This series tracks the entirety of my trek of Mount Rinjani with Jiahao and Joseph on April 28 to 30, from the planning to the final steps on the trail.
This pre-trip post will hopefully will help you to make informed choices, prepare adequately and equip you with inspiration to explore Rinjani or other gunungs in Indonesia (or elsewhere in the world).
Why Rinjani?
After our 10-day trip to Oman, Joseph thought of doing something focused on what he liked best: hiking and being out in nature. Inspired by photos of ribus (prominent peaks) in Indonesia, it took us a week over the phone to decide to try out a mountain trek there. Soon after Jiahao and Kewen joined us.
We wanted to do a trek none of us had ever done before (Joseph has done Kinabalu; Jiahao, Bromo and Ijen). It took us another 2 weeks to narrow down our list of treks to three mountains: Tambora, Rinjani and Kerinci. We chose Rinjani for cost and time considerations.
The decision to hike Rinjani opened up a lot of questions. If you’re going to Rinjani too, you’ll probably have to tackle these same questions during your planning:
How do I get to Lombok (and Rinjani):
Silkair is the only airline that flies direct from Singapore, but it’s ungodly expensive (>$500). Airasia flies direct from KL. All other airlines stopover at Jakarta. Because I’m a cheapskate, we took a combination of Batik Air and Lionair for S$330 return.
Which company should I get?
There are several hundred trekking companies that organize trips to Gunung Rinjani, with varying degrees of professionalism. Visit some of their websites and browse through their offerings. Be aware of what’s covered and what’s not (meals, transfers etc).
Ideally, choose a company based on the mountain itself, either in Senaru or Sembalun Lawang, so at least your tourist dollars go back to locals.
The only criteria we had when choosing a trekking company was that they had to be committed to taking care of the environment. This was a dealbreaker for us (it might not be for you). With this in mind, we chose Green Rinjani.
What programme should I do?
Trekking Gunung Rinjani will be strenuous no matter what programme you decide on. But generally speaking, the longer the programme/ trek, the more time you’ll have to recover, and hence the less tough it’ll be. A programme that includes the summit means experiencing altitude gains and losses that you don’t normally get in Singapore. There are also treks around Gunung Rinjani National Park that don’t include climbing either the summit or the crater rim.
It seems common sense to repeat this point, but I’ll say it: a three-day programme with a summit push, will be much tougher than a four-day trek.
Where should I start from?
Senaru and Sembalun Lawang are two nearest villages to Gunung Rinjani. Most people prefer to start from Sembalun Lawang because the approach from here is much gentler, scenic and is nearer to summit trailhead. (The route from Senaru passes through some steep rainforest). You can probably customise start & end points with your guides.
Where should I stay?
Both Senaru and Sembalun Lawang have a range of guesthouses and homestays. Keep in mind they are 3 and 4 hours travelling time from the airport respectively, so factor in travelling time when planning.
Most people head to the Gili Islands or Senggigi, the main tourist areas on the island. But we didn’t go there, so I can’t speak for its merits. At the end of our trek, we headed to Mataram, the island’s capital. Mataram is rougher, with less accommodation and has less to sightsee. However, we got to see where the locals eat and shop, and Mataram is slightly nearer to the airport (1 hour).
Should I train? (How much should I train?)
Gunung Rinjani is one of the toughest mountains in Indonesia to trek. If you don’t train, the mountain will own you.
I can’t emphasise how many people I saw utterly exhausted on the trails. Or the people who gave up their summit push out of sheer tiredness. Of my group of eight, only three of us made it to summit before sunrise after 4 hours of early morning trekking. That’s how tough Gunung Rinjani is.
Don’t disappoint yourself. Train hard for this. Do hill repeats at Bukit Timah or Mount Faber. Get to the summit on time. Walk and run trails like Rifle Range Road (in McRitchie). Also, worth noting: you’re only as fast as your slowest teammate. So get your friends to train too.
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