back to mount guntur

on early Feb 2013, with my friends Fandi and Wil, i went back to Mount Guntur in garut, West Java. Saturday early morning we had arrived at Leles and waiting for the truck that will bring us to Citiis village. Around 7 am we hitched a truck, passing citiis so we didnt register at Bu Tati and continue to sand digging area. The sad news is now that area has reached the point near citiis waterfall. I think in not very far months we could lose that water fall because of the sand digging activity. well, we start hiking from the waterfall area at 8.30am and as we hiked quite fast, we has reached Puncak 2/peak 2 around 11.45am. We built 3 tents here, one for each of us. Actually there were 2 groups of hikers beside us but they made camp in puncak 1 or lower than our camp. Sunday morning we walked to puncak 3 and peak 4 before went back to puncak 2. broke the camp then hiking down to citiis.

Hiking Mount Cikuray

Last weekend me and five of my old college friends went hiking to Mount Cikuray (2.821m) in Garut. This was my fourth time to Cikuray and the first for my friends. Using one of my friend's car, we drove from Jakarta on Friday night. Arrived at Garut at Saturday early morning, we parked the car at Wisma LEC Garut. Then we used local public transportation, an angkot, toward Patrol in Cilawu. Switched to motorcycle taxi/ojek to Pemancar/television aerials as our starting point. Started hiking aroung 8.30 AM, we struggled uphill. I felt not too tired but one of my friend was, so we had to walk slowly. As consequences, we reached Pos 6 or the false peak when it was almost 3 PM. And it started raining, so we decided to make camp at Pos 6 rather than at the actual peak. Usually not many people hiked Cikuray, but this time there were so many around us. It turned out, a group of hikers were doing mass climbing. We glad built camp in Pos 6 as we figured out that we wouldn't be able to get a space at the peak with so many people like this. Sunday morning, at 4.30 AM we left the tents and hiking to the peak, bringing only water and some food. Around 45 minutes later, we reached the peak of Cikuray. And yes, it was full with people and tents. The weather was clear and we could view the surrounding area. There was Mount Papandayan with its famous white crater walls. Far away we could see the top of Mount Ciremai and Mount Slamet. It was so beautiful. We hanging here for about 45 minutes, chatting and taking photos, before hiking back to the camp. Made and ate breakfast of fried noodles and eggs, then we went back to Pemancar and Jakarta.

Trip to Papandayan

I was back camping in Mount Papandayan. Now with old college friends on 29-30 September 2012. There were five of us using one car on Friday night from Jakarta to Garut. We made it to car park near the Papandayan crater at Saturday morning. Two of my friends had to back to Jakarta. So after lunch, only three of us hiking to Pondok Salada. We made camp at that valley, along with other hikers. Monday morning, after breakfast, we broke the camp then hiking uphill to Tegal Alun, Hutan Mati then back to the car park. Around 1PM we drove back to Jakarta. A nice weekend and i felt glad to be able to camp again with old friends.

Trip to Mount Salak

Mount Salak located in the border of Sukabumi and Bogor, West Java. It consists of six peaks, but people only hike to peak 1 and 2. The other peaks are too difficult to climb. And peak 2, climbed via Curug Nangka, also now has been closed because of poor and dangerous trail condition. I have been to peak 1 using Cidahu trail and Cimelati trail. And on 22-23 September 2012, i am back using Cimelati trail. On Friday night we started hiking and made camp at Pipa Bocor. Saturday morning, five of us continued walking uphill without much break. Around 11.20 AM we reached peak 1. After lunch we tried to hike to peak 2 but the old route was washed by landslide. So we had to try new route using the evacuation route of Sukhoi crash victims. The trail was steep and I was feeling very tired. Around 3 PM, as it was colder and began to cloudy and ready to rain, we decided to stop and back to the camp in peak 1. I had decided not to join if my friends wanted to go back to peak 2 in the following morning. That night we rest and ate. Sunday morning my friends back to try to peak 2. Fortunately one of them also decided not hiking and instead waiting with me at the camp. My friends back from peak 2 around 1130 AM and we broke camp. Lunch then we hiked back to Cimelati.

Dry season continue

Right now the dry season still continue in Indonesia. That is why some mountains also still closed. The latest is Merbabu in Central Java. It turns out that park managements are worried about the risk of fire. I just hope that the rain season comes as soon as possible.
Right now i also had bought a new phone. So i hope i could update this blog more often.

Fire in the mountains

Actually this weekend I have a plan to climb Mount Gede. Too bad that it closed until the end of September 2012. The park office decided that it was too risky to open the mountain for climbing in this dry season. Especially after there were some cases of forest fire in some mountains, like Papandayan, Slamet, Agung, etc. Some said that the fire happened because dry season is so intense this year, but it also happened after some hikers built fires carelessly during their camping in the mountains.

Pic of fire in Mount Papandayan (by Koran Jakarta)

Trip to Mount Sanggara (1.925 mdpl)

Last weekend I went to Bandung and climbed Mount Sanggara with Kelana Indra and Fajar PY. We used two bikes From Bandung to Dago Giri then to Maribaya and Bukittunggul plantation. After parking the bikes at Pak Iin's house in Pangli village, we started hiking around 2 PM Saturday. That afternoon we made camp at one area known as Taman Survival or Survival Garden. Here we share info about how to use flysheet for tent, how to build fire and then we got talking untill around 9 PM before sleeping. On Sunday we broke camp then continued to the top. At some point we decided to go direct and using machete to cut open the new track. Finally around 10 AM we got the top of Mount Sanggara. Here we found other hikers. We got down to Pangli Village then continued to Bandung and back to Jakarta. Sanggara is a small mountain but it is perfect to train your survival and orienteering skills.