The Path Through Java, Indonesia - Borobudur Temple, Mount Bromo/Semeru, and Ijen Crater - Jan 2014

I feel guilty because I haven't blogged in a month, but it's really been out of my control due to slow or non-existent WiFi. Today Darryl and I parted ways AGAIN, ugh :( happy Valentine's Day. I am currently in Singapore for the night and the WiFi at my hostel is the fastest I've encountered in Asia, so carpe diem, time to start catching up!

I lucked out after my last blogging location (Lake Toba), and intersected with another friend who is traveling the world for 8 months on a UW scholarship (how awesome is that!!) - Catherine. In addition to having a new super smart and funny companion, I had someone to help me feel more comfortable/safe with the inquisitive (to the point of aggression) people... mainly men... encountered. It's kind of cute until you have been followed for the 5th time in an hour by a nagging voice "Excuuuse me miss, where are you from?" 

What I did enjoy greatly though is how consistently we heard "AMERICA? Barack Obaaaama!" Indonesians relate to Mr. Obama because he went to school in Jakarta in his youth, and recently visited and addressed the nation in their native tongue. It's pretty funny to try to explain that their beloved Obama, someone they also relate to as looking more like them than any previous President, is quite controversial back at home.

Teeny tiny people climbing up - there are hundreds
of Buddha statues adorning the pyramid

Anyway, Catherine and I met in Jogjakarta (central Java). Neither of us were set on spending too much time there, so chose one major tourist activity: Borobudur Temple. We both expressed a bit of temple fatigue (she has been in Asia the past 3 months)... honestly I wasn't even that motivated to go, but holy cow, I am really glad we did.

Borobudur is a UNESCO World Heritage site, over one THOUSAND years old and the largest Buddhist temple in the world. This means it has had to go through a few restorations, most recently by UNESCO, who pretty much took it apart and put it back together in a painstaking process - at least what still remained.

Poor Buddha's arm!!

Almost all of the Buddhist statues are headless or missing limbs, but it makes it feel all the more genuine and well, old. There is no actual inside to this "temple," which is kind of a loose translation of the Indonesian word "candi," which can mean a structure.

When viewed from above (thanks Wikipedia for bringing these words and concepts back to me), Borobudur "takes the form of a giant tantric Buddhist mandala, simultaneously representing the Buddhist cosmology and the nature of mind". In the form of a pyramid, you ascend through three levels of Buddhist cosmology until you reach the top (as our guide called it - Heaven, really meaning enlightenment).

Incredible stone carvings, all done by hand

The lower levels are covered in endless stone carvings depicting the story of Buddha and Buddha's previous lives, which in their entiretey stretch 2km. "Heaven" is covered in tons of bell-shaped stupas, some of which contain Buddha statues inside. I definitely felt like I was in an Indiana Jones movie, without the action.

It was truly remarkable and as I'm sure I've said a hundred times... photos can't do it justice.

The stupas at the top of Borobudur - enlightenment!

It was time to get out of Jogja, as the locals call it. Catherine helped find a 3 day bus trip that would take us east to both Mt. Bromo and Ijen Crater (after I told her I was dying to see both), and drop us off in Bali. This involved 8-12 hour days packed in a mini-bus with very early wake-up calls to see the mountains, but we masochistically decided it was the best, fastest, and cheapest way to see the area at about $60 a piece.

Day 1 on the road, and I was thankful the van was at least large. The seat I was in must have been right over the engine, however, and I thought I was going to die of heatstroke during the 12+ hour drive. Additionally our driver had a knack for taking a phone call every 5 minutes and SCREAMING his way through the conversation, resulting in a lot of mutual eye rolling by the passengers.

We got to Bromo Tengger Semeru National Park around 9pm, grabbed a quick dinner, and went to bed as we had a 3am wake-up call. We were in a jeep by around 3:30am to head to a lookoutpoint to see the sunrise over the mountain range.

Mt. Bromo isn't the biggest in the range, but is definitely the most well known. We got to the lookout point and there must have been at least 100 people crowding to get a view. About 10 minutes into the sunrise we were tired of trying to peer over people and started to walk back, when I found a mostly unoccupied viewpoint which was much more satisfying to watch from.

Mt. Bromo in the forefront, Semeru to its left

I thought this was all that was in store for us, but once the sun was up our jeep took us to this endless desert area called the "Sea of Sand" at the base of Mt. Bromo, as well as Mt. Semeru, one of Indonesia's most active volcanoes, which we took stairs to the top of.

Horses were available to ride part of the way up Seremu
(Bromo in the background)

We were staring down into the crater of this beast and I felt a bit lightheaded watching the locals traverse down the steep slope like mountain goats, as if they might leap into the crater at any moment. One man just stood sideways smoking a cigarette nonchalantly. Semeru erupts about every 20 minutes so there is constant steam and smoke belching out making for quite the show.

View of Bromo from Semeru

Then... back in the van, for a substantially shorter 7-ish hours, when we were dropped at a rustic guest house (to be generous with my description). We had another early morning ahead of us and woke up at 4am to hike up to Ijen Crater - surprise, another volcano! Some folks we met opted for a midnight hike to see the famous "blue fire," aka sulfur flames in the dark. At first I was envious, but we passed them on their way down, and they said that the fumes were too thick for anyone to breathe or even see anything, and had also missed seeing the crater in the daylight.

Miner with sulfur baskets

This was my first warning that it was going to be a bit rough at the top. The trail is lined with sulfur miners, who are local men hauling 70-90kgs of sulfur out from the crater at a time, balanced on a wooden beam on their back. It's a steep hike in and out, with most wearing flimsy rain boots - truly back and lung breaking work for $6-12 a day.

As we approached the top viewpoint of the crater my asthma kicked into overdrive as the sulfur fumes seeped into my lungs. Some hikers did a better job of researching and were prepared with masks (or even gas masks). It was painful to be up there let alone walk DOWN into the mining area of the crater, which we opted out of.

I couldn't fathom how the miners were doing their work unprotected. But as the smoke layer that covered the view cleared and showed the aqua blue waters of the crater lake below, and the sulfur source where the miners were working, it was truly an awe inspiring sight.

Catherine hiking through the hazy sulfur fumes

Ijen Crater

All of those black dots are miners

Yet... depressing to know the lifespan of the miners is maybe 40 years of painful work. I am not sure what the correct action is honestly - tourism brings more attention to their plight, and if the tourists weren't there, the mining would still continue.

My mind full of thoughts on this perilous lifestyle, we hopped back in the bus, then were dropped at a local bus (read: cramped with no air conditioning) to take onto the ferry to Bali. Finally we arrived at our fancy hotel... OK, the nicest place I had been at in days so it felt like luxury, even if the towels were dirty.

Looking back, I'm glad we did the grueling 3 day trip... BUT if anyone asked me how I would do it again, with a larger budget, I would hire a private driver for extra comfort and sanity. We're talking about $50 a day for the driver, which is what you can accidentally pay by taking a drunken Uber home from Ballard to Cap Hill at the wrong time of night.

And current news side note... a mountain erupting on Java (one we didn't visit) is causing all sorts of trouble, airport shut downs and flight diversions due to debris. This is the third major eruption I've heard of since I started my trek through Indonesia - remind me to never move there.

Up next... beaches, beaches, beaches. And Darryl! I've pretty much been at the beach since leaving Java. So tough.

Link to full Borobudur photos here, Bromo/Semeru here, and Ijen here.

-Erin

The hike up to Ijen