before coming. I had tried my best to ignore it since there were no bathrooms around. Now with all this sudden high intake of sulfur in my system, I needed a bathroom. Fast. Feeling dizzy and sick from the sheer concentration of sulfur I unintentionally sucked in, I stumbled up the crater with my flashlight.
There were a lot of people at this point, slowly making their way up. I rudely pushed past everyone, and with super sayan speed, navigated the steep, jagged rocks. I had about 3/4 miles to the top.
On the way up I got yelled at by a local, so I said "I'm feeling very sick where's the closest toilet? " He didn't understand.
These European guys were kind and offered to ask their guide, so said there was none. They advised that I find a place off beaten path and wished me luck. I wished I never had to see them again.
I made it up the crater and as I backtracked I thought to myself - people climb up the mountain to go down the crater; no one is going to climb up this random side mountain peak thing that's loose and steep....right? So I frantically made my way up this wall of loose rocks to the top, which was surprisingly flat.
I did my business, sat there in a shameful bliss, saw the brightest, most beautiful shooting star in my life, and then realized - this flat terrain goes on for a while....as I followed it down it dawned on me that I had taken the tough way by climbing up.... this is actually a part of the upper rim path. I effectively took a dump on a volcano crater trail.
You're allowed to stop being friends with me if you want to after this.
So now I'm feeling weak, dizzy, extremely cold, hungry but nauseous, and tired, I was not in the best condition to hike in the pitch blackness. I react pretty strongly to sulfur and bad bananas I guess. But I was up here already and I didn't want to miss the sunrise, so I stumbled after my flashlight, around the rim of the volcano to find a good spot facing east. I found out after it got bright that this was what I had trekked. I'm glad I didn't fall into the crater.
I couldn't make it all the way around the rim, so I found a spot to sit down with my blanket wrapped around me, facing the crater.
Watching the beautiful turquoise crater lake that I didn't know existed light up, along with the mountains behind it and the clouds rolling in, as the stream of flashlights slowly make their ways out of the crater like glowing ants - one of the most magical moments I've experienced. I set up my go pro to record, so I could fuly enjoy the experience sans-technology. Love.
Definitely one of the most beautiful places I've been to; i felt this way even in my conditions at the time.
Oh yeah, and then the European guys came up to me and asked if I "figured it out". Dammit. I hope this meant they didn't walk to that section of the trail...
I have to talk about the way down because it was SUCH a struggle. So on top of all this other stuff that was making me feel unwell, my knees have hit their breaking points - Ive had a knee problem ever since the half marathon, where if I use my legs too strenuously for too long, my knees hurt like a bitch, especially downhill. So after 10 days of walking a lot and 4 days of straight hiking, my knees were not happy when the entire trail down the mountain was steep down hill. I was so miserable that I eventually had to finish the descent backwards.
By the time I got to the top I had already decided not to return to Mt. Bromo for the food throwing Kasada festival. I was going directly to Bali to relax my body.
Jason, who was also going that direction, worked out a plan with me where he'd take me to the east coast city with the ferry over to Bali.
The ride was amazing as usual. We descended from the mountains and went through basically 3 different ecosystems!
We parted ways at the ferry dock. I hopped on the ferry, and right away met a nice coulpe from England. We got to talking, and since I hadn't decided where I was going after getting off the ferry yet, they invited me too go with them to a fancy costal beach town, Pemuteran. Sounded cool, so I said yes. Plus, I wanted to treat myself after the hard couple of days.
Their hotel a booked, so I had to find a different one. This was such a resort-young town that everything was quite fancy and expensive. I had learned some haggling skills from the Danish girl a coulpe days ago, and put it to good use.
The
1) Can you give me a little discount
2) I'm a student
and 3) you look like a good business woman, that do you say we...
got me a standard room for 350000rps down from 500000rps. Nice. Then, because I found some black dropping-like things under the sheets, I got bumped up to this superior suite, still at 350000 (about $26usd). Winning.
It has an OUTDOOR fenced-in bathroom with a tub!
I feel like a princess.
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