Java Episode 7: Volcanic Moments: Mt Bromo
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Sunday 7 February 2010 Cemoro Lawang, Java, Indonesia
About the only thing that can entice me to wake up at 3:30 AM is the chance
to see the sunrise at the top of a spectacular mountain or volcano. In Java, I
got that early wake-up call twice.
Ray and I signed up for a tour to Mt Bromo in Eastern Java. To get there we
left Solo in a minivan and drove almost nine hours through heavy traffic and at
times torrential rainstorms to get to the mountain village of Cemoro Lawang. The
only way the driver was able to get there that fast was to pass every vehicle on
the two lane road. For the busiest section, Ray, sitting in the front seat,
finally found the buckle for his seat belt. I found myself closing my eyes
several times. At the coastal town of Probolinggo we switched minibuses and made
the last hour climbing up to Cemoro Lawang on relatively quiet roads. It was
still raining when we reached Cemoro Lawang and the temperature had dropped
significantly from the 30 C plus of Solo to about 10 C in Cemoro. We needed our
heavy quilt that night.
It was raining lightly at 3:30 AM. I wondered if we were going to see
anything. Cemoro Lawang is on the edge of the vast and ancient Tengger
Crater in the center of which stand three volcanoes, one of which is the smoking
Mount Bromo. We dressed in all our warm clothes and were glad we had taken
the jeep option instead of a one hour walk in the rain. It was still dark when
the jeep took us down a paved road to the flat Sand Sea, across the black lava
sand and up a steep, narrow and twisting paved road to Gunung Penanjaken, the
highest point on the crater rim at 2770 M.
We weren’t the only people up at that time in the morning. There were scores
of other jeeps already parked along the road. The main platform was thronged
with people waiting expectantly for the daily appearance of the sun. It was
Sunday morning and Indonesians as well as tourists had come for the show. It is
popular with high school groups and families who come on the weekend, but
everyone was very orderly and polite.
Soon after 5 AM, it had stopped raining and we could see the sun start to
rise above the opposite side of the crater, lighting all the surrounding peaks.
We could see the highest mountain in Java, Mount Semeru, with its telltale plume
of smoke, indicating it is still an active volcano. We could see Mt Batok, no
longer active and we could see Mount Bromo. It was easily identified as the
whole top has been blown off and it continually emits a cloud of white
sulphurous smoke.
We snapped lots of pictures then returned to our jeep for the ride down the
mountain and across the Sand Sea to park near Mount Bromo. We all got out of the
jeep to walk about 250 M to the base of Mount Bromo. Sometimes grey hair is an
advantage and sometimes it is a nuisance. That morning my grey hair elicted at
least 20 offers of a horse ride to take me to the base of Bromo. I got tired of
saying I preferred to walk and I wasn’t dead yet.
253 concrete steps have been built to get the hoards of tourist up to the rim
of Mount Bromo. I had started the morning wearing two fleece and my rain jacket.
By the time I got to the top of the stairs I was down to shirt sleeves. The sun
was warming the land and climbing stairs is a sure way to get you warm.
Ray and I had fun staring down into the smoking caldera but we confined our
activity to the section that was made safe by a concrete fence between us and
oblivion. It is possible to walk around the rim of Bromo but the narrow path
gradually gets to be a knife edge. We don’t have to prove we can do that
anymore.
Breakfast beckoned us back at our hotel at 8 AM. Ray and I had planned to
stay another night in Cemoro Lawang rather than face another long minibus drive
to our next destination, the Island of Bali. The charge for an extra night at
Hotel Permai Bromo, where we had stayed, was more than we wanted to pay. The
tour director suggested we could change hotels to another farther down the road.
He also suggested we could extend our trip to include the Ijen Plateau the next
day. It sounded like a good idea so we packed up, changed hotels and said
goodbye to the rest of our tour group who were off to various other
destinations.
Ray and I spent a lazy and relaxing day. I think we were the only tourists
who stayed for another day. We had a short walk around the small village grown
up to service the many tourists to Bromo. Everyone looked at us curiously and
greeted us in a friendly manner. The village was quite attractive with flowers
in pots at many of the houses and every inch of land planted in vegetables. The
hillsides hemming in the village on both sides were terraced with more fields,
all green with mature crops.
The clouds that had enveloped the mountains earlier in the morning returned
to creep down again, blanketing the town. The thunder warned of impending rain.
We had lunch in a nearby restaurant and spent the rest of the afternoon reading,
safely protected from the rains that fell once more.