Mount Bromo - Tengger - Semeru National Park - East Java

Sunrise Just after the partial lunar eclipse (which I didn't get a picture of... my lens just isn't happy with so little light... sorry... it's in the memory card of my mind and it was an unexpected surprise)

Sunrise on Volcanoes: Mt. Bromo is the steam pot in the foreground, last time it exploded was in 2004, now it is just a pot of steaming sulfur and ash... after the sunrise view we drove down then hiked up the 276 steps to the rim, to take in some sulfur... breath deeply... Aaaaaaaah

Mt. Semeru: The highest mountain in Java

The Legend: According to a local folk tale, at the end of the 15th century princess Roro Anteng from the Majapahi Empire started a separate principality together with her husband Joko Seger. They named it Tengger by the last syllables of their names. The principality did prosper, but the ruling couple failed to conceive children. In their despair they climbed Mount Bromo to pray to the gods, who granted them help, but requested the last child to be sacrificed to the gods. They had 24 children, and when the 25th and last child Kesuma was born Roro Anteng refused to do the sacrifice as promised. The gods then threatened with fire and brimstone, until she finally did the sacrifice. After the child was thrown into the crater, the voice of the child ordered the local people to perform an annual ceremony on the volcano, which is held today. Another version has the child throwing himself in after the mother refuses.

Motorcycle Mania! It was motorcycle weekend at Mt. Bromo, hundreds upon hundreds of motorcyclists flocked to Bromo to struggle through the ash all the way up to the view point.

Nature's Feng Shui

View looking down from half way up to the rim of Bromo: given that it was Indonesia's national day, it seemed very appropriate that this lone horseman was draped in the national flag

Local landscapes

Independence day games: the pool was full of fish and the kids had to catch them with their hands and throw them in buckets as fast as they could... it looked like a lot of fun!

Independence day smiles :)