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Claire & Steve's Excellent Adventure
We left the comfort of our bed in Ubud to get picked up at 2am in order for us to travel to the bottom of Gunung Batur by car, and then to trek to the crater rim for sunrise.....I think we are probably nuts but it is a must do apparently?!!
Gunung Batur is one of Bali's most famous volcanoes and supposedly inactive (we hope). There are lots of other volcanoes around the area but some are too high or too risky to climb. So, with torches in hand and a trusty guide we headed up to the summit - we had forgotten how demanding trekking could be having not done it properly since leaving Nepal....our fitness levels have taken a turn for the worse in the last few months!!! It still amazes me that the locals - who also climbed with us to sell us Coca Cola (?) - did it in flip flops and still were able to help us out when we got stuck.
After stripping down to our t-shirts and soaking with sweat we finally reached the top of the volcano and settled down to wait for sunrise. It was a great sight as the sun started to creep up and reveal the surrounding volcanoes and light up the lake below us. As the clouds cleared we got a good view of the island of Lombok in the distance and also the scorched earth - evidence of the many eruptions from the past. People are still building houses here despite the constant threat of further eruptions...I guess they have enough warning to get out but then they would still lose everything.
After breakfast we walked on to see more volcanoes and had a free facial from the hot steam coming out of the rocks. Some of the other guides were performing their party trick of cooking eggs amongst the hot rocks which was pretty cool.
After spending some time taking in the amazing scenery we started our descent - our guide took us down the slopes made up of black sand from the volcano. It was so much fun as you could jump and slide down without hurting yourself although you did get a shed load of sand in your socks.
We made it to the bottom safe and well and felt really good about trekking again - even our dodgy knees had survived the experience!
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