Trekking a Trio of Deadly Volcanoes in East Java

May 13-May 20

Ijen

I’m cold. I’m in Indonesia and I’m cold. Shivering. Shivering, on an island that is about 8 degrees of latitude away from the equator.

To be fair, I am about 6,000 feet above sea level and it is 2:30 am.

Why, you might be wondering, am I awake at 2:30am?

I woke up at 11:45pm, after getting to my hostel at 10:30pm (yes, 1-ish hour of sleep only). But the adrenaline–and the cold–are doing their job.

I’m at the base of Mount Ijen, an active volcano in East Java, Indonesia. An active volcano I’m about to climb.

Hopefully. These seems to be some complication that our guide is dealing with, so the group of us (about ten people) are standing in a huddle on a wide sidewalk as hundreds of people stream past us and to the entry gate of the hike. We were supposed to start hiking at 2am, some of the first people on the trail. Instead, we wait and wait as the hordes clomp past and begin the hike.

Some of the group members are whining and complaining, but I feel pretty confident that I can pick up the pace a little bit and still make it in time to the top. We’re all here to hike to the rim of the volcano, but also to descend into the crater. And that’s where the real deadline lies. And the big attraction.

Ijen’s blue fire.

There are only two places in the world where this phenomenon occurs. But Ijen is the only place where you can see it. As our guide explained, “there is blue fire in Iceland, where the government said that it’s dangerous, don’t go. And there is blue fire in Indonesia, where the government said that it’s dangerous, let’s go!”

So I’m here with probably about 4,000 other people with hopes of seeing the blue fire. But it’s best to see it before 4:30 am as then the sky starts to lighten and the flames grow dim.

Our guide comes running towards us waving his hand. “Let’s go, let’s go!” he shouts, and we join the crush to pass through the entrance gates.

It’s shocking that our guide was held up on something as so far it’s been smooth sailing. All hikers are supposed to get a health certificate before hiking Ijen but somehow our guide made it so we could bypass that process. At another checkpoint, where staff were stopping cars, he just rolled down his window, whistled something, and dropped cash into a staff member’s hand and we sailed through. This is obvously unusual, as is proven by our guide’s intense frustration. I’m a little frusterated too, simply because now I’m part of a herd.

But the guide gives us permission to split up and hike our own pace, so I take off, speeding past people left and right. After an hour and fifteen minutes and the removal of 2 layers and lots of beads of sweat dripping down the sides of my face, I reach the crater rim. I left behind the majority of the crowds about fifteen minutes ago, so it’s mostly me and my headlight in the dark. A few lights bob ahead of me, but I’m exactly where I want to be–away from the crowds.

The guide has caught up, though most of the group is still behind. He gives me a walkie-talkie and tells me he’ll find me at the bottom at 4:30, then sends me off into the dark, heading back to find the others.

I shift the gas mask hanging around my neck and begin descending into the dark, into the crater of a volcano.

The walk up was on a wide dirt-packed road, but the descent into the crater is rough sulfur rock that shifts under my feet and zigzags steeply down the slope. I keep expecting to reach the bottom or to catch a glimpse of the blue flames, but I descend and descend, all the while thinking about how I will have to walk back up this steep, unsteady incline.

Looking behind, a line of lights snakes behind me. But it doesn’t bother me. From here, it’s a soft glow and it makes me feel like part of something even though I’m hiking alone.

Soon, I start seeing evidence of hand-mining. There are about 30 sulfur miners who trek down into the crater, gather and chip away blocks of sulfur, and then carry it up in baskets. The sulfur is used mostly to whiten sugar, and it’s a horrible job, especially as the miners don’t wear gas masks, and they make about $10-15 USD a day. I put on my gas mask at this point.

And then, I’m there. The ground flattens out and there’s a small gathering of about ten people in front of a handmade fence. As I near, the sulfur smoke gets thicker and I start to taste it in the back of my throat. It doesn’t smell like the sulfur I’m used to, like rotten eggs. It’s so much stronger that it doesn’t really have a distinct smell anymore. Just bad, thick, choking chemicals.

Beyond the people are the blue flames. The way they move and flicker looks almost like flowing blue lava, but it’s not lava, just fire. Pure sulfur leaks from cracks in the earth at over 500 degrees celsius. Upon contact with the air, it bursts into flame. The flames aren’t tall, but they dance and move along the ground and the slope–a dark, eery blue thing that sends a mix of excitement and chills down my spine. It really hits home, as the flames move and the sulfur smoke vents furiously from the ground, that I am standing in a volcanic crater.

And it’s only 3:45. I’ve got 45 minutes to stay here until my guide shows up again. Suddenly, what felt like freedom, what felt like a blessing to get to to spend so much time at the blue flames when most people only get a few moments–now feels dangerous. The sulfur smoke is billowing around me, a deadly cloud.

I find another hiker to take a photo of my with the blue flames. For a few seconds I slip off my mask so I don’t look like a cyborg in every photo, but it takes too long and I suck in a lungful. But really, it doesn’t feel like a lungful because it feels like it all gets caught in my throat. Like it’s heavy and thick, a poison gas–because it literally is a poison gas.

I put that mask back on and don’t take it off again!

When the wind shifts, I hear other guides telling their group to close their eyes, so I follow suit. Even through the mask, I can taste the sulfur on my tongue and in my throat. I move away from the billowing clouds and wait there, occasionally wandering back to see the blue flames. I’m drawn to it, like a bug to a bug zapper!

Finally, the group arrives, takes a few photos, and we start the hike up the crater. It’s not bad in terms of hard work, but only because it is bad in terms of bottlenecking! So many people are still coming down on the narrow trail that we get backed-up for almost ten minutes at one point. The sky is lightening, the sunrise imminent, so again I break away from the group and make my way up to the rim.

And this is the real highlight. The blue fire is incredible and miraculous, but the light finally reveals where I’ve been for the past few hours and it is stunning. The landscape, the crater, the other volcanos in the distance. The way the earth is lined and pitted is incredible, looking so volcanic in nature, so foreign and distinct and hard, like cracks in asphalt but a million times bigger. The soft sunrise light makes the low clouds glow and turns the crater lake into the softest blue.

The lake is always a bright blue because it of it’s PH level 0.2 (the largest sulfur lake in the world), but the light makes it seem soft and dreamy rather than viciously deadly. And, as all the masses of people are spread out around a huge stretch of crater rim, I get to enjoy it mostly alone, just taking in the majesty of the scene in front of me, the mind-boggling beauty of this volcano, the utter uniqueness of this country.

Bromo

A nap is most welcome in the afternoon and a slow, quiet evening. The next day I take another bus (I love Indonesian Executive buses–big seats, foot rests, blankets, pillows, snack boxes, and free lunch!) about 6 hours to the East Java city of Malang. This time I arrive at 6:30, which is much nicer for my (again) midnight wakeup. It’s time to visit another volcano!

In the early hours of the morning, I join a jeep-looking vehicle already stuffed with 5 other people plus our driver. The 2 hour drive is loud, the diesel engine roaring. I expected empty streets, but identical cars roar by. Everyone awake, it seems, is headed to Mount Bromo.

It takes 2 hours. The windows are open, humid air blowing in. The night is dark, though the whole way is spotted with lights in the distance. Coming from Colorado where we drive vast stretches with nothing but farm fields or mountain forest, and the night-time scenes out the window are just dark voids, one of the more shocking things about South East Asia is that there are people everywhere. Sure, there are rice fields and farm fields, but they aren’t the big sprawling things of mass farms in the US. They are much smaller and a home sits on each little farm, situated right along the road, lights blazing. In all three weeks so far in Indonesia, it has never felt like I’ve left civilization.

However, for the first time, we do leave civilization. The road turns to sand and I understand the need for the roaring jeep. Outside, the scenery is black and I can’t imagine what lays beyond. Hills? Mountains? Rice fields? Water? We blast through the night, probably not going all that fast, but the way the vehicle bellows and vibrates, and the lack of distinct features other than the sand disappearing beneath the wheels makes our speed seem fast.

We’re driving on sand paths, weeds sprouting up in some places but others just endless sand. I knew from research that Bromo lies across the so-called “sea of sand” so I conjure in my mind a vast stretch of nothingness. A desert. Headlights surround us, flashing behind in the rear window and to each side. Taillights glow like coals in front and often the jeeps weave around, like a haphazard braid. It feels like being in an adventure movie when the good guys escape from a secret compound and the bad guys send out a fleet of armored jeeps, weaving and leapfrogging across the rugged landscape in pursuit. 

I wind closed the window, both to keep out the sand and because the temp has dropped. It’s chilly. 

We climb out of the desert and ascend a narrow road. So narrow that I’m glad no one comes from the other direction. The hundreds of jeeps, now forced to follow a single road, become a glowing trail of lights snaking away behind us. 

Our driver parks on a narrow road, yanking up the parking brake. It’s 3am.

He points the direction we’re to go and lets us know to return at 5:40am for the next part of our adventure. We walk up the road a short ways, the six of us giving each other sideways glances. Then, the shops start, tucked close together like a line of blocky teeth in a wide mouth. Each one offers the same things: rental jackets, wool hats, and lines of attached packets of instant tea and coffee hanging like garland from the rafters.

Several of the group members stop for coffee and I point to a photo on the wall. “How far to that lookout?” I ask the shop owner.

He shrugs. “15 minutes.”

My group exchange looks. It’s 3:10. The sun rises at 5:15 and it takes 15 minutes to walk to the viewpoint…

We sit down in the cafe and kill an hour trying not to fall asleep!

Finally, we venture again into the blackness. More and more people have arrived and only a very small number of the thronging populace understand how to be decent humans and keep their flashlights pointed to the ground in front of them.

We stick together, following the path and then scrambling up a steep hill to find a fenced area. I claim a seat right by the fence, recalling conversations with other travelers about how busy the lookout gets.

I hold my spot for an hour, trying not to shiver. I am wearing two layers of pants and three layers of shirts, but they’re not exactly made for 45 degree night-time weather. That’s not what you generally pack for when headed to SEA!

The stars are brilliant and bright, but all I can see are the bright, searing trails left behind by twenty plus flashlights spiraling around the place at any given moment. Bodies shove. Flashlights blare into my eyes. The wind blows just enough that I can’t face away from the masses without being seized by shivers.

It seems as though sunrise will never come, but it does, slowly lightening in the east, then turning orange. The lines of the volcano and the famous view I’ve seen pictures begin to emerge. 

The sunrise isn’t brilliant and colorful, but it softens the volcano, makes it soft and pastel-colored and gives it a certain glow that I’d thought before was from photo-editing software. But in person I can see that it’s accurate. That those colors are true.

It is very beautiful, but the fighting and jostling and getting shoved to one side and then the other by the crowds of people is frankly horrible. Thankfully our driver wanted us back shortly after the sunrise so there’s no reason to linger. 

As I’m walking back, one of the more distant volcanoes has a mini-eruption, which sends a shiver down my spine. Should we be here? Should we run away? Is this signs of more (and bigger) to come? But no one else even seems to notice (which is actually weirder)?

We jump back into the jeep, cruising past an endless row of rainbow colored vehicles. 

It’s race to the bottom, down the steep hill and back to the sea of sand. Our jeep parks, again in a row, and the driver sends us off again with a waved arm, but the directions aren’t necessary. It’s pretty obvious how to get to Mount Bromo. It’s a volcanic mountain in the middle of a small desert…

Plus, there are all the other people streaming the same way, carried on the same tide.

“Hiking Bromo” takes about 30 minutes and is mostly flat except for a staircase at the end. I’m feeling somewhat let down by the whole touristy herd experience. And then, about ten steps from the top of the mountain, I hear it. And I realize I’ve been hearing it, but it’s just gotten louder. A small roar becomes a big roar.

And then I’m on the rim and the volcano is steaming and the roar is coming from the crater. Sure, this is cliche, but it’s like an open mouth, a black pit hissing and bellowing into the air. There’s little else it can be but a mouth. If it were silent, it could be a pit, a hole, but with the sounds, with the escaping steam, with the energy, it can nothing else but a gaping maw into the deepest parts of the earth.

Even among all the trash strewn about the volcano and the ever growing number of people, I feel it in my body, the power of this thing. The crazy aliveness of it.

It looks deadly. It looks like a threat.

It sounds like a challenge, one no one will dare to meet.

It makes the entirety of the touristy craziness worth it.

And frankly, a little reassuring. I think I’d be too freaked out if I were standing on the narrow lip of this roaring volcanic rim alone.

Interlude

Leaving Bromo lets me see what we drove through in our crazy midnight journey. So much of the sandy portions of our drive weren’t in endless, flat sand, but in a narrow valley of sand with steep, green cliff sides hemming us in.

And much of the dark portion of our drive wasn’t through forest or empty land, but was along a sharp ridgeline, deep valleys on either side and steep farm fields descending at an angle that makes me wonder how anyone actually harvests anything.

After a short nap, I strove to return to a more regular schedule by getting up and heading into the city of Malang for an afternoon wander.

I visited the rainbow village, which was a slum that local art students helped paint in rainbow colors in order to make it a tourist attraction and bring in money for the locals.

And then I wandered through the streets for a long time. Here and Banyuwangi (the town by Ijen) are the first places I visited that weren’t primarily devoted to tourism (Bali, Gili Air, and Labuan Bajo) and I loved seeing the way city life unfolded. The exercise classes at the park, the wide avenues and big buildings coupled with the little pop-up restaurants on the block corners, just a few plastic tables and a hose with a tub to wash dishes.

I am intrigued by the roadside restaurants, but I’ve been hesitant because of everything I hear about food and water in South East Asia, but I’ve also had very few meals in Indonesia that impressed me. So when I walk past a place with such a delicious smell that I literally put my nose in the air and turn around like a cartoon figure, I waver. I walk a few steps onward and then turn again. I can’t resist.

I try to ask the woman what she’s making but she doesn’t understand English. Using Google Translate, she tells me that she’s frying fish. I make the executive decision to sit down on the plastic stool and hold my finger up to indicate “one.”

While she cooks up the fish, an Indonesian woman sits next to me. She gets a piece of chicken on her rice and begins eating it with her fingers.

Shortly, the cook gives me a plate with rice and herbs and plops a small but completely whole fried catfish next to the rice. She shows me a bowl on the table that has a sauce in it. Wary of the potential for it to make me cry from spice, I spoon on just a little bit. Then I look for chop sticks or a fork. There are none, so I follow the other customers lead and use my fingers.

And the fish is so good. It’s not deep-fried, but lightly fried so that it’s crispy on the outside and tender on the inside. I pick off pieces with my fingers and scoop up loose rice to go with it. The sauce is good (but spicy, so I’m glad I was frugal). The cook is making more food, but when she turns around again when I’m about halfway through with my meal. She and her husband, who has just joined the party, both laugh. The cook gestures to a container, a rectancle standing on it’s small end and removes the white plastic lid. Inside are chopsticks.

I laugh too and shrug and just keep eating with my fingers since they’re already dirty. Plus, the other Indonesian woman did it so I’m probably not being rude. Actually, it would be more difficult to eat the crispy with chopsticks than with my fingers.

When I’m finished, I get out my wallet to signal that I want to pay. The cook holds up her phone with the calculator showing and types 13,000.

Considering that the cheapest meal I’ve had so far in Indonesia was 25,000 for simple veggie fried rice, I’m blown away (and also realizing how much tourists are up-charged). Needless to say, it was the best meal I’ve had so far in Indonesia, the cheapest meal I’ve had so far in Indonesia, and, since I didn’t get sick at all from it, I am definitely going to change my eating habits.

The next day I visit quite possibly the most famous waterfall in Java: Tempuk Sewu, which means 1000 waterfalls. It is absolutely beautiful, but because of some food poisoning (not me, but the other girl), I end up going alone. And, what I thought was going to be a fun tour climbing through the falls, is actually just an Instagram outing.

The guide (or maybe he should just be called the photographer) who takes me through the falls just takes me to lookouts and photo spots and then takes a thousand pictures of me while telling me how to pose. His favorite pose to make me do (and he won’t hear otherwise), is to have my arms crossed and non-smiling. I keep trying to tell him that’s not my style, but really the whole day isn’t my style.

We spend several hours among the river and the waterfalls, climbing through the water and going through archways, getting absolutely drenched. It was fun but it would have been a blast with some other fun people and less posing!

So that’s disappointing. At least the waterfall is beautiful and my driver is nice and speaks English well. He even buys us a small durian to share so that I can try it for the first time. (I don’t hate it, but I don’t love it.)

Then my hostel host shares some fruit from his trees (passionfruit and soursop) and it’s just a fruit extravaganza!

The next day I travel to Yogyakarta via train.

Fun fact, Yogyakarta is also the only Indonesian city to still be ruled by a king. Basically, when Indonesia gained independence, the governorship of Yogyakarta city passed to the previous king and the position has henceforth been hereditary.

Yogyakarta is busy and vibrant and hot, but I get out and explore a bit.

I stick to my guns and try another local, non-English food establishment and thus have the new best meal I’ve had in Indonesia. My attempts at finding a recipe so I can try to recreate it at home have failed, so if anyone reading this knows how to make “Nasi Gudeg Krecek Telur Paha Atas Kecil” (which Google translates to Nasi Gudeg Krecek Egg Small Upper Thigh,” please contact me ASAP!

Also in Yogyakarta, I visit Borobudur. This temple is from the 8th and 9th centuries and is the largest Buddhist temple in the world. Java, like all of Indonesia except for Bali, is primarily Muslim, so it’s wonderful to see the effort they’ve put into restoring and preserving this amazing monument to a different religion.

Like Gili, most of Indonesia are “soft Muslims.” They aren’t strict in practice; it seems half the women wear hijabs and half don’t. Some people drink alcohol. They are welcoming of other religions. There are churches in Yogyakarta. And the people and government still celebrate and protect their Hindu and Buddhist pasts.

At Borobudur, an UNESCO World Heritage Site, I joined the limited amount of daily visitors who are allowed to climb the nine levels of the structure. The scale of the temple and the intricate stonework impressed me. The whole thing is built with small square stones that are placed together like puzzle pieces. The motifs and carved images, many of them stories about the buddha, are made up of these square stones too, so that one stone might hold the torso of a figure while another has the head and another, the legs. The restoration work is also impressive, fitting back together the thousands of designs.

The temple is a remnant of the Syailendra Dynasty that brought Buddhism to Java. Prior, Javanese people practiced a spirtual folk religion and Hinduism, which had been introduced in the 1st century. Then, Buddhism came in the 8th century, and it got stirred into the mix.

Then, Islam spread in the 13th century from traders and settlers. This complex background and history of adding together different elements of belief, I think, helps to explain why Indonesians tend to be more open in their practices and accepting of other beliefs.

They’re also pretty open and friendly in general. At Borobudur, I had to go running after my tour group in fear that I’d be left behind because so many school children came up to me wanting to take pictures with me!

Merapi

So, for the grand finale.

I hadn’t heard anything about Mount Merapi until the night I arrived in Yogyakarta. I stayed at a wonderful hostel that offered free dinner (which, as far as I’m concerned, is the single best thing a hostel can do to promote socializing because it welcomes both introverts and extroverts). The hostel owner arrived and began telling a group of us about Mount Merapi, a local volcano that is still active and is still spewing lava. And, at night, you can see the lava. In fact, there’s a live camera feed on YouTube that you can check to see if the mountain is clear or if it’s shrouded in cloud.

Several of us said we really wanted to do it, but after checking the camera we found that the mountain was cloudy. Maybe tomorrow, we said.

So I spent my day at Borobudur and eating Nasi Gudeg Krecek Telur Paha Atas Kecil an then frantically googling recipes for Nasi Gudeg Krecek Telur Paha Atas Kecil. And that evening, I returned for free dinner and looked for the people I’d chatted with the night before. But they were nowhere to be seen.

I searched for the viewpoint and route on Google, but nothing came up other than some facts about how Merapi is the most active volcano in Indonesia and that there are no longer guided hikes to the top (understandable). In 2010, over 300 people were killed in an eruption.

Luckily I got talking to some other people (more evidence for my case: single best thing a hostel can do to promote socializing) and they wanted to go. We checked the video and it was clear. But it’s complicated. Renting a motorbike (for $5) is the easiest way to travel the hour to the viewpoint. But it was already 7:30 and some of us didn’t drive motor bikes. So we needed a taxi or a Grab. But, we couldn’t just take a Grab there and let it go. We needed it to stay and wait for us, because it’s in the middle of nowhere and late in the evening.

So we figured out how to reserve a Grab for several hours. But we needed two grabs because we had 8 people. Though, some of those people still hadn’t come back to the meeting point. And, some of those people wanted to buy beer and snacks to eat at the viewpoint. So, all told, I was so excited for our trip to Merapi that was going to leave at 7:45. But, we didn’t end up actually wrangling everyone together and finding Grabs that didn’t cancel on us when they found out where we wanted to go until 8:45.

Then, of course, we had to stop for beer and snacks (cue eye roll).

An hour later at 9:55, my group, dubbed group 1 (since we split into 2 cars), arrive at the tiny parking lot. Using Google Translate, the driver tells us that if we’re not back by midnight, he’s leaving without us.

The four of us girls begin to hike the trail to the viewpoint, camera flashlights trained on the endless concrete stairs and hands waving around our heads each time we walk into spider webs (I try not to think about the size of some the spiders that inhabit such webs in this part of the world). It’s a perfect temperature, but of course it’s ridiculously humid so I’m sweaty and soaked half an hour later when we reach the top.

Except we don’t go all the way to the top.

Backstory: when the other girls went into the minimart for snacks and beer, I stayed in the car with the driver. Using Google Translate, he asked me, with a legit wrinkle in his brow, “why do you want to go to the tomb of Sheikh Jumadil Qubro.”

It took me a bit, but finally I worked out what none of us had realized. The viewpoint for the volcano (unoffical viewpoint, apparently) is actually a hill with the tomb of some old important guy. Awkward.

Anyway, we didn’t make it all the way to the top of the mini mountain because there was a light up there (we needed dark) and also because there were at least 10 men/boys up there sitting around the tomb and chanting.

Luckily, about 5 minutes before the top, there was a small shelter built with a perfect view of Mount Merapi. So we settled there and got out our cameras to wait for the promised (and hoped for) lava spew. It was about 10:30pm.

And, as annoyed as I’d been with the girls for the past 2 hours (even wondering if I should just back out and go to bed), the darkness, the hope, the nighttime climb–it really brings you together and creates this magical space. We can’t see each others faces, we have nothing better to do than talk, whispering in the night air.

We spot a few fireflies darting around in the leaves in front of us.

Then Mount Merapi delivers. Just small streams of lava tumbling down the side of the volcano and burning out, burning up within seconds. Even many miles away, we can hear it. We shush each other each time it happens, each time hoping for a bigger mass of lava (but, of course, not too big).

And we do get a pretty big flair. Not as big as some of the photos the hostel owner showed us, but plenty rewarding.

Finally, group 2 arrives, unfortunately missing most of Mount Merapi’s best lava flows, but somehow they don’t break the sanctity of the experience and they join our magical bubble, enjoying the night time, the company, and the fact that there is a volcano in front of shooting out actual lava–something I never thought I’d get to see in my lifetime.

Worth the chaos, the indecision, the late night (I finally got to sleep about 1:30), and worth the 4 hours of sleep (since I woke up at 5am to walk to the train station to take a train to the airport to fly to Singapore).

Three months ago I’d never even heard of Ijen and Bromo. Three days ago, I’d never heard of Merapi. Now, I don’t think I will ever forget them.