Steven's Peak-bagging Journey

August 19, 2023

3019m

Java, Indonesia

The two peaks of Pangrango and Gede form the famous Gede-Pangrango National Park not far from Jakarta in West Java. The more popular of the two is actually Gn. Gede as that peak offers much better views, whereas Gn. Pangrango is just another dormant volcano with dense forest on the top. However, Gn. Pangrango is the taller of the two and subsequently boasts over 2400 m prominence making it the second most prominent peak in West Java. To me this status is much more important then the views so the main focus would be Gn. Pangrango. I admit that I was contemplating the double-header but opted to play conservatively in the end. Doing the two peaks in one day would involve over 2000 m elevation gain and that’s not very smart in a road trip with an extremely condensed peak-bagging schedule.

Among the 6 peaks in West Java this one was not only the longest but also required the most amount of strategic planning. The bureaucracy complication in Gede-Pangrango National Park is the next level probably due to the close proximity to Jakarta, which is stupid but understandable. I’ve been told that it’s not uncommon to have thousands of people spreading out on this mountain on a weekend and many of them would come unprepared. The red tape involves a combination of a mandatory online registration with a quota system, a health “certificate” provided by a doctor and some ridiculously expensive fees for foreigners, which eventually turns into a QR code to scan (first time I’ve seen that in Indonesia), and that’s not enough. Additional papers must be carried during the climb. To make the complication even worse we badly timed our visit to overlap with the Independence Day madness, that the government opted to close this park for a week in August 13-18th to reduce fire hazards. We had to adjust the sequence of these peaks such that we would finish our Java’s slam on Pangrango on Aug. 19th. Our driver told us that they could change or extend the dates without warning, but there’s nothing we could do other than hoping it wouldn’t happen. The flight tickets to Sumatra had already been booked on Aug. 20th so we only had this one shot on this objective.

The associated red tape only applies to the standard route starting from Cibodas. There’s another way to access the summit on a different (north) side, that both Petter B. and Rob W. had taken in the past. The most recent “beta” was Rob’s trip in 2020 and it sounded brushy and unpleasant. The government had already made that route illegal long time ago and who knows how much the nature of the jungle had taken it over in 3 years. Adam and I had been debating and our stands had shifted back and forth several times. Adam seemed to prefer to have physical difficulties over bureaucracy but I feared it might turn into another adventurous outing with unknowns. It’s likely not as bad as Gunung Liman but without recent information we wouldn’t be able to tell. On the other hand our driver had been extremely helpful with his local connections so there’s a higher chance that we could actually figure out the red tape for the standard route to save us from having another miserable and exhausting day, and that was our final decision. Our driver connected us to a local guy living in Cibodas and this guy knew the people at the park’s gate. By paying him 600,000 rupiah (40 USD) per pax we were able to bypass all of the complications including the health certification and subsequently obtained the QR code. It’s also worth noting here that a “day hike” of Pangrango or even Gede is technically not allowed but we were able to get a permit somehow. I assume the guy used the excuse of “just hiking to the waterfalls” and there’s likely some bribing involved. The final complication was the park’s gate would not open until 6 am but that’s too late for us due to the heat. I understand the 6 am gate-open time as to do it over 2 days one does not need an earlier start, but Adam and I must find a way to bypass that time restriction.

I actually rode with the driver to the village of Cibodas the day before to talk to the local guy, and everything seemed to be well set except for that 6 am thing. I did not have a precise plan as how to bypass that, and we would figure out a solution upon arrival. In any case we all woke up the next morning at 2:10 am and left the homestay at 2:30 am. There’s a local warung opening for 24 hours so I got my much-needed breakfast there. Adam opted for not having a breakfast as he ate too much in the previous day, but I don’t know if that’s the right choice. We made to Cibodas at 3:30 am and the park’s gates were all closed. Adam was hoping to drive all the way to the 2nd or the 3rd gate at the actual trail-head but that was not going to happen, so we turned around and parked at that local guy’s house. I won’t write how exactly we figured out the solution to these gates but it’s actually pretty simple. Those who read a lot of my trip reports or know me in person should be able to make the correct assumption, but I won’t answer your questions or tell the story.

The entire ascent can be divided into two stages – the lower cobblestone pavement to the large camp near Gede/Pangrango saddle, and the upper tree roots/mud scrambling to the summit. Most of the lower stage was done using head-lamps and the trail bed was entirely paved by the irregular rocks. It was painful to say the least, and would only be worse on the descent. The only notable feature was a crossing of a hot water creek. That whole area was steaming and felt like a souna. The rocks were also extremely slippery that even I felt quite tricky to not slip and wet my shoes. Near the aforementioned large camp Adam required a food break, but I did not need that and I was wearing absolutely no clothing beside shorts. I disliked making any unnecessary stop because I didn’t want to get cold, so the decision was made to regroup on the summit, about 700 vertical meters higher. I anticipated some incredible sunrise views from the SE slopes above Gede/Pangrango saddle, but the result was disappointing. There’s very minimal view throughout the climb due to the thick canopy. The scrambling on tree roots and mud tunnels was also quite intense at times, requiring 3rd class moves. The summit was also extremely disappointing with only a glimpse of view towards Gunung Gede. I wondered why the hell they charged people such expensive fees to just see this.

While waiting for Adam I contemplated about descending Petter/Rob’s way to make a loop mostly to avoid the potential bureaucracy issues at the gates, but we had to have a discussion about that. This would be a massive gamble but I did not think the downhill thrashing can be unbearable even at the worst possible conditions. However, after 30 minutes Adam still didn’t show up. This was very unusual so I decided to make my way down. This meant we must descend the same way we came up from, and we would deal with whatever issues at the bottom. I eventually crossed path with Adam at around 2900 m elevation and it turned out that he was struggling with energy, likely due to not eating a proper breakfast. Instead of making my own way down I opted to wait at that spot, and we made the rest of the descent together. We did not see any other human being until that creek crossing, which made sense as the mountain was closed in the previous day. An averaged Indonesian hiker would take several hours to reach that spot and the gate was not supposed to open until 6 am. It was about 10 am and it seemed correct. After passing that Cibeureum waterfalls junction we met hordes and hordes coming up. Not far from the end of the trail Adam spontaneously spotted a side trail diverging to the left, and after quickly checking the maps we decided to take a gamble. This trail was extremely steep and slippery and quite undefined at places, but brought us down to the road and bypassed all of the potential bureaucracy problems. Our round trip time was 8 hours, a bit longer than expected but our driver was still patiently waiting.

Walking walking down towards the vehicle we noticed several warungs and the spontaneous decision was then made to have lunch there. We also did a bit of shopping as Adam was currently missing his hat. They were selling cheap touques so why not. I needed to break the larger bills so went to a nearby shop for some tea, and meanwhile a woman was screaming outside as a cobra appeared under her seat. I sadly missed out this excitement as I don’t think I had ever seen a cobra before. I probably would not prefer seeing them while hiking neither… We then drove through some heavy traffics to our hotel near Jakarta’s airport, and this would be our final stay in Java.