Sendang district is where Tulungagung stops being a plain and becomes a mountain. Eleven villages climb the southern and south-eastern flank of Mount Wilis, in the northernmost corner of the regency, and the ground changes from rice paddy to vegetable terraces, grass for cattle, old tea land and forest. This page describes the district village by village, its dairy economy, the temple and waterfall that draw walkers, and the way in and out.
Where Sendang District Lies
Sendang is the highland end of the Tulungagung regency. Its northern edge meets Kediri regency, where the village boundaries of Picisan and Nyawangan touch the Kediri side, and its western villages, Nglurup among them, border the Ponorogo side of the mountain. To the east lies Karangrejo district, and to the south and west it adjoins Pagerwojo district, the next highland district, which is known for its reservoir.
The mountain behind it is Mount Wilis, the great volcanic mass that fills the north-western skyline of the regency. In Sendang the nearest villages to the slopes are Geger, Nglurup and Nyawangan. Together these three villages hold the forest edge, the highest farms and most of the trails that lead upward.
The easiest road into Sendang runs through Karangrejo district to the east. That single fact shapes daily life: the district is not on a through route, and travel between Sendang and the town of Tulungagung is a long, winding drive that climbs steadily.
The Eleven Villages of Sendang District
The eleven villages are Dono, Geger, Kedoyo, Krosok, Nglurup, Nglutung, Nyawangan, Picisan, Sendang, Talang and Tugu. The number of hamlets in each is a good indicator of how scattered the settlement is on a mountain slope.
- Geger has the longest hamlet list in the district, more than twenty names, among them Baraan, Beji, Dewogoro, Gebyuk, Kritik, Penampihan, Samparan, Sengon, Tawang, Turi and Watugono.
- Kedoyo is almost as spread out, with hamlets such as Ampel Gading, Caruban, Centong, Kayulawang, Ketulan, Nogosaren, Sumberagung, Suweru and Wates.
- Nglurup has sixteen hamlets, including Babaan, Babat, Jambuwok, Jeruk Kuwik, Magersari, Munggur, Pokolimo, Porosido, Prigi, Sonokembang and Tumpak Andong.
- Nyawangan has nineteen, among them Bantengan, Beru, Jagungan, Klanggeran, Mirisewu, Modangan, Ngantup, Talun, Tapang and Tipes.
- Picisan, Nglutung and Krosok each have around a dozen hamlets, with names like Banaran, Boso and Juaran in Picisan, Cerme, Gempol, Jaten and Wotgalih in Nglutung, and Gendingan, Mrican and Pulerejo in Krosok.
- Dono, Sendang, Talang and Tugu are the compact villages. Dono has seven hamlets, Sendang seven, Talang four and Tugu six, including Kalimati, Soko and Watu Wayang.
Several of these names describe the land. Watu Wayang can be read as a stone shaped like a shadow puppet, and Kalimati as a dead river. They are the kind of names a map at the village office would carry but a road atlas would not.
Sendang District Farming and Dairy Cattle
Farming here is mountain farming. Vegetables and fruit are grown on the cooler slopes, and elephant grass is cultivated as fodder for cattle. Sendang is the largest producer of cow’s milk in Tulungagung, and the dairy trade is the clearest part of the district economy. Cattle keeping is a household activity: in Nyawangan, a village of roughly two thousand households, the herd has been counted at several thousand head, nearly all of them dairy cows, which works out to about three animals per family. Six villages stand out for dairy numbers: Geger, Kedoyo, Krosok, Nglurup, Nyawangan and Sendang.
Because milk is perishable and sold raw to collectors, farm income here depends on one daily product. A small study of thirty dairy farmers found that income fluctuates for exactly this reason. Disease has been a worry too. Animal vaccination efforts reached the milk-producing villages of Sendang and Pagerwojo early, with farmers organising it themselves.
Tea and coffee belong to the history of the slope. During the Dutch period the higher land was planted with both crops. Many plantations were later abandoned or replaced, and today vegetables occupy most of the former estate land.
Candi Penampihan and the Old Tea Slopes
Candi Penampihan stands in Geger village on the south-eastern slope of Mount Wilis, in the middle of what was once a tea plantation. It is a terraced sanctuary of three levels dedicated to the god Shiva. The first terrace holds a large andesite altar carrying an inscription. The second is a transitional space marked by a stone fence, with no special building. The third holds the main structure, shaped like a giant turtle, beside a smaller building decorated with reliefs.
The site is tied to an inscription dated 898 CE, in which the Mataram king Dyah Balitung set the south-eastern slope of the mountain apart as a tax-free sacred area and gave it the name Penampihan. A later copper inscription shows the sanctuary was still in use in the Majapahit period. Local legend adds a story about a suitor from Ponorogo who was set impossible conditions by a princess of Kediri, and the name is explained through that tale. As with most legends, it is a story told about the place rather than an event with a date.
The tea estate that once surrounded the temple went through hard times. Under the management of a military cooperative it went bankrupt in the early 2000s, and most of the land now grows vegetables. About one hectare of tea still stands near the temple. That detail matters to visitors, because the temple’s green setting is now a survivor of the plantation rather than a working estate. For wider context on the temple age, the page on the Kediri Kingdom sets out the medieval realm whose rulers appear in the inscriptions.
Lawean Waterfall and Other Mountain Sights
Lawean Waterfall also lies in Geger village, about twenty-five kilometres south-west of the town of Tulungagung by road. Reaching it is a walk of roughly three kilometres on foot, with up to nine crossings of a stream along the way. Visitors should expect wet feet, a muddy trail in the rainy months and a walk through green hills rather than a roadside viewpoint.
Other places in the district include:
- A chrysanthemum garden that shows how the cool climate suits flower growing.
- A campsite at Jurang Senggani, which also serves as a trailhead for climbing Mount Wilis.
- A pine forest park in Nyawangan village.
- Bukit Lumpang, a hill in Picisan.
- A mountain guesthouse known as Pesanggrahan Argo Wilis.
- The markets of Sendang and Dono, which are where the villages sell produce and buy supplies.
The weather decides much of a day here. The rainy months turn trails slick and streams high, while the dry months give the clearest views of the slopes.
Villages on the Boundary With Kediri and Ponorogo
Sendang is also a border district. The boundary with Kediri regency runs along the mountain, and the villages of Picisan and Nyawangan are the ones named as touching the Kediri side. Nyawangan sits at a point where Tulungagung, Kediri and Nganjuk come together, which makes it the highest and most remote of the district’s settlements. On the western side, Nglurup borders a village in Pudak district of Ponorogo regency. These boundaries matter because the mountain does not follow administrative lines: people from either side of the ridge share trails, markets and kinship, and a village’s nearest town may be in another regency.
The same geography explains why the district keeps two kinds of centres. Sendang and Dono each have a market, serving the lower villages, while the higher hamlets of Nyawangan and Nglurup depend on small shops and on the walk down. A reader following the mountain road from east to west passes from villages where the fields are mostly grass and vegetables to hamlets where forest begins at the back gardens.
Getting Around and Planning a Visit
Sendang is best visited as a day trip from Tulungagung town or as part of a longer loop through the highlands. Public transport into the highlands is typically sparse, so most visitors drive or hire a vehicle. The route enters through Karangrejo and climbs, with the road narrowing and the air cooling at each village. Walkers heading for Lawean or the Wilis trailhead should leave early enough to return before dark, carry water and wear shoes suited to wet rock.
A practical combination is to pair Sendang with the lowland sights of the regency. The reservoir in neighbouring Pagerwojo, described on the Wonorejo Dam page, is a natural second stop, and the coast beyond the plain makes a very different second half of a trip. Those who want a stone-temple counterpart in the lowlands can read about Candi Boyolangu.
Sendang rewards people who like a working landscape: cows led out at dawn, grass cut along the terraces, a temple above old tea rows and a waterfall at the end of a stream walk. It offers none of the beach crowds of the south coast, and that quietness is the reason to go.
Related guides: Gondang District, Tulungagung: 20 Villages Under Mount Wilis, Wajak Fossil Site: The Early Modern Human Skulls of Tulungagung.