TLWR? (Too long, won’t read?) Watch the video of our Lombok girl's trip video instead!

👩‍🦰 Girl’s trip! Myself and three girlfriends (Anke, Missy and T) had been planning this trip to Lombok for ages and we were so keen for it. Lombok is an island in Indonesia, east of Bali, known for its beaches and surfing spots. While being close to Bali, it’s far less touristy and a lot more quiet, which is exactly what we were looking for rather than a party vibe.

On the first day of our arrival we dropped our bags and jumped straight in the pool. After taking a little wander around to get our bearings, we got some massages (one of my favourite things to do in Indonesia!) and pedicures then had some (anti-social) drinks.

The next day we took a trip to the Gili islands, a group of 3 small islands off the northwest coast of Lombok - Gili Trawangan, Gili Meno and Gili Air. The islands are absolutely stunning and definitely worth a quick visit. We stopped off at a juice bar for some coloured drinks then took a snorkelling trip and went chasing turtles. Our guide - part man, part fish - dove down to chase them for us and got some great footage, which you can see in our Lombok video.

We just couldn’t get enough of the beautiful warm Indonesian waters, so scuba diving was on the cards for our third day in Lombok, back at the Gili Islands again. We went with Scuba Froggy, and they were fantastic.

We did a quick crash course in the pool of the skills we’d need under the water, and disaster struck - I didn’t realise that we’d need to remove our mask underwater and I lost a contact lens doing it, then freaked out and choked on water and had to surface in the pool. Our instructor was probably more nervous than I was about how I would go under the water after that haha!

I was pretty terrified but once we were in the water things went smoothly and all of those fears melted away. The calm under the water is like nothing I’ve ever experienced, the only sound being the steady in and out of my own breathing, and the amazing feeling of weightlessness. The dive itself was fantastic for my first dive ever. Admittedly there wasn’t a lot of wildlife, but we dove near a wreck which was cool.

We then had a cruisy day on Lombok checking out the local markets, where we were 100% getting laughed at by the locals. Probably due to our facial expressions when looking at all the creatures that they considered food haha! The next day was ANZAC Day, so it was appropriate that we were up before dawn for a hike up Mount Rinjani, and what would be the worst day/night of my life. Mount Rinjani is 3,726 metres of massive, mean mountain surrounding a crater lake and volcano.

We set off for what was to be an 8 hour ascent, with lunch and multiple stops along the way to catch my breath. The higher we got, the thinner the air was, and I was genuinely struggling to breathe, not just from my terrible cardio fitness.

Our guide Rony and the porters were incredible and made me feel ashamed at how much of a fuss I was making. They not only carried all the gear/water/food up with such ease, they did it in thongs (i.e. flip flops) making it look a breeze as they navigated the harsh terrain.

Things started to feel very real when we had to move off the path while on the way up so that they could bring a body down. A 23 year old Javanese man had drowned in the hot springs the day before we set out and they’d recovered his body. I was definitely regretting my life choices at that moment…

I was practically crawling and gasping for air by the end of the 2,600 metres to the camp site. It was torture on my lungs and my whole body was aching. That was easily the hardest and worst day of my life (which says a lot about how lucky I am!) and I’m pretty proud of having done it.

That night was cold, and it wasn’t exactly a comfortable sleep either. Just before the sun started to rise the temperature plummeted and none of us could sleep, so up we got, and we watched the sun rise over the crater. It was pretty spectacular but I’m still not convinced it was worth the torture of climbing to get there…

My friend, Anke, was an absolute trooper. She was the only 1 of all of us that made it to the summit, which was an incredibly steep and very loose gravelly trek. Gruelling!

Once she returned triumphant, we then smashed out the much easier descent in just 4 hours. I was clearly rushing just a little too quickly trying to get the whole thing over and done with - after pretending to have fallen into a hole earlier that day, I actually did take a fall and had some nice big sore bruises and scratches to remind me of it for days after.

It was a pretty crazy 2 days. We treated ourselves with a pamper session that night. Safe to say that while it was an experience I’ll never forget, I never want to do that again. I still can barely walk 5 days later!