Trip to the Summit
The next time someone tells you Mt. Kinabalu is a trip through Hell. Believe them. Except this hell is a freezing Hell.
So I've actually been back from my Mt. Kinabalu Trip for quite some time now. It's just that I was too tired and uninspired to blog anything about it yet.
As Sabahan's, I bet nearly everyone of you have been asked the question "Have you climbed Mt. Kinabalu before?" at least once. And from now onwards, I'm proud that I can actually say "YES!"
So what's so special about this Mt. Kinabalu, for those who HAVEN'T climbed, you might ask. Well, first of all, the peak is 4095.2 meters high; the journey to the peak and back down would take you 2 days and 1 night; it cost me a bloody RM550++ (price as of 2009); and lastly, if you ain't from some country that snows.... lemme just say you could keep your fruits and veggies perfectly fresh all the way up to the peak if you brought any.
My trip however was a 3 days 2 nights one. That very morning on the 21st before I left my house... I looked out my window, and saw
and I looked back at my 12-kg packed backpack and double checked my jackets....... and I said... "nah... It can't be that bad"... ... ... I had no idea what I was getting myself into.
The first night was a stay at the renowned Kampung Mesilau!! Where we spent most of afternoon time having a foot-massage in the blisteringly cold river....
which made your toes feel like they were missing, and your feet feel like... cold penguin feet....
But of course... us little children couldn't care less about having our feet frozen and kicked off our shoes to the side.
Owners at Play
Just to take pictures...
Well... after about an hour and a half of getting our feet numb, we trotted back for a cold shower 0.0 ... .... Cold + Cold = Hot ^^ just like negative + negative = positive ^^ ... ... ... okay... nevermind me...
The cold shower after a cold leg dip was seriously a WRONG idea. Having a 10 degrees celcius shower would practically make girls scream
Having paid more than 500 bucks to freeze our asses in some wet river though... there IS... of course... something good that comes out of that. And that is buffet meals~! We had a filling steamboat dinner that night, and an even more stuffing breakfast the next morning. I have to say that the most enjoyable thing about this trip I had...... is that I did not have to worry about FOOD!!
Even the squirrels had to take the chance to have breakfast with us.
At 9:00 am of the 2nd day.... locked and loaded, we headed off
The first day's walk is an 8km walk uphill.... I have to admit that the road climbing up is actually very EASY.... especially for a person like me, who only did serious training 1~2 week prior to the climb.... and who usually sits at home only playing COD and O2Jam.... all it takes is 1.5 litres of water, 1 bar of chocolate, 1 lunch pack, and LOTS and LOTS of REST along the way... ... You'll feel as if your brain was going to explode and your heart would stop any minute... and if it rains, bravo~, you just got yourself some natural air-con that's pre-set to 12 degrees C and cannot be turned down.
But don't sweat it =) because there's always a resting hut within an hour's walk from where you are. And if you EVER happen to run out of water along the way.... and you're like in the middle of the whole journey and nearly half dead from thirst, and you expect to re-fill your bottle on the road... there's always this:
It really does make soOooo much sense when you're in the middle of nowhere and somewhere... with no water left... to be informed that you should've brought more water doesn't it? Thank you for your Understanding... Oh sure... I DO understand... ~.~
Anyway... it's a good thing I didn't run out of water myself. But pity the other people who thought they could get some water along the way... uh-uh.... too bad for them.
Honestly though. If anybody were to ask me where was the Best place in Sabah to have a photoshoot. In all honestly, my suggestion would be: Mt. Kinabalu.
Besides the challenging surroundings and backgrounds to take photographs with, there're still much insanely beautiful scenery to take pictures of. If you're not so interested in the scenery, you could even try some of this.... ....
At 9:00 am of the 2nd day.... locked and loaded, we headed off
The first day's walk is an 8km walk uphill.... I have to admit that the road climbing up is actually very EASY.... especially for a person like me, who only did serious training 1~2 week prior to the climb.... and who usually sits at home only playing COD and O2Jam.... all it takes is 1.5 litres of water, 1 bar of chocolate, 1 lunch pack, and LOTS and LOTS of REST along the way... ... You'll feel as if your brain was going to explode and your heart would stop any minute... and if it rains, bravo~, you just got yourself some natural air-con that's pre-set to 12 degrees C and cannot be turned down.
But don't sweat it =) because there's always a resting hut within an hour's walk from where you are. And if you EVER happen to run out of water along the way.... and you're like in the middle of the whole journey and nearly half dead from thirst, and you expect to re-fill your bottle on the road... there's always this:
It really does make soOooo much sense when you're in the middle of nowhere and somewhere... with no water left... to be informed that you should've brought more water doesn't it? Thank you for your Understanding... Oh sure... I DO understand... ~.~
Anyway... it's a good thing I didn't run out of water myself. But pity the other people who thought they could get some water along the way... uh-uh.... too bad for them.
Honestly though. If anybody were to ask me where was the Best place in Sabah to have a photoshoot. In all honestly, my suggestion would be: Mt. Kinabalu.
Besides the challenging surroundings and backgrounds to take photographs with, there're still much insanely beautiful scenery to take pictures of. If you're not so interested in the scenery, you could even try some of this.... ....
Looks like some kind of album cover page if you ask me ^^
Of course... for serious photographers.... carrying your full set equipment, tripod, and lighting could break your back in 101 places. You'll need so many lenses from wide angle to telephoto to macro to cover the whole heavenly sky to the tiny squirrels and spiderlings which made Spiderman spiderman.
Cutting off from photography talk... we arrived at mid-mountain... or so-called Laban Rata in the evening.... 8 hours of climb, rest, eat, talk, photo-shoot..... I guess we did fine ^^ But the worst was yet to come....
That night. None of us bathed. We stayed in Gunting Lagadan, which didn't have a heater... so the water was like... ... 5 degrees?? But it seemed that Laban Rata wasn't doing much better =)
We continued our climb at about 2:30 am midnight. Climbing in pitch-black darkness. The darkness was one thing... the steepness of the mountain is another!! and the COLD WIND is the worst part~!
Unfortunately, since my camera flash is out of order, I don't have any pictures of the climb T.T
To cut the long story short... we climbed 3 hours in the Cold Night... walking on without a clue where we were going (of course the only clue was.... the peak)... all we did was walk along a the white rope which our whole journey depended on. In the middle of the night, 50 Meters LOOKED like a 100 meters!! But FELT like 500~!!!
Your Life Line
It was more of a test of Mentality that physical fitness I'll tell you:
"Your Body is about to collapse... your lips are nearly frozen... you are 2 kilometers more to the peak. You can choose to walk 500 meters downhill back to your warm room... or you could walk uphill till your eyes froze for another 2 kilometers... Which do you choose...."
Somehow... I managed to make it in to the peak in time for sunrise ^^ But I was already too tired to be taking photographs... so I just watched... while my face was blown dry by the icy wind.
Of course... for serious photographers.... carrying your full set equipment, tripod, and lighting could break your back in 101 places. You'll need so many lenses from wide angle to telephoto to macro to cover the whole heavenly sky to the tiny squirrels and spiderlings which made Spiderman spiderman.
Cutting off from photography talk... we arrived at mid-mountain... or so-called Laban Rata in the evening.... 8 hours of climb, rest, eat, talk, photo-shoot..... I guess we did fine ^^ But the worst was yet to come....
That night. None of us bathed. We stayed in Gunting Lagadan, which didn't have a heater... so the water was like... ... 5 degrees?? But it seemed that Laban Rata wasn't doing much better =)
We continued our climb at about 2:30 am midnight. Climbing in pitch-black darkness. The darkness was one thing... the steepness of the mountain is another!! and the COLD WIND is the worst part~!
Unfortunately, since my camera flash is out of order, I don't have any pictures of the climb T.T
To cut the long story short... we climbed 3 hours in the Cold Night... walking on without a clue where we were going (of course the only clue was.... the peak)... all we did was walk along a the white rope which our whole journey depended on. In the middle of the night, 50 Meters LOOKED like a 100 meters!! But FELT like 500~!!!
Your Life Line
It was more of a test of Mentality that physical fitness I'll tell you:
"Your Body is about to collapse... your lips are nearly frozen... you are 2 kilometers more to the peak. You can choose to walk 500 meters downhill back to your warm room... or you could walk uphill till your eyes froze for another 2 kilometers... Which do you choose...."
Somehow... I managed to make it in to the peak in time for sunrise ^^ But I was already too tired to be taking photographs... so I just watched... while my face was blown dry by the icy wind.
To sum it all up... I'm pretty satisfied and proud of myself for actually reaching the peak... because it wasn't only once, that the idea of turning back and just giving it all up came to mind.... but I thought that if so many others could've made it, I can too, and I pushed on...
**I'll give a hint to those intending on climbing and haven't climbed before.. Looking at the photo on top.... and all other photos taken by people at Mt. K's peak... it seems small doesn't it?? I'll tell you that... from the place I was standing when I took that photo, to the tiny person walking there.... is about 100 ~ 150 meters of downhill walk.... which would take you about.... 4~5 minutes to walk... ^^
If you asked me if I'd want to climb again.... my answer:
I'd love to. But with better camera equipment, a flash... and a tripod.
When? Not anytime within a year's time, haha.
And this time I'm gonna train harder and further so that I won't have to be bothered with being tired while making my way up...
Oh.... and if I didn't have to worry about the price =.=.... RM600 a year.... no thanks... that's gonna blow my pocket.
**I'll give a hint to those intending on climbing and haven't climbed before.. Looking at the photo on top.... and all other photos taken by people at Mt. K's peak... it seems small doesn't it?? I'll tell you that... from the place I was standing when I took that photo, to the tiny person walking there.... is about 100 ~ 150 meters of downhill walk.... which would take you about.... 4~5 minutes to walk... ^^
If you asked me if I'd want to climb again.... my answer:
I'd love to. But with better camera equipment, a flash... and a tripod.
When? Not anytime within a year's time, haha.
And this time I'm gonna train harder and further so that I won't have to be bothered with being tired while making my way up...
Oh.... and if I didn't have to worry about the price =.=.... RM600 a year.... no thanks... that's gonna blow my pocket.
3 comments:
js to make yr blog perfect...
u wrote tis : "Somehow... I managed to make it in the peak in time for sunrise ^^" ... try tis "I managed to make it TO the peak in time for sunrise" { from ~ will ~ }
boy ! it's a sunrise u wont forget ... i know as i seen it too...
Haha. Thanks for the tip, guess it was a typo.
Yup. It sure is. But I was too cold and tired that I couldn't be bothered taking pictures anymore and just watched. Haha.
GREAT PIKS, bert! keep em coming yo
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