Bromo, 10 May 2007

Just two days before the SITIA Conference at ITS Surabaya, a crazy idea popped up into my mind. The conference schedule was compacted into one day, and I got another day free. Then why shouldn't I use it for something unusual...something that I've never done before. And of course, it should be able to charge my spirit.

Bromo soon came into serious consideration. It matched with my requirements, and more importantly, this time is a perfect time to visit the infamous mountain since I would be travelling alone without my family. I know that the journey would be difficult and harsh -- something absolutely not for family. Then I booked a car for local transport to Bromo from Surabaya. Rp 300.000 (plus petrol) is fairly cheap for 24 hour rental period.

The car owner told me to depart at 11.00 pm. Okay...no problem. The driver was stunned for a moment when I told him I was travelling alone :) He must have thought I was a bit weird...

We took almost 4 hours to reach the last stop of the car. This small village is actually still a few kilometers from our destination. From here normal vehicle cannot proceed due to the very narrow and winding road. So I rent a 4WD old Jeep to continue the journey. First, we went to Mt. Penanjakan and stopped at a lookout shelter. We wanted to watch sunrise from this spot. Unfortunately the sky was not too friendly...too many clouds. However, the other side of the spot offered a breathtaking scenery! The view of two mighty mountains: Bromo and Butak. Both of them stand proudly in the middle of sand sea. Bromo is easily spotted by its greyish volcanic rock composition. Butak, on the other side, has a perfect symmetric shape, with greenish colour. The two mountains, side by side, seem to tell me that two contrast characteristics can still go together, hand-in-hand in harmony. The quiet and chilly morning added some further sensations. My soul was like to surrender completely... subhanallah...

From Mt. Penanjakan, we descended down to the sand sea and crossed it to reach the slope of Bromo. There is a Hindu temple close to it. The temple is used for Kesada ceremony. Our Jeep stopped near the temple, and I took a horse to climb Bromo. The horse didn't really bring me up to the peak, but stopped near 250 stairs towards the top of the mountain. When I saw the stairs, I thought...oh, this should be easy. But when I started climbing about 30 of them, my knee started trembling and I suddenly could hear my heart pumping very hard. Oh boy... it was not as easy as I thought... Finally with hard struggle, I managed to get to the top, and I was rewarded for my effort with another fascinating natural phenomenon. The Bromo crater is not big, but it continuously blows heavy smoke with strong sulphuric smell. And when I looked down, the temple and the surrounding sand sea offer another great view...

I didn't stay long at the top of Bromo since the smoke was also itchy to my eyes. From here, the Jeep driver brought me to another side of the Bromo's vast caldera, to a plain land full of bushes. Local people call this place "padang rumput" (savanna). I quickly remembered an old film, A Little House on the Prairie... this savanna was just exactly like that shown in the film :)

On the way back to our car stop, the driver brought me to the center of the sand sea. He called the place "pasir berbisik" (whispering sand). Whichever direction I saw, I saw sand and small stones. Oh...people said that this place is also famous for being used as a scene spot of Dian Sastrowardoyo's clip.

At around 8.30 am, we drove back to the car stop, and after I paid the Jeep driver (the cost of Rp 450.000 was a bit to expensive, I thought -- I should admit I'm not a good bargainer), I went back to Surabaya.

What a charging experience... the only thing I felt sorry was that I brought a wrong lens for my camera. I brought my 70-300mm tele lense, which was perfect for zoom pictures. However, I had difficulties to capture the breadth of the scenes. Unfortunately, the grandness of Bromo can only be captured through wide, panoramic views. So it seemed that I would rely on Photoshop to fix things...