Mount Rinjani Second Summit (2D1N) 🌋 in Lombok | Indonesia

By Roberto (Updated Nov 22)

⏱ 10 min

About the different routes up Mount Rinjani in Lombok 

When one searches for “the best things to do in Indonesia“, hiking Mount Rinjani is always on the list. Mount Rinjani is the second tallest volcano (and mountain) in Indonesia at an altitude of 3716 m. It offers gorgeous scenery with a crater, a lake inside the crater, and another volcano in the lake.  In this post, we talk about Rinjani Second Summit, which is the second highest point of Mount Rinjani with a height that is no laughing matter, of 3126 m. 

If you are checking trekking tours, the options can be a bit confusing because many websites generally offer the following: 

Duration	Description	Difficulty	Recommended for
3D2N	Complete hike around Mount Rinjani + Summit (from Senaru or Sembalu)	Very hard and long	Habitual long-distance trekkers that want the bonus of visiting additional places
2D1N	Hike to the crater rim (from Senaru or Sembalu)	Hard	Everybody who wants to visit this amazing place without dying
2D1N	Hike to Rinjani Summit (from Sembalu)	Epic	Only for experienced and fast hikers
2D1N	Hike to Rinjani Second Summit from Senaru	Very hard	The one we did. For active people who want something beyond the crater rim, reaching a 3126 m peak

According to your available time and experience, go for one activity or another. We went for the Rinjani Second Summit hike (2D1N) and it ended up being an amazing experience. Note that Rinjani Second Summit is a new route that opened in 2022, and you won’t find much info about it in other posts! So stay here ☺️

Basic info of Rinjani Second Summit hike

In 2022, some months ago, they opened a new path to the second highest summit in the area: Mount Sangkareang. This hike consists of a hard and long trek until the Crater Rim, where you camp overnight. At 3:30 AM you wake up and embark on a very difficult trek to Mount Sangkareang for sunrise at the summit. Finally, you descend to the campsite at the Crater Rim, and then back down to the starting point in Senaru. 

The total hiking time is around 20 hours. 9 hours (with stops) to the Crater Rim, 4 hours in-and-out to the Second Summit, and another 7 hours (with stops) to descend.  

In our case, we did this with another couple of friends. We all agreed that the trek to the Crater Rim was hard and the way to the summit was very hard, basically because it’s at night and the path… well, we’ll talk about it later. 

What to bring for the hike 

The best tour agency to hike Mount Rinjani 

Before going to Lombok we checked several companies and they all offer similar packages, but one especially caught our attention: Jou Trekking. It had great reviews, and more importantly to us, the reviews were from recent travelers. Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, maybe not all companies have been able to survive or maintain quality. 

The recent stellar reviews Jou Trekking had, gave us confidence that we would have a great experience. Jou, the owner, was also more responsive than the other companies Ellen reached out to, demonstrating his professionalism. Moreover, their prices are aligned with the market. 

Things got even better: they provided super nice accommodation at Villa Bambu Rinjani for the night before (something we didn’t expect at all) and provided amazing treats and services during the hike. We couldn’t have made it without Awe, our awesome guide who is always kind and charismatic, and our four porters (one per person). We were spoiled with quality tents, food, service, and attention from Jou Trekking.

Other hikers asked us which trekking company we came with. We can confidently say that Jou Trekking is the best tour agency for this activity. I mean… look at where they set up the tents! ⛺️ (Ours are the white ones.)

Our Mount Rinjani Second Summit Hike experience 

Moving on to the details, we divide the Rinjani Second Summit hike up into different stages because all of them have something special to talk about. This is a hike that you will never forget because of its varying environment along the path and epic views. 

In our case, we were grateful to do this amazing hike with two friends from Minnesota, Meg and Ian, who run the Youtube Channel Effortlessly.Earpy and produce amazing videos. Below, there is the superb video they made about our experience. We highly recommend watching it in addition to reading this post!

From the Gate to Position 2

The plan of the day was clear: to reach different positions along the way to the Crater Rim and spend the night there. The next day, early in the morning, we would reach Rinjani Second Summit. It sounded easy… 

At 7:30, and after having a decent breakfast at Villa Bambu Rinjani, the driver picked us up and we headed to the entrance of the National Park. It was humid as hell, and after 15 minutes through two steep hills, we were already sweating. Some minutes later we realized we weren’t even at the official entrance Gate and hadn’t technically started the trek. Morning fail. 

We took the photo above at the beginning of the adventure, fresh faced and eager about the adventure ahead! As we made our way 1 km to Pos 1, we got to know more about the hike from Awe, our guide. The path from the Gate to Pos 1 is by far the easiest, being mainly flat, jungly, and serves as a good warmup. At this point of the hike, we thought “this is pretty easy!” or, in the words of our friend Meg “this is very hikeable and a well maintained trail.” Little did we know what was up ahead…

From position 1 to position 2, there are 2.7 km and the hike starts to get more demanding. More roots, steps, and mud appear on the trail. At this point we were still enjoying our hike, just sweating a ton, and thinking about the lunch that was waiting for us near Pos 2.

The porters, work incredibly hard and go up running and jumping in flip flops, with 20-25 kg per person on their shoulders. These champions make us look like a joke, with all our tech-gear… They carry our food, tents, extra water, cooking utensils, and somehow, they do it with a smile. 

Position 2 to Position 4

After passing Pos 2, we made it to the stop for lunch. The place couldn’t be better. We were surrounded by playful monkeys, had good food and drinks to refuel our energy and all the lunch was well organized. Ian and I changed our tank tops because we were so sweaty it was as if we had been swimming. 

The break only lasted roughly 30 minutes, because we couldn’t allow ourselves to cool down too much as we needed to go to the next position.  Something we didn’t expect was that the rest of the trek was going to get harder. Much harder.

Gradually, the path starts to change after Pos 2 to the “savanna”, as they call it. This terrain is not an African Savanna, instead, it is less humid, with less trees and more grass. One hour after starting this part, we were walking in a mist, reaching the altitude of the clouds. 

On the way up, we stopped at Pos 3 to talk with other hikers and started to imagine how the view would be at the crater rim. At this point we had left the clouds below us, and our surroundings became clear.

From Pos 3 to Pos 4, lay the most difficult part for us: a 2 km part with soft and loose earth, lots of big steps, and technical terrain, where it was so easy to slip and fall. All of us slipped several times, yet nothing bad happened. Since we left the clouds below us, the sun was up and Ian and I were wet drenched in our own sweat again… But this time we decided to wait until the rim to change clothes. 🤙🏽

We reached the last part after Pos 4. The home stretch! It is another 2 km technical path, with rocks this time, that literally drains any energy you have left in your battery. At this point we were pushing with our hopes and words of encouragement to each other. The rim was there waiting for us!

The Crater Rim

Finally we made it! It’s hard to describe what you feel when reaching the crater rim, because it was honestly, one of the biggest sighs of relief and of awe, that the four of us have ever had. The crater looks huge, the peaks around it are massive, and the fact there is a lake in the crater, and a volcano in the lake, looks like something only magic could create.

The view couldn’t be more picturesque and when we checked the campsite, we couldn’t believe that the best location for tents was ours. Everything looked gorgeous from there, and the sunset we got was simply EPIC. I’m not overexaggerating, you know that we’re quite objective in our posts. It was one of the best sunsets we have ever seen 🌅

Thanks again to Jou Trekking, we had a pleasant dinner and good rest in our like-new tents. We even got a portable toilet tent set up for us, lol. Some other hikers couldn’t believe we had one porter for each person and all the stuff. After enjoying that sunset, we chilled and had dinner before crawling into our tents at 7:30 pm.

Night hike to Rinjani Second Summit (3126 m)

After some hours of rest, we woke up at 3:30 am, to have a snack and head to Rinjani Second Summit. The hike was supposed to be around 3 hours in and out. I say “supposed” because Awe, our guide, had never been there and we followed another guide (who was also one of ours porters). The path to the Second Summit first opened in 2022, and that’s why many people, even guides, don’t know it. 

The four of us put on our headlamps and started to walk in the dark. It was pitch black under the starry sky, and you could only see one step in front of you with your headlamp. Because of this and the absence of a clear path, we were walking slowly. After forty minutes or so, Ian shouted “Ellen fell!” I was thinking the worst, and when I went back to see her, she was on the ground in pain. She stepped in a hole and rolled her ankle. 

Now she needed to decide whether to keep going or to go back. To add more tension, my headlamp stopped working and we were still far from the summit...

We decided to keep going, but after 30 minutes, Ellen’s ankle got worse, and so did the path. When we reached a point where you could see that we would first have to descend and then head straight up a daunting steep path, Ellen decided to stop and go back to camp. Awe and Meg helped her back, and Meg also gave me her headlamp. I really appreciate this gesture, because thanks to that, one person from each couple could keep going to the summit… “the sweat team”. 

Reaching Mount Rinjani Second Summit

It took us another half hour, even speeding up, to reach the summit. Effectively, there is almost no path, and in the dark everything seemed harder. Ian and I were breathless at the end but … we made it! We were there, grabbing the wooden sign of Rinjani Second Summit and receiving the rays of light from an epic sunrise. 

From this spot, you don’t get the lake view, but people who went to the 1^st Summit say that the view from there is basically the same as the one from the Crater Rim. From this Summit, we could see the sea and the main Rinjani Summit perfectly.

Also we saw that the main summit of Mount Rinjani looked colossal. We understood why only 20% of people actually make it to the top. I’m glad we didn’t try to go there because sincerely, we weren’t ready for it. 

It was time to go back to the campsite, now with light on our path. After 90 minutes, and sweating again, we met the girls who were chilling at the tents. There was nobody left at the crater rim since other people leave early to continue their route to Rinjani 1^st Summit or go down without going to either summit. 

The way back 

Since tito Rober always carries a first aid kit, we put a bandage on Ellen’s ankle and took some meds. We were ready now to go ALL the way back to the beginning. This manoeuvre would take us more than 5 hours, in addition to the more than 3 hours that Ian and I hiked earlier… We went all the way down, slipping and sliding on the loose earth past Position 4 and 3, the savanna, the clouds again, and entered the jungle. 

Towards the end we just wanted to finish the adventure and quickened our pace with our tired knees and messed-up ankle. This time we had lunch in between Pos 1 and Pos 2, and it started to rain pretty hard. We waited awhile but decided to plow ahead and finish the hike in the rain, not leaving without tipping the porters first, for their titanic work. Thanks to the big trees in the jungle, we were somewhat protected from the rain and finished it without problems. 

And there we were, back at the beginning. We took the same picture we did at the beginning, to commemorate the end of the experience, and tipped Awe for being amazing and “guiding us to success.”

Our honest verdict

Mount Rinjani offers a spectacular experience, and there are levels of difficulty for everyone. We loved and absolutely recommend reaching the Crater Rim in the 2D1N route. It’s a hike we will always remember and thanks to the weather, we got one of the best sunsets of our lives. 

For truly experienced hikers, we think reaching Rinjani 1^st Summit has to be an excellent choice, but we wouldn’t recommend it for average people, even considered active, like us. On the other hand, I’m sure that for those who want a little more than the Crater Rim, this Rinjani Second Summit would be a perfect match. 

In some months, probably years, the path to this second summit will be there, made by people like us, who ventured to go where even guides haven’t been. When Jou Trekking told us we could to the Second Summit, I went crazy trying to find some info about it. There was nothing. That’s why it’s an honor for me, to write the first post with information about Rinjani Second Summit. 

For more adventures in Indonesia and hikes…