[Travel] Hiking an active volcano in Bali
The Mount Batur adventure
Mount Batur sunrise trekking, was the magical sentence I read on Google Maps that fueled me with motivation to explore the place and experience this magical sunrise as the reviews said about it. Mount Batur is an active volcano located in the central part of Bali and rises to an elevation of approximately 1,717 meters above sea level. Hiking a volcano was long ago on my bucket list. I just had this strange idea of cooking an egg in a volcano steam. Now it’s the perfect time to do that; so let’s do it together.
The road to Mount Batur takes you to beautiful scenery through the magnificent nature of Bali. It was me, my wife, our scooter, and an endless new paved road. On the side you’ll find trees that stand high and majestic, reaching up towards the sky with an impressive height. The grass on the side of the road was like a green carpet that goes on and on. I enjoyed every second driving my scooter on this path of heaven. The road to Mount Batur will be graved forever in our minds.
We arrived at the nearest hotel we could find. This place is only a few meters away from the starting point of the trekking. We entered the place and it was breathtaking. Words can’t describe how magnificent the hotel is; but believe me, I will do my best.
Gladak is a traditional yet magical wooden house that can be found all over Bali. Its roof, shaped like a grand pyramid, covered with leaves that sway gently in the breeze. When raindrops fall, they create a peaceful melody. Frogs, crickets, and other insects, all team up with the raindrop to create a natural orchestra. I found myself in a perfect time and place. The hotel has ten identical Gladak beautifully made one next to the other. Trees, plants, and flowers are decorating this enchanting place. Squirrel running and playing around made me feel as if I was in heaven. Two different swimming pools are standing in the middle of the hotel. The owner of the place pumps the water directly from a hot source he found next to the volcano. It’s free but it makes an unforgettable experience for the guest.
You can’t do the hiking to Mount Batur by yourself; you must take a local guide with you. Guess what? The hotel offers some guided tours to the summit of the volcano. The owner of the place showed us a map of Mount Batur with several trekking options. You have the easy one, the medium then the hard one. I looked at my wife and said:
-” Honey, we will take the hard one. It lasts longer and certainly, it will be the most beautiful. Difficult roads often lead to magnificent places.”
Her eyes, once calm, are now wide open. Her brows, slightly furrowed, reveal a troubled mind, etching lines of worry. A gentle tremble on her lips made words hesitant. Her cheeks, once rosy, are now pale under the weight of unease. Yet, in this face, there’s a raw beauty — a beauty of being real, showing the bravery it takes to face the unknown. She agreed on taking the hard road. I love my adventurous wife.
Tomorrow will be a special day. It will be a new day of adventure, a day of climbing Mount Batur, a day of enjoying the mesmerizing sunrise, and a day of cooking an egg in the volcano steam. The departure will be at 3:00 AM, a perfect time to reach the top just before sunrise. TAC TAC TAC…, our guide knocked on the wooden door of our Gladak. It was 2:55 AM, and darkness was still conquering the place, but it was time to start the trekking. We took our torches, some fruit, and crackers and of course, I didn’t forget the egg that I will certainly cook inside the volcano steam. One of my childhood fantasies will soon be a reality. This is a moment that will be inked with golden words in my book that we all call Life. A warm cup of tea was enough to boost us with morning energy; just enough to start the hard hiking road to the Mount Batur volcano. We powered up the torches and started making our first steps toward the top, the first steps into this new adventure…
The area remains covered by darkness but every one of us had a fixed head torch that lit up our path. Our local guide was named Arman and was in his early twenties. He was born in one of those small villages that surround Mount Batur, grew up there, and never left his place. Even though he has remained in the same remote village for twenty years, he can say words in Arabic, others in French, German, and Spanish, and he can perfectly speak with me in English. He knew some places in Europe and others in Morocco. Arman is doing the Mount Batur sunrise trekking every single day; not for leisure but for survival. It’s one of the works he does that pays less for doing more. I was out of words when I found out that he will get less than five percent of what I paid for this trekking. He was the one waking up at 2:00 AM to knock on our door at 2:55 AM and he was the one showing us the path and enlightening us with information about the place. Unfortunately, he will only get five percent. On the other hand, there is another person who most probably was still sleeping but will get the remaining ninety-five percent. That’s unfair, I know but it’s just a tiny reality of how our modern world works. We shouldn’t just cry about how unfair it is, but we should fight in order to change it, or at least change our reality. Everyone must start somewhere and the story of the owner of the hotel we are staying in is a perfect example.
His name is Keytut, he was once a local guide for Mount Batur trekking, and like Arman, he was getting less than five percent. I’ll always remember when he told me:
The work I was doing was highly physical and I knew that I can’t keep doing it for the rest of my life. When I met my wife, she was making and selling bracelet to tourist. We were poor but determined enough to provide for our own future and our own family. We increased our ability to earn by developing other skills, at the same time we started to control our expenses and save some of our earnings. There is something called “compound effect” and it doesn’t care how much effort you put into. How little it might be, by time it will be overflowing! That’s what happened to us. We woke up one day with enough money and enough skills to start this hotel project. After a year, we opened the second one then the third. This is just a shortcut of my life. It wasn’t easy, but it was worth it.
We continued our trekking with Arman and I hoped that one day, he will have an amazing story to tell like the one of Keytut. The Road became steep, demanding extra effort from us. Everything around was beautiful except one thing, the motocross. Their Diesel fumes tend to linger in the air for longer periods, making the hiking experience not fully enjoyable. Some people only wanted to get to the top of the volcano and take some pictures with the sunrise. The same motocross rider that took them to the top will take them back to the bottom. I personally didn't cope with this idea. I believe that true pleasure doesn’t come when you are at the top of the mountain but while climbing it. After roughly two hours and a half, we were at the top and the scenery was just magical.
Our adventure was not yet finished. We chose the difficult road and we still had a long way to go. This time there will be no roads for motocross. No diesel fumes around, only pure air to breathe.
The volcano was active and steam was generated from several spots of it. I approached one of them. The steam was rising with a quiet elegance. It dances through the air, before disappearing into the sky, becoming a part of the ever-changing cloudscape. The high temperature only reminded us that beneath the surface, there is the earth’s molten hearth called magma. I still have my egg with me and still have the desire to cook it inside this volcano steam. This was the experience I was waiting for. My eyes sparkle with the effervescent joy of a child, a child who made one of his childhood fantasies, a real story.
I continued this magical experience hand-to-hand with my beautiful wife. Arman was still enlightening us with information about the place and showing us the difficult itinerary we had chosen. The steep became sharper than before. Our legs started to shake, not with fear, but fatigue. We started the trekking at 3:00 AM, it was already 9:00 AM and we still had at least one more difficult hour to go. It didn’t matter how hard it became; we rested when needed, but never thought of quitting our adventure. I kept pushing my wife forward and she did the same for me. We found ourselves on a road where only the few can make it. We kept going.
After roughly six hours, our adventure comes to an end. We were out of energy, we could barely walk. On the other hand, I asked Arman what he was going to do after this intense physical activity and he said:
I don’t know, maybe a small nap then help my parent farm our land.
For us, our reward was a tasty breakfast and an unforgettable moment in the natural hot spring of the hotel.
