Journey

I won't bore you with the details of the walking itself: it was hard going, and that's enough to say. However, a quick description of the area might be of interest. From Senaru, which is to the north of the mountain itself, I headed south through rainforest, climbing from Senaru at 600m to the crater rim at 2600m: there I camped on the rim, overlooking the inside of the crater, and its beautiful lake and second, still-smoking cone. The views were indescribably beautiful: suffice to say that I have never seen a sight quite like the crater of Rinjani, even in Tongariro, and it was worth the long six-hour uphill struggle just to see that view. Of course, I had myself a 'body-guard', which "thanks" to my protective parents - our local driver that have sworn to "risk" his life to protect his masters' children.

The next day I was up for the sunrise, a pleasant affair that would have been better if the whole of Lombok wasn't covered in cloud (though, being above the cloud layer by now, it was still beautiful). An early start saw me loping down the crater rim towards the east, stopping at the Crater Lake for a breather. Then it was on to the hot springs, a delightful river that cascades in waterfalls and rock pools of temperatures between boiling and warm: I found a lovely spot under a 40 degree waterfall and washed away all those aches and pains. However, it wasn't long before I had to strike back up to the crater rim, this time on the eastern side, ready to tackle the summit.

The summit itself is part of the crater rim, a sharp tooth that juts out of the eastern side of the volcano, dominating the whole area. The second rim campsite is at about 3000m, just below the slopes that lead to the summit, and there I tasted real Indonesian hospitality, as the sun went down and lit up Bali in the distance. I had made some friends on the way: one girl, a Slovenian, had broken her sandals, and I'd whipped out my penknife and twine and fixed it up for her; another couple of girls had blisters, which I patched up with plasters and anti-bacterial cream; another guy had a painful knee, so I gave him some pain killers... yes, some people try to climb mountains without the most basic equipment, and by the time I got to the rim, I'd earned a bit of a reputation as a survivor. My kindness was repaid that night, as the porters from the group containing all these people fed me noodle soup and tea, a pleasant change from my cold nasi goreng. I felt good being a "lonely planteer" then!