While my parents were here, they brought me my GameCube from back home. That's right. Mario Kart in Jakarta.
Miko just finished a Masters degree in Geology and she is big into volcanoes (I'm not sure exactly what her degree was in but I think it focused on volcanoes).
We were able to book a tour through a friend of a friend. Bradley (BBS teacher in Malang) hooked us up with a tour that would take us to Mt. Ijen, Mt. Bromo, and Sukamade Beach where we could release baby turtles into the ocean.
The trip included a lot of time in this Jeep:
(SE Asia travel is not for me)
The first task was riding in the car and heading to where we would spend the night before hiking Mt. Ijen. Mt. Ijen is known for having a blue fire that comes from the volcano and it is supposed to be awesome.
(I got to listen to nerd talk the whole trip; I didn't know a damn thing)
(my awesome girlfriend hugging a tree at roughly 2am when we started hiking Mt. Ijen)
(there was a ton of sulfur coming up from the volcano; it was miserable)
(but the good news is that the sulfur was so thick we couldn't see the blue fire!!!! I'm not gonna say I was pissed...but I was pissed)
(this was crazy; the local guys there carry the sulfur down the mountain - about a 2.5 hr hike - for a living; they make 84.000 rupiah ($7) for 80kg of sulfur; they do this twice a day - crazy)
After that "lovely" part of the trip, we went to Sukamade Beach which was breathtaking:
Sukamade is a beach were giant green turtles come back to lay their eggs. This was truly fascinating. The turtle dug her way into the sand and started laying eggs. As the turtle was laying eggs, an Indonesian guy was there taking the eggs out so that they could put them in their conservatory. Surprisingly, the turtle didn't seem to mind and just kept plopping out eggs. The turtle laid 84 eggs which is actually a pretty small amount.
The next morning we got to release baby turtles into the ocean. The conservatory is there because crabs and birds get a large number of the eggs before they hatch if the eggs stay on the beach.
The third stop on the trip was beautiful Mt. Bromo. It was so cloudy and cold that we couldn't see anything. One for three isn't bad on a trip, right? haha
After Mt. Bromo, Toni and I spent a day and a half in Surabaya just to explore. It was an okay city. Basically a smaller Jakarta. Still a lot of traffic. The good news is that I bought a couple dope paintings.
The trip wasn't my ideal vacation but I did truly enjoy getting to know Toni's sister and spending time with the Herrero girls. This was the last trip before it was back to reality for Term 3 in January.
It was a busy month, but I wouldn't have it any other way. Gotta see as much as I can before it is time to head home permanently.
God bless and thank you for taking an interest in my blog !!
No comments:
Post a Comment