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A JOURNEY TO THE TOP OF BATUR

HAPPY INDEPENDENCE DAY, INDONESIA! A JOURNEY TO THE TOP OF BATUR

Commemorating the 69th independence day of Indonesia last August, together with several high school fellows I had a trip to Mount Agung. It is the highest mount in the island, located precisely in Karangasem prefecture. There were two tracks we could follow as the entrance. The first one is Pura Besakih track and Pura Pasar Agung track. I opted for the first one. It was a longer track, however with more attractive and scenic panorama.

We started the trip 8AM sharp from Denpasar, and spent around 1.5 hours to reach the entrance post. It is important for us to start the journey with pray to the deities and asked for their blessings, Mount Agung is one of the holy mounts in Bali, anyway. Pura Pengubengan was the last temple in Pura Besakih before we actually start the hike. To reach this temple, we could take a walk from the northern part of Pura Besakih through the local’s gardens for around an hour or used vehicles. We met other hikers at the temple, which dominated by other high-school students, especially from SMAN 3 Denpasar who put this agenda annually to celebrate the Independence Day.

11.30AM and we finished our lunch before continuing the hike to Mount Agung “Boycamp”, which was actually the base camp for those who wished to spend the night to reach for the early summit attack the next day. It took us 6 hours to reach this spot, with the first 4 hours passing through lush heterogenic tropical forest. The density of the trees made the dews easily trapped by the leaves and after awhile, fell down to the ground creating the illusion as if it was raining. The last 2 hours we passed through the pine trees forest, with sandy rocky track.

6.30PM we finally arrived at the camp. The sun was almost set and I took several shoots to save the magnificent views. We were unable to set up tents due to the uneven ground, and had mattress and sleeping bag, instead. Boycamp was located above the cloud, thus saved the hikers from the tropical rain. The milky-way was super clear at the time I went up there, and several shooting stars were seen in the beauty of night sky.

We planned to have to start the summit attack at 3.30AM in the morning to chase the sunrise, 2 hours away from the Boycamp. We started the journey after breakfast with the track to the summit dominated by sandy rock, pushed us to be more careful. It was a narrow track with steep cliffs at both of the side. The early morning wind was not easy on us, either. Finally we reached the summit at 5.30AM, just before the sunrise. At the time the sun rise from the east, we were having a ceremony, rose the National flag, and sang the anthem of Indonesia Raya. A moment later, when the sun was becoming clearer, Mount Rinjani of Lombok Island, and the caldera of Mount Batur were seen.