Merapi- Mountain of Fire

It’s 0320am and we awake earlier than planned full of excitement of going to see Merapi. A few facts, to get you warmed up:-
1) It's rated currently as the MOST active volcano in the world…
2) It’s been in a near-constant state of eruption for 100s of years; last major eruption was November…
3) It wiped out a staggering 10 Million hectares of forest and land…
4) It destroyed 22 villages…
5) It killed 300 people (found), another 100 never found…
6) 30,000 people evacuated some of which can never go back…
7) It erupts clouds of rocks (some as big as houses) and gas all at about 1500 degrees C that travel down the side of the mountain at 150kmph. It looks like traditional lava, but it’s actually the rocks crashing into one another and exploding into flames and sparks…
8) Only Christian (a legend in these parts) can lead into the danger zone (3km from peak), which is exactly what we did!..

We get ready and go the restaurant to meet Richard, another trekker, and Christian our incredible guide and have our first of apparently 3 breakfasts before being briefed on how dangerous this is!

We then set off through town guided by the stars and up a dark path and steps into a forest.

Getting to the top of the ridge is about 30 mins before the sun starts to break.

We wait here and as the sun creeps up and the stars disappear, we can see the silhouette of Merapi smoking in the distance. As it lightens, the sheer magnitude of the devastation is revealed. Chris tries his best to capture it on the camera, but it was impossible to reflect what we saw. Basically, massive hardwood trees have been smashed just like a domino effect all along the slopes down, and on the slopes in the distance there WERE villages. Some people are still believed to be buried under the 2m of volcanic ash!

A house that had a tree landed on it

Up Merapi volcano

Walking

The climb up was pretty slow, as it was more scramble and climb than actual walk, but we made it through without any significant damage. It was only 3.5kms but it was tough and very rough and some of the ridges drop off several hundred meters. You don’t want to slip, so you go very slowly.

Merapi

Happy tpo be in the danger zone

Entering the danger zone- hence red flag

We retuned back and saw some of the damage to houses in Kaliurang, which was mainly protected by a hill. We then had a second local breakfast (soyabean burgers, sticky rice with whole green chillies, yummy) and returned to the guesthouse for a full breakfast. Chris got double as he recognised the smell of the Cinnamon leaf on the tour. So much for all the exercise.

A TRULY AWESOME DAY and it was only 10am.

written by  chrischarly on June 6, 2011 from Kaliurang, Indonesia
from the travel blog: Chris and Charly's Passage through SE Asia
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