Volcanoes in Indonesia

We’ll land in Jakarta. From there a car will be waiting for us for the private transfer to the Yogyakarta airport. We probably can’t bond so we should spend a night in Jakarta. Once in Yogyarkarta they will be waiting for us in a private car and we will move to the Aman chain hotel, Amanjiwo. If you’ve never been to an Aman, this is definitely a good premiere.

Waking up in Amanjiwo is already a unique experience. Impeccable service and divine stay. We recommend enjoying the first day at the hotel and its swimming pool. At the most, a short ride around the area on the hotel’s bicycles. In the afternoon we will visit the Buddhist temple of Borobudur in private. That’s where the sunset will surprise us. From Borobudur we prefer not to explain anything yet. Mysticism mixed with history. Something unrepeatable.

In the early morning, we will leave to the Merapi volcano, located in Central Java, near the city of Yogyakarta. In a couple of hours we will arrive with our 4×4 at the base of the volcano. And there we will begin our ascent; a trekking, not complicated, of 4 to 6 hours, until the top of the Merapi volcano, that is to say, Mountain of fire in Javanese. This ascent takes place at night in order to arrive in time to see the sunrise from the top. With its 2,911 meters of altitude, it is the most active volcano in Indonesia. It’s erupted 70 times since 1548, although it’s totally safe. When you reach the base of the summit, you will find dozens of tents of other travelers who have made it overnight to do it in two days and in a more relaxed way. The last stretch, up to the crater, is done by climbing up volcanic sand, with a lot of inclination so it is done much slower. Once on top the views are indescribable. Then we will continue our descent with calm. Amanjiwo is waiting for us. If you have time, it would not be bad to take another day off to continue enjoying the hotel and in the afternoon visit the temple of Pragbanan.

After getting up we will be taken on a flight to Surabaya and from there a private car will drive us to a hotel in Tosari. It’s a whole day of transport and it gets a little annoying. We’ll take the opportunity to see rural Indonesia.

We’ll have to get up early. The objective is to climb Mount Bromo, 2,329m, after stopping to admire the sunrise, from the viewpoint of Penanjakan, on the edge of the Tengger Caldera, with the smoking volcanoes in the background. What makes Bromine such an interesting place is not the cone of the volcano itself, but the environment where it is located: the Tengger cauldron.

If you’re lucky and it’s clear when you visit them, the first few minutes of that day will remain etched in your memory forever. The silhouettes of the different conical craters in the Tengger cauldron will appear in front of you. It is easy to identify the wide crater of the Bromo, which we will later climb, among the other cones and, behind, the imposing Semeru volcano of 3,676m.

By the way, your guide will provide you with a cup of coffee or tea to withstand the cold, while waiting for the sun to rise. The Bromo volcano last erupted relatively recently, in 2011. But don’t think too much about it, or you’ll never make up your mind. Once we see the sunrise, we will begin the descent, with our 4×4, from the viewpoint to the valley where the volcano rests. A pony or a horse will be waiting for us at the foot of the volcano, and will help us to advance faster and more comfortably on the way to the base of the volcano. We will dismantle in front of the 246 steps that will have to be climbed up to the crater of the volcano. The views are amazing. When we feel like it, we’ll start our way back to the hotel for lunch. In the afternoon we will start our route to Mount Ijen. We’ll sleep nearby.

Very early in the morning, we will retake our route to Mount Ijen, 2,799 m, in the 4×4 that will take us through clove plantations, coffee and rural villages to the last rainforest of Java. Once on the mountainside, covered by a thick blanket of vegetation, we must wait until 4 a.m. when the rangers allow us to pass upwards. We will have to start a 90′ trekking in which the speed counts. We have to get to the crater of the volcano before dawn. Then we can see the famous blue fire. In the ascent and descent we will share the path with the miners of Ijen. They collect almost a hundred kilos of sulphur from the crater and carry it in baskets on their shoulders. Like this twice a day. It will engrave in your memory the smile on their face, their kindness and even their pleasure to share the narrow path with visitors, while they suffer their strenuous work. The gases are what create the spectacle of characteristic colors of the Ijen. During the day, yellow color, contrasting with the blue of the sky and the turquoise of the water; at night, electric blue, causing the beautiful blue fire, the result of the combustion of the gas emanating from the volcano. Once we have descended, we will drive to the port of Ketapang to take a ferry to Bali.

From there we can go home or give each other a present. A well-deserved rest on the island. Shall we go on?

For the more adventurous and who do not wish to rest yet in Bali, we can always change islands, specifically the island of Flores, and climb to the volcano of Mount Kelimutu, at 1,639m, where there are 3 lakes that change color between blue and green tones to black or reddish tones, due to chemical reactions that occur inside each lake. As in the others, the ideal thing is to arrive at dawn. You should leave, from the city Moni and with a transport get to the entrance of the Park to begin the ascent. There is a viewpoint, like in Bromo, that when the sun appears on the horizon and the lakes begin to color, has no equal.