Mount Batur is a weird, weird place and I'm not quite sure how to describe it. It is supposed to be a top attraction in Bali due to the fact that you can climb a live volcano to watch the sunrise.

Our trip to Mount Batur was typical Balinese i.e. it took hours to get there and we stopped at many places. We stopped at a place called Pina Colada, which was a farm, arts centre, dance studio and gift shop all rolled into one! We were given tea, coffee and fried bananas (Aidan and I hate all these things but had to be polite). We then watch little girls dancing.

Upon arrival at our hotel we decided to walk into the village to see what was going on. It was about a 4-5km walk and we were hassled all the way by a guy who tried to sell us everything and reckoned he knew Aidan because he knew a guy from Birmingham. He drove us mad!!!!!!!!! The village was empty with only one restaurant, where we ate (but I wish we hadn't) it was gross. The owner made his daughter pester us to give them money. We then realised that tourists don't really come here!

We booked a volcano trek with the hotel (after a whole day of battering to and fro) then canceled our second night as we didn't want to hang around too long.

Kirsten and Tom joined us here and arrive about midnight. It was great to see them and they probably hated us for booking them on a volcano trek, starting in 4 hours time!!!! So at 4am we got up in the dark to go trekking in the pouring rain. (I bet the image you have is not one you would associate with a tropical beach holiday in Bali!!!!) We climbed th volcano in the dark until we reached a hut where we were given hard boiled eggs and banana sandwiches (yum, more bananas). The sunrise was slightly spoilt by the clouds, everyone was pissed off apart from Aidan who loved the cloud formations.

After the sunrise we trekked further to see the crater and play in the black sand. When we got back down we were taken to some hot springs and left to chill. We felt we'd deserved this little treat. We stayed in until we looked like prunes.

We soon left in search of those tropical beaches....

Katie.