Finding Serenity at Gunung Agung, Bali

I went to climb Gunung Agung last month, the mountain at Bali Island. I went there with On Design Adventure, headed by Budi Cahyono. Budi Cahyono is an experienced Indonesian climber; he was involved with Ekspedisi Merdeka, a climbing team that brought amputee climber Sabar Gorky to climb not only the Selamat Datang statue at Jakarta, but also Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa and Mount Elbrus in Russia. Budi is also very close to nature activism, being a member of GreenPeace Indonesia.

Budi Cahyono is a great guide and a great human being, and it’s safe to say I had a great time climbing Gunung Agung with his group.

Aside from how wonderful it was to be at the summit of Gunung Agung, I was also impressed by how clean the campsite at Gunung Agung was. This, particularly as I remember my previous trips to Gunung Rinjani and other mountain sites around Indonesia, where as many have mentioned at various write-ups throughout the Internet that too often Indonesian mountain-tourists have less-than-admirably failed to keep their campsite clean from human trash.

Littering is an issue all around Indonesia and this needs to be addressed at the national level through a nationwide campaign. It needs to be taught into the schools at an early age and through advertised national campaigns. Make it a part of the national psyche to not litter, and discuss the downsides of littering in our national parks and everywhere in general.

One reason for the serenity of Gunung Agung is that because most Balinese people consider Gunung Agung to be a sacred site, and so many would hesitate to climb the mountain and would even discourage people from climbing Gunung Agung. This has the added effect where many who would be given the opportunity to go up Gunung Agung would be very, very careful about how we would treat the mountain.

I’m not much of a regular mountain hiker myself, but I personally wish that the beauty of such sites as Gunung Agung would continue to be preserved for coming generations. And this of course requires responsibility on the part of all of us, together having been blessed and entrusted with this precious & beautiful nature of ours.