Trek Day 1

Day one of the trek started at 630 am when our guide picked us up at our hotel. From there we went on a 2 hour van ride around the island of Lombok to Senaru where we met our porter and started the adventure. We were supposed to have two porters to carry all of our stuff, but for some reason the second one never showed so our porter, Dee, ended up carrying ALL of our food, water, tents, sleeping bags, cooking gear, and anything else we might need for three days of treking. After today Jenn and I are convinced the porter has magical powers because he doesn't carry all this in a normal backpack, but instead he has a large bambo stick with a basket on one end and the bigger stuff tied to the other end. We have absolutely no idea how he not only does the trek balancing with the stuff, but in flip flops and beats us everytime!



Ok enough about the porter on the trek. Like I said we started in Senaru at about 600 meters. We took a break at Post II (4.9 km into the trek) where Jenny and I took nice naps while our porter and guide cooked us some traditional Indonesian food for lunch. The rest of the day we continued upwards till we finally reached our camping spot at elevation of about 2,500 meters...just short of the first crater rim. We saw a couple of monkeys along the way, but mostly it was like hiking in the clouds so you couldn't see too much during the trek. When the clouds did finally lift at out camping spot you could see all three of the Gili islands.



It was at the camping spot we decided the only way to camp/trek is with guides and porters. It was freezing when we reached the top and we were both wet from the rain, but our guides quickly put up our tents and then got started on our dinner. Jenn and I did not have to lift a finger. They even served it to us right in our tent because we were too cold to come out.

Xoxo,

Nichole and Jenny