I awake to a knock on the door. Groggily I check my watch – it is 4am!

 

I really hate mornings and this is the third ‘night' in a row that I've been awoken at this time. I grudgingly throw on a few clothes and walk outside to examine the sky once again. The last two nights I've looked upwards to see nothing but inky blackness: no moon, no stars, nothing but a thick layer of invisible cloud.

 

I arrived in Moni three days ago after flying from the much (in my opinion) over rated Bali. I am here to see the Kelimutu Volcano whose seemingly permanently mist shrouded peak rises 1700m above this small village. On the odd days it is visible, watching the sunrise from the summit is supposed to be a special experience. The sun, I am told, will appear over three different coloured lakes that are nestled in the three craters within this single volcano. No one knows why the lakes are different colours, or more spectacularly why they change colours periodically. It is said that different minerals hang in suspension in the lakes and as the concentrations change, so also do the colours. This, up to now, is still theory.

 

As I look up blearily I have to rub the sleep from my eyes. What I see instantly kicks me fully awake. I see no invisible void this night and instead I look up in awe at the spectacle above me. The stars are shining, their brightness unreal in the pitch darkness of the village, their multitude unfathomable.

The sun, I am told, will appear over three different coloured lakes that are nestled in the three craters within this single volcano.

The night sky has always held a certain amount of wonder for me. I know I can see only the tiniest fraction of the countless number of stars and yet what I can see is bewildering. Having seen so much to intrigue and awe me in this world alone, what of the unimaginable wonders that must be out there too? Maybe in centuries to come people will be backpacking the galaxies just as I am doing on this tiny planet right now. I realise that I will never even get close to seeing all the incredible beauty and diversity that Earth alone has to offer. At this moment then, I am happy letting my imagination travel the rest of the universe for me. I take a few moments to stare at the immenseness, thousands of tiny pinpricks, each giving a little light to the otherwise black cloak of night.

 

Arriving at the volcano's peak in the darkness is in itself an accomplishment. It starts with a bone-shaking ride in the back of a tired old truck up the steep winding road followed by an energetic walk/scramble up the steep side to the rim. It is a very worrying journey in the dark, especially when I look a step ahead of me and realise that I have indeed reached the rim. One step more....I hate to think! It is a long way down the near vertical inside of the crater and once down, nothing short of a helicopter or an experienced and well equipped mountain rescue team would be getting anyone back out! On the island of Flores in the remote Nusa Tenggara region of Indonesia, I know that neither is much of a possibility.

 

The Portuguese sailors named Flores 350 years ago after they saw the beautiful underwater gardens around its coast. These multicoloured corals reminded them of flowers - ‘flores' in Portuguese. The island is situated in the Nusa Tenggara or ‘Eastern Islands' region of Indonesia that stretches out to Timor and then onwards towards Irian Jaya and finally to Papua New Guinea. The people here, although mostly converted to Catholicism have learnt to combine their own spirit worship religion with the words of the missionaries. This has lead to many interesting practises including the strange presence of cattle heads strung up around their churches.

 

The sunrise is perfect. Slowly it edges over the crater rim and shafts of light pour into the depths below. First through the lowest, jagged cracks of the rim and then joining together in force, the sun creeps its way higher and higher. The blackness below me fades to dark blue, and then azure and finally an incredible light blue streaked with white like the thin high clouds in the now bright dawn sky. I look across at the next crater, a deep rusty brown, glittering in the morning light. The two craters are only split by a thin, jagged ridge of rocks that would have once been molten lava; boiling and splashing, being ejected into the air by some immense unseen force far below. I walk around the crater, looking down upon this natural wonder and perch myself on the edge. I sit and think, relaxed in this peaceful setting, trying to put it all into an impossible perspective. Clouds slowly start to appear from nowhere, hovering over the lakes in thin filaments. They increase into thin dreamlike ribbons, topping the crater's void like feathers. This morning was a good morning to get up early!

...dreamlike ribbons, topping the crater's void like feathers.

Volcanoes have always amazed me: sheer power and energy submitting to nothing, too powerful for our humble imaginations and reeking havoc and destruction on us tiny beings below. Whilst destructive, at the same time these forces are creative: building the islands, the mountain ranges, shaping the earth into the beautiful and diverse place that it is, giving us the most fertile crop growing areas where people choose to live despite the risks. It is no wonder that these cones that reach into the heavens have been worshipped as gods since man first started to look at his surroundings.

 

After an hour or so of letting my imagination run wild I decide to head back down. It is a fair hike back to the village, steep but beautiful; the views looking out over this isolated island are incredible; rugged and stark in places, densely vegetated in others and then sloping more easily down to the fertile farmlands below. Back down I am ready for my breakfast! It's still early and

my stomach is telling me to eat before I use up energy like that again.

 

After breakfast, there is a tour of the local villages that I've heard is a worthwhile experience; the passage of time and the advancements of modern civilisation haven't really changed the locals in the area. People still live pretty much as they have always done. Their wooden houses are hand built in grandiose style. Long buildings with steeply sloping high roofs, bare inside but for the wooden floor, sleeping mats and meagre possessions.

 

Outside, people go about their lives as they have for generations, carving wooden tools, spinning cotton, weaving the most beautiful blankets, clothes and textiles, cooking, building, relaxing.

They have of course succumbed to tourism, as is inevitable, and I am able to buy, for embarrassing amounts, beautiful works that would cost hundreds of pounds back home. The people accept us looking around and practising our extremely basic command of their language, most just get on with their lives, some actively come and talk with us.

 

Although we can buy their crafts, much of their commerce is still based on bartering animals, tools and cloth, quite opposed to the western idea of small pieces of paper and metal. The people still wear the colourful hand-woven traditional clothes of their village. It is like going back in time, or maybe forward to a time when people have grown tired of all the materialism and stress of life and are living for the day, for themselves and for their loved ones. Not that they live

without their problems; for one, they are always in fear of their life-giving volcano spirits who may at any time take out their ire upon them.

 

Back onto my transport for the day, a ropey old minibus shared with 6 other travellers, taking us from village to village. I get chatting to a Scottish couple sitting opposite me. We go through the usual routine: What's your name? Where are you from? Where are you going? Where have you been. It is my turn on the “where have you been” stage and I mention that I was in Hong Kong for a couple of months.

Much of their system of commerce is still based on bartering...

“Really, we lived there for a year, where did you stay?”

 

“Up in the New Territories in a place called Nim Wan” I say, expecting that if they have been there that long they may have heard of the small community.

 

“Wow, that's where we lived! I don't suppose you know Jenny and Stuart?”

 

“Err, well yes actually, I was staying with them and also with Jenny's sister Colleen for a while!”

 

We talked more about Jenny and Colleen, whom I have known since I was 14. I went out with Jenny for a year or so and we still keep in touch. I also get on really well with Colleen and we have been very good friends for the past 15 years. I say that the last time I saw Jenny before I arrived in Hong Kong was at one of Colleen's parties in Southampton about 3 years back. Jenny was returning from a concert at about 3am and was stopping off on her way back to Jersey where she lived.

 

“Incredible! The Phoenix Festival! We were with her then and at that party! Who was the guy that lived in Slough and kept getting his house broken into?”

 

“Err, that was me actually!”

 

Amazing that you can go half way round the world to a spot so remote that the only reason you would know of it is if you have been there yourself to meet someone you met at a party 3 years ago in Southampton! Crazy! At times I realise the cliché that it is a small world really is true! We spend the next hour or so talking about our mutual friends and exchanging travel stories whilst driving through the incredible scenery all around us.

 

The next part of my travels in Nusa Tenggara is to get to a small port north of Ruteng where there is a six-day boat trip to some of the other islands and then to Lombok, right next door to Bali.

 

The journey proves to be very interesting. On the way the bus is stopped at a police checkpoint. This is nothing too unusual, buses are often stopped and a rudimentary search conducted. This time however, there is no search...