Kamis, 21 November 2013

The Journey to 3726 above sea level part II-a (The main course)

.....
Senaru Village-Senaru Village (31 October-3 November 2013)

The main course menu are:
The seven not so deadly hills
The summit of hell
The heavenly lake
The hell to the power of two third

Lets start with

The Seven Not-so-Deadly Hills
Look deadly enough to you? :)
The journey started at 9 am on Oct 31 with five contenders and three porters. Yes, we hired porters to bring our logistics and what we carried  were only personal things in our bags. (You can always pay for more porters if you like).
We begin from the hilly side of the village to reach Plawangan Sembalun...Plawangan means door and we had to walk through seven deadly sins err.. I mean, seven not-so-deadly hills before we could knocked on "the door". Don't be fooled by the appearance of the hills, even though they just look like the hills in the Teletubbies movie, there are nothing cute about them.....
We immediately went for a tree or two in the first hour of our tour. I had to remove one layer of my clothes since the sun shone very generously....They say that the first step of every move is always the hardest...well, the second and the rest of it were not getting easier though...

The walk to the Plawangan Sembalun usually takes 6-7 hours by normal standard with one time stop for lunch.This information was provided by our porters who let us started the journey ahead. Later I know that it was very easy for them catching up with us and then left us behind.. :( 
And they did it every time!!

The hills were called "tujuh bukit penyesalan" (literary means seven remorse hills). The name came up because usually tracker or climber starts regretting his/her decision at this stage of the journey. It is still too far to reach the summit, but it is also already too far to just go back...
I am proud to say that we regret nothing! BUT...we came up with the silent promise that we will never do this again... :D

The first and second hills were okay. On the third and the fourth, we still had the spirit of excitement...the fifth...it was getting harder to breath...especially when it started to rain and very windy...it was very difficult to just move one step forward. A tiny body covered with a raincoat had to stand a very strong wind...I almost...yes, almost regret my decision...but Allah Almighty knows best when to cheer us up...This is what we've got...
A gift..double dose :)
Yup! rainbows...as if one is not enough, we've got two!!...I and my friends instantly forget our misery, that we still had two more hills before we settled and be prepared for the summit attack...
When the rainbows subsided, we continued our walk, but the dark started blinding our ways...we were behind schedule mainly because of the rain (excuse) and photo taking (more excuse). We reached Plawangan Sembalun, our first camping site, at about 7 pm with aches all over our body, from head to toe, no exception!.

The view from our camping site in Plawangan Sembalun

The porters had already set up our tents and prepared our dinner...Their service was one of not so many luxuries we had on the mountain.  It was...first class service!! :)
That night, we most definitely needed our rest before the summit attack started...

The Summit of Hell

We begin the journey for the summit at 2 am, the time that suggested by the porters. They said it would take approximately 3-4 hours to reach the summit (of course by normal standard). They woke us up at 1.30 am and asked us to have some breakfast first, the meal that we rejected. Later on we knew how important the meal was....
For the journey to the top, we only needed to bring one bottle of water and , of course, a camera :)

Among the groups that planned to the summit that night, we were quite the earliest and one of our porters became our guide. The road was not as I expected at all. It was full of sand and loose rocks and consistently ascending which make it was very difficult (if not impossible) to walk. Not to mention it was dark, the wind was very strong and so da*n cold. Two steps forward, one step backward... (My friend said that you need to know a proper Math to climb Mt. Rinjani, otherwise you'll end up with "minus" steps... :D )
3 hours had passed and I didn't feel that we were already near....which I indeed didn't :(...
4 hours...the ray of light started to shown and this was my view at the moment...

Which means that I was going to miss the sunrise from the summit...
at this moment, I didn't care anymore...

I was very exhausted. It felt that I needed a very great strength just to start a new step, especially when the wind blown hard, I needed to stop to keep my feet steady so that I didn't fall . 

I was very hungry ( I did ate a half piece of bread previously and brought the other half in my pocket, the piece that I ate while leaning on the stone half sleeping)...*just FYI, when the porters tell you to eat your breakfast at 2 am...eat it!

It did came across my mind that maybe I had to give up and just go back...
Another FYI.. Do not ask any question about how far it still is....it's just wasting your energy... and sometimes the answers you get (even when they do not intent to) are no less discouraging...a friend proved that :D
oh...I almost forget to tell you.... I don't believe in time unit anymore...2 hours, 3 hours..7 hours...it is sooooo relative!!! and during this journey 3 hours NEVER mean 3 hours...

During the journey one group at a time start to out-walk us and leave us as the last group behind....remember that we are among the first to start? yeah... that's how slow we were :(
4 hours became 7 hours..yup! at 9 am...no...you do not miss-read it, at 9 am!!  we gathered at the summit... Alhamdulillah
The road not-less traveled..but I won't go back there...
Because we named the road we've taken as the elevation of hell, it is only appropriate that the peak became the summit of hell...right? :D
The summit of hell...freezing hell

Just to show the world that I am Indonesian :)

Two bataknese, two javanese..one is picture taker :D


The mountain top is not a place to hang around for a long time...unless you want to be frozen and then blown by the wind...so, after enough photos were taken, we start to climb down.
*yeah, you don't need to write down your name in a stone just to show others you've been there..why limit the audience? take a photo and show it to the world...hahahaha

The walk down was easier, at least for me. I manage to be the fastest by applying sand-skiing-method, which magically, didn't ruin my IDR 65K shoes. On the way down, I saw why people keep asked to take the left side of the road when they climb the Rinjani summit. Because this is what's on the right....

The hell's bottom?
I think, that's also the reason why the journey to the summit is done on the dark...so you won't see that...hehehe
We arrived at the camping site at about 12.30 to 2 pm (one of my friend got injured so he came very late). The earlier plan was, on that same day we would go down to Segara Anak lake. But, considering our condition at that time, we decided to postpone it until the next day so we have more time to get lots of rest before continuing the journey...and yes... all we did was sleeping and eating and sleeping again.... :)

...to be continued...