Monday, March 19, 2018

Toastmaster P4 Speech : Ijen Crater

Opening : 1M

    Have you ever smelled burnt sulphur ? It has this sharp choking smell that hits your nose and scratches your throat and makes you want to stop breathing. Imagine breathing that smell for a long time. Dear toastmasters, I visited a volcanic sulphur mine at ijen crater during my trip to indonesia. It was a trek which I will never forget.

Body : 4M

    We got up at 12 in the night to start our drive to the base of the volcanic crater. It was a steep drive and I could feel my ears popping due to loss of air pressure. The temperature dropped drastically and it was very cold by 1pm, when we reached the base. We had a round of hot tea and started to climb the 4 km long route at 2 am. It was a very steep climb and we were soon out of breath. We were huffing and puffing like the wolf in the 3 pigs story. There were no lights and we could see only upto 2-3 steps before us.

    After climbing for almost 2 hours, suddenly I could smell the sharp acidic smell of sulphur. On looking around, i could see that I was at the peak and the path now led down into the mountain that we were climbing. The path was made of  steps cut into the mountain and was broken. And in spite of the darkness, I could see the sharp drop to my right. It was scary and smelly. My throat was raw and scratchy. I had a gas mask, but putting it on the face made me feel suffocated and clouded my spectacles.

    After climbing down, we reached the base of the crater. Where we saw the main attraction. We could see electric blue fire coming out of the mine at certain places. We were told that it happens due to sulphur gas catching fire at high temperatures. I tried a lot, but could not get a clear photo of the fire.

    We climbed back the scary path holding and helping each other. All this time, we could see miners going to and fro carrying heavy buckets full of sulphur. We trekked further on the rim of the crater and came to the sunrise point. As the sun came up, I saw the beauty of the crater. I was at the edge of the crater with the sun in front of me and the beautiful sulphur lake behind me. I stood staring at the lake, mesmerised by the view.  The lake is in the form of a huge circle 1 km wide. I could see the complete lake inside the crater. The lake is turquoise in colour. Some part of the lake was covered in yellow smoke of burning sulphur and another small part was covered in floating white fog. As the sun rose, the fog started clearing and we could see thick yellow smoke coming out of the mine.

Conclusion : 1M

    The lake is said to be very toxic. We also saw the path we took to visit the mine. It was then we realized why we were taken in the dark. The way was so twisted and dangerous, that we would not have dared to climbed down to the mine, if we had seen the complete picture. Overall the view was worth the effort. It is rightly said that the best view comes after the hardest climb.

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