RAKATA ISLAND

Setting up the tents, Doni and Sirkip employed a military sense of having done this more than once before. The last time I put up a tent I watched as someone else did it for me, the time before that… I did the same. The tent I own I have no idea how to put up, usually on account of me being drunk. I’m telling you this as a precursor, so you understand how often or used to sleeping outdoors I am. Pay attention now… it’s important. I’ll be asking questions later.



My tent faced Anak Krakatau and provided the perfect view, as did my hammock that the guys erected for me. Two more pyroclastic eruptions gripped the mountain and, as darkness grew, the boat guys and Doni prepared a dinner of sweetcorn soup and garlic, cheese and tomato omelettes “to keep the Vampyre away”




If truth be told I was waiting for a full blown Strombolian eruption - to you non-obsessives that’s the one that looks like a firework with molten lava jetting every which way from the vent.




















As the three of us we laughed our tits off at anything and everthing, I produced my treat. DJ Willer was in da house once again. Doni and particularly Sirkip were bemused with what I brought from my bag as I blasted Rakata island with The Streets, Chris Cornell and Led Zeppelin. DJ Doni took the virtual wheels of steel looking like a kid in a sweetshop as he'd never heard music on Rakata before and I even proffered Doni’s favourite Phil Collins’ “I can feel it coming in the air tonight” as a sacrifice to anger the Volcano Gods into giving me my Strombolian. That is the first and last time I will ever play that bald shag-sack’s music.



We smoked a hundred cigarettes and entertained each other, the boys particularly liking my tale of the monkey that was hanged for being a Frenchman up north. Doni translated to Sirkip and I established that Javan stand-up comedians must be on stage a week as it took a good ten minutes to translate. They could have been talking about the price of Nasi Goreng or cockfighting for all I knew.

I swung in the hammock being eaten alive by mozzies, a tad reluctant to get into the tent. Then it was time for bed, I zipped up the tent as with a squint the volcano could just be made out - black against a blue-black sky.

Popping my head outside every three minutes wasn’t gonna cool me down but somehow, I fell asleep. Every few minutes I would wake but then after one hours sleep I woke from a nightmare. At that self-same moment, a giant bug landed on the semi-transparent opening. Aaaarghh. Things with four legs moved around outside knocking pots, pans and plates over… I couldn’t breath. I was having a panic attack. Eventually, having calmed myself down with ventolin I went for the most terrified wee of my life… I could hardly piss straight with fear as things moved front, left, right then behind me. The waves crashed ashore with such force that the whole beach shook each time, the noise tremendous. The forest moved unnaturally and the trees narrowed like a Spielberg zoom every time I trained my torch on them. I knew the only release from this, my normal antidote - was daylight.

After yet another night with one full hours sleep, I unzipped the tent to see the volcano erupting again. Doni brought some Farang food in the form of half a melon and a banana pancake, asked if I was okay as I looked like shit and very sweetly asked if he had done something to offend me. Bless. He let me half-sleep in the hammock for another hour before the boat left.

Only I could happen upon the country with the world’s largest Muslim population during Ramadan. There’s no food available during the day as everyone (except guess who) is fasting. We finally found a fish restaurant for want of a better word and ate prawns and carp and sticky rice with our fingers.

It goes without saying that I was tired and grumpy all day, on the drive back through Jakarta (think London but twice as many people (16million) twice as many cars and a googolplex more scooters) Grumpy that was until I showered, ate and best of all, got the first of what would turn into hundreds of texts from someone special.

Panic attack or no panic attack, I had climbed my first volcano; I had become an explorer, an adventurer. Fuck bungee jumping, any loudmouth Ozzie prick can do that, so from this day forth I shall be known as Will “Volcano Climber” Howell-Cornes… or you can just call me Indy.