25° Final Boss Gn. Rinjani

Do you remember the beginning of the year? When I said after my volcano hike in Panama that I would never hike up a volcano at night again? Now I already have 2 more on my list and the third one is coming up. This time without crazy altitude sickness medication and with a bit more planning. I have a total of 2626 meters of elevation over 9.1 km one way ahead of me and I'm wondering if I made a good decision.

I have been looking forward to this for a long time and now it is finally happening! I take a boat to Lombok and I am picked up at the harbor with a DIN A4 sheet of paper that says 'Welcome Maria'. I always wanted to be greeted like this and I felt very important when I approached the guy. He takes me to my driver and I have a 1.5-hour car ride ahead of me. He takes me to a very remote accommodation and together with the homestay owner, we sit silently for an hour. There is supposed to be a briefing for the hike in the evening and I will meet the others in the group the next day. It all feels a bit strange, but luckily everyone is very nice. I can move into my spartan room and shortly after, someone actually comes to roughly explain how the next day will go. After that, I take a walk to have dinner and try to sleep despite the many creepy crawlies and without a mosquito net.

I haven't even finished half of my breakfast when I am picked up by the truck. We drive to two more homestays and I finally meet the group. Three Dutch girls, Liz (she was also alone and thought everything was very strange), Mickey and Aria, Nick from Chile, and the Australian girl Bronte. We are squeezed onto the truck bed with two porters, the guide, and the third porter sit in the front, and bump along for about an hour to the Medical Center. There, they measure blood pressure, pulse, oxygen saturation, and temperature. I have no idea what values you would need to not be allowed to do the hike. Our porters get ready and go off with the supplies and equipment. We only have to carry our personal belongings, clothes, and a water bottle. It is 9 o'clock and we have 1539 meters of elevation over 5.3 km ahead of us. We take our first break after 40 minutes and I am already exhausted. We reach position II at 11 o'clock and the porters cook us lunch there. With a full stomach, we continue... that was probably not such a good idea because everything feels even more exhausting now. But the landscape is so incredibly beautiful that I keep fighting my way step by step and meter by meter. I haven't been able to keep up with the group's pace since the beginning, so I mainly hike on my own. But they always wait for me very kindly at the break positions. At position IV, the guide motivates us with the words: 'Last Hill!'... HAHAHAHA... it takes us a whole two hours for this last hill... a total of 239 meters of elevation. But then we have made it for today! When we arrive at the camp, we are all so cold that we squeeze into a tent with 6 people and have dinner and tea there. At first, there was nothing but fog around us, but it eventually clears up and we get a glimpse of the summit... our challenge for the night! The subsequent breathtaking sunset gives me another boost of motivation. We crawl into our sleeping bags with lots of clothes on and try to sleep despite the cold and thin mat. We are woken up at 2 o'clock with coffee and a snack. At 3 o'clock, we set off with headlamps and warm clothing. Goodbye group, maybe we'll see each other at the summit. The 1100 meters of elevation are even more exhausting than expected. A large part of the trail consists of fine volcanic sand. So my hike looks like this... four steps forward, one step back, break... With every step, I had to negotiate with my body and convince it that it will be great. One step at a time. I often thought about just standing still and not going to the summit. It is slowly getting light and the goal still looks incredibly far away. But those who know me know that I don't like to lose, and in the end, after 2 hours and 45 minutes of struggling, I reach the summit and don't look as exhausted as expected! I am overjoyed and the group is also very happy that I made it. It turns out that I am not the last of our group. I apparently passed Mickey at some point and he only arrives a few minutes after me, exhausted but happy. Sweaty, tired, and worn out, we don't stay at the summit for long and start our descent back to the camp. Going down is a lot of fun for me and I slide down the sandy sections and am actually one of the first back at the tent. After a very small, definitely not sufficient breakfast, we pack our things and the group splits up. Liz and Bronte have booked a 3-day tour, for the rest of us it's a 6-hour descent. Actually, Mickey and Aria were supposed to do the descent as well, but they gave up and decided to leave with us. The descent is even more exhausting than expected. Towards the end, we are all pretty tired and the beginning muscle soreness makes every step quite painful. We were incredibly lucky with the weather, but on the last two hours, just before lunch, we finally get caught in the rain. Everything is soaking wet and it only gets really cold when we sit around. Monkeys steal my last peanuts and we struggle the last kilometers back to the parking lot. Then a rather uncomfortable truck ride awaits us. Then we are squeezed into a car with our luggage and taken back to the harbor. We all rented accommodations in the village and meet up for dinner. Afterwards, we are all looking forward to a hot shower... but tadaaaa, there is only cold water. Spoiler... of course, I catch a cold... but I won't miss the last few days of diving! So that's it... the Rinjani... Looking back, I can say it was my biggest challenge so far. Despite all the hardships, muscle soreness, cursing, and everything else, I don't regret it in the least. I think I have never been so proud of myself and I am incredibly happy to have done this hike.