In the mountains of Lombok

Leaving Gili Meno was tough, but we were excited to continue our journey in Lombok.  We had a recommendation from several new friends that the mountains had to be seen, and although trekking was not in season due to the rain, it was still worth a trip up to Senaru, the base camp for treks up Mt. Rinjani, Indonesia's second-highest mountain (and an active volcano nonetheless).  We had been so enticed by Rinjani, staring at it daily from our beach on Meno, that we really needed to see it, at least a little closer.  Sulman, expert dive guide, had a friend who picked us up when we arrived back in Lombok.  Another of the dive guides who was visiting his family in Lombok also came to meet us, just to make sure that we found our driver without any problems (so nice!).

2 hours drive through Lombok was pretty outstanding.  We arrived by 10am and found our hotel, overlooking the rice paddy fields and with a view of Rinjani.  It was pretty cloudy and it immediately started raining, so we napped the rest of the morning away.  We woke for lunch (the food in Senaru is pretty terrible), then went to "roam" the town.  3 minutes later, we had seen the entire place!  There's not much to see.

The views, under the full moon and whishing by on motorbike, of Rinjani were absolutely spectacular.

Senaru is the base camp for all treks up Rinjani, so we knew that the magic of the place was really outside of the actually town.  We went in search of "tourist information" and got to talking to a guide, who, just happened to have worked as a chef on Gili Meno for 5 years.  We were his fast friends, and he was so pleased to reminisce with us about the past and old friends.  He even got out his cell phone and called Rahim, the manager at Malias and my breakfast buddy, so that we could say hi to him!  After 3 hours, a Lombok coffee (free, now that we are friends!) and a promise to go on the panorama walk with Curio (ex-Gili Meno chef turned trekking guide) the next morning, we went back to our room to relax and enjoy the scenery.

The next morning, we walked to breakfast and before I could sit down, Anto -- my breakfast buddy from Malia's on Meno -- came walking towards me.  Just like on Meno!  Except, he wasn't serving my coffee!  He was coming to see us!  I was super confused... why was he here, so far from home, just to see us?

We quickly made plans for him to join us on our walk with Curio (of course, he and Curio are old friends from the island, so they were also happy to hang out).  The walk was pretty great.  Up and down, through the rice paddy fields, visiting Sasak villages.  Finally, we began our descent into the ravines, where we could see the famous Senaru waterfalls up close.  The first waterfall was pretty nice.  We could actually see it from our hotel where we eat breakfast, so not too exciting.  But the second waterfall... so outstanding.  The big fun of seeing them is that you can then go swimming in them.  The sasaks even believe that if you swim behind it, the waterfall has healing properties.  The rocks were very slippery (okay, trecherous), so Jen stayed behind, but Anto and I were intrepid (okay, Anto was intrepid, I was afraid), and we bravely made it to the waterfall, then around, then behind the waterfall.  It was incredible.

After playing around for 30 minutes or so in the water, we went back to Jen and Curio for some lunch.  By this time, a few more tourists had arrived, so it was time to go.  On the walk back, Curio and I went through the irrigation system, which was like a cave.  Really cool way to travel!  We met Jen and Anto at the end of the irrigation system and then began the ascent up the ravine and back to the hotel.  What a day!

For dinner, Anto and Curio were waiting for us to take us by motorbike to a restaurant up the hill.  The views, under the full moon and whishing by on motorbike, of Rinjani were absolutely spectacular.  It took us 3 tries to find a restaurant that had food to serve us (apparently it's tough to get food up in the mountains!).  Dinner that night was great, with Curio singing on guitar, and our first time trying the famous Lombok wine.  What a great day!