The Braeburn Blog: Bromoooo

Our alarms were set for 2:15 in preparation for our 2:30am pickup time. But at 1:30am, I was gradually awakened by the group of 17 young people with whom we were sharing the dorm, as they started getting up and rustling belongings and zipping bags. I tried to tune them out for a few minutes, and then sat up with a start as I was struck by a panic-inducing thought: What if I was wrong about our pickup time? Could it be 2am instead of 2:30? At this point, the clock read 1:55.

I drew back my tiny curtain and stuck out my head.

“Excuse me, what time is the sunrise pickup?” I asked the group at large.

“Our group is leaving at 2am,” someone responded with a European accent.

“Hayley,” I called. “This group is leaving at 2am. Did we get the time wrong?”

She mumbled something unintelligible from within her tiny bunk-pod. I climbed down from my bunk, pushed through the group of people, and stumbled down the building’s exterior stairs to get to the lobby area. A man who looked Indonesian was standing near the bottom of the stairs, smoking.

“Excuse me,” I said. “Are you the driver?”

In response, he pointed me toward the people sitting behind the front desk, heads bowed over their phones.

“Excuse me,” I said to them, “Is our pickup at 2 or 2:30?”

They assured me that Hayley and I were scheduled to leave at 2:30. Relieved, I stumbled back to bed. However, I was pretty fully awake at this point, so I spent the next 15 minutes reading on my phone about how effective my Water-2-Go filtering bottle really is. (Several studies found that it filters out >99.5% of E. coli present in water samples, but I still haven’t figured out whether I could get sick from that remaining 0.04%.)

At 2:30am, guy-we’d-been-told-was-our-driver told us that actually, his “brother” who didn’t speak English would be our driver. He told us to take a photo of the jeep’s license plate so that we could find it later, and that we should meet back at the car at 6:30am after the sunrise. He then opened the jeep’s back door for us and waved us off.

For me, the next two hours were a confusing blur of sleepiness and fear. My eyes kept involuntarily drifting shut as our driver whipped around dark mountain roads and through thick fog. What I remember most was the cold and heavily polluted air pouring in through the vehicle’s open windows. After a week of heavy sweat, Hayley and I were unprepared for the cooler temperatures of these higher elevations at night—and I was especially unprepared for the thick exhaust fumes generated by our jeep and the dozens of others all grinding up the mountains’ steep inclines together. (Hayley happened to have a covid mask in her bag, but I had left mine at the hostel.)

I hate air pollution for several reasons. They are listed below from least to most important.

Sensory: It ruins views and often smells bad
Sensitivity: Exhaust fumes make me feel sick
Localized health: It’s bad for my lungs, which I care a lot about as a runner
General health: It is a carcinogen, which I try very hard to avoid since they are everywhere :(

So for me, the car ride was terrible mostly due to the fumes and slightly due to the cold.

For Hayley, who was wearing a mask (which she kindly shared with me later), the ride was terrible mostly due to the vehicle’s speed and lack of seat belts. Despite the language barrier, she eventually managed to convince our driver to slow down. Meanwhile, I covered my nose and mouth with a washcloth that Hayley lent me and kept my head between my knees.

Finally, we parked on the side of the narrow road along with the dozens of other tourist-ridden jeeps. It was around 4:30am at this point and still very dark. The sunrise was at 5:10. We were cold and still choking on fumes from nearby vehicles angling for better parking spots.

Our driver pointed us toward a dark, steep dirt path on the other side of the road.

“I guess the lookout point is this way,” I said.

We decided to buy a hot drink before starting the hike. There were several small stands along the roadside—some selling meatball soup, some selling sweet corn pudding, some selling chicken satay. There was also a well-lit cafe-type situation that reminded me of a ski hut, except it had just three walls and no heating system aside from a small charcoal fire in the middle of the floor. But it was bright and full of people (mostly Asian tourists) so I felt much safer there.

Three americanos later, feeling bolstered, we headed back into the darkness. Luckily Hayley had thought to bring a headlamp, so at least we could see our feet on the way up. And turns out the viewpoint was only a 5-minute walk away.

The area was already crowded with people, so we had the classic tourist experience of watching the sunrise with 100 pushy strangers, their flashing cameras, and at least one buzzing video drone. But of course we were all there because it was gorgeous. I had equal fun taking pictures of the sunrise and of the other tourists.

soft smiles for sunrise selfie

me teaching some Dutch women how to selfie

spoiler alert: we hiked that smoldering crater next!!

Hayley hates the selfies so I did this just to needle her

By 5:30, it was fully light. So we headed back to the cafe-shack, where I downed another americano and learned some new food words with the help of the menu and the barista.

We admired the newly illuminated valley view from the cafe’s back deck and from a nearby viewpoint that sheltered us a bit from the heavy fumes that had started up again as our fellow tourists began to depart.

Then we headed back to our vehicle, ready to make our own contributions to the toxic pollution.

Next, our driver took us to a broad sandy area that was clearly popular for photos. Hayley and I took the requisite two (one in each direction) and then were ready to move on. Our driver then took us to the Bromo volcanic crater. First, though, we stopped for food from the stands lined up near the parking area. That turned out to be a mistake, as Hayley’s chicken satay did not sit well with her stomach. She felt sick the rest of the day :(

Despite her physical discomfort, she soldiered on and made it up the 400ft climb to the rim of the crater—not easy at 7,000ft above sea level.

We took some more photos, then headed back down—and breathed more fumes the entire hour drive back to the hostel.

you could hear it gurgling!!!

But it was beautifully quiet when we arrived around 10:30am. We both showered and then had a delightfully restful afternoon and evening in what turned out to be a gorgeous setting with ideal (daytime) temps. A much needed rest!

Scenes from the drive back to Bromo Camp: