Mt. Ijen a repeat journey to inspire

It was never a plan to repeat Ijen in such a short time, within 3 weeks to be exact. My original plan was to do Mt Bromo with few of my colleagues and friends from Malaysia and Germany. But again when it comes to mountains especially volcano, you just have to accept what the mountain brings you. Bromo turned active and closed for trekking...we can still proceed with the viewing from Bukit Penanjakan, but that will not be a complete journey though, so I decided to switched to Ijen. In fact this is the second time I have to cancel Bromo trekking plan this year, as the mountain became a bit angry :)

So it's Ijen again...
After few arrangement  of switching flight and flight time, and pull out of my friends Eva and Gitta from the trip due to timing issue, we left with 5 persons to proceed to Banyuwangi. This round I made the trip arrangement with Pak Ary from Bromo Ijen Tour Transport which consist of transporting us from Surabaya to Banyuwangi directly to our guesthouse, finding us places for great local food, drive us to Paltuding post, getting us the guide for the trekking and drive us back to Surabaya. In overall I'm happy with all the arrangement by Pak Ary, who is responsive to all my enquiries and also by Mas Nico, the one who drive us throughout the whole journey. I'm impressed with the good time management shown by Mas Nico, it made our journey super smooth.

I flew from Jakarta to Surabaya with Dian, and we waited for everyone at the agreed meeting point in terminal 1 Surabaya airport. Midie flight from Kuala Lumpur was delayed, so we had to wait quite sometimes until he made his way from terminal 2 and arrived terminal 1 at around 11 pm. From there we directly hit the road to Banyuwangi, 6 hours journey in the middle of the night. Before the trip begun, Mas Nico has made a suggestion that we will stop at Pantai Pulau Merah first upon arrival to Banyuwangi as it going to be too early to check in to our homestay. We made few stops along the way for toilet break and hot tea. In Indonesia, all the 24 hours minimart offered a great convenient as they allowed toilet use, making traveling along intercity road become easier.

We posed at our meeting point in Surabaya airport before proceed with road trip to Banyuwagi

We made a short stop to grab hot tea from this minimart in Jember

We reached Pantai Pulau Merah at 10.30am. Quite a nice beach to hang out with good facilities. Immediately we freshened up before we took some  rest under the umbrellas along the beach.

 

Local food peddler

 Thirst quenching fresh coconut water

 Pop Mie instant noodle taste better on the beach :)

 One of the facilities at the beach
 

We did have some fun

By noon, after enough rest, we continue our journey to Banyuwangi, heading for the guesthouse in the town where we will continue to rest and sleep before hiking Mt. Ijen in the midnight. Of course mid way, we stopped for a superb Banyuwangi's Nasi Tempong lunch at Dapur Bintang restaurant.

 Super yummy dishes. The sambal is so hot and delicious

 A rare local bottled drink

 Warm tea and warm lemonade

 All the interesting nasi tempong's menu

A rare snack...snail cracker

 

In the evening, we explore a little bit the area nearby our guesthouse and had our dinner at Satay Jamur restaurant. Not bad at all.

 

 Found this at the guesthouse wall

After dinner wefie

 

Around 12 am, we were again on the road, this time headed for Mt. Ijen. Everything was arranged accordingly by Mas Nico, and by 1 am we started the ascend towards the mountain top. This round, I accompany all the ladies while our guide and Midie go ahead with the blue flame chasing.

 

 Posed just before we started the hike

 Take five for the 20th time...haha

 Thank God!! We reached post 1

 Stealing some sleep :)

 We didn't make it to the top before sunrise. What most important for me this round is to get everyone to the crater top

 Nice bluish morning sky

 I just love the mystical look surrounding the mountain

 Another pose before we leave the crater top

 Yeay!!! everyone made it to the top.

 

 

Even though in all it took me 5 hours to bring everyone to the crater top, it was such a great experience. The fact that everyone encouraging each other and a great level of tolerance help all the first timers achieved the magnificent view up there.