beautiful moments
This is a long, long, long delayed post on my trip up to Kota Kinabalu (Sabah), home of the highest mountain in South East Asia.
It was a trip which I at first regretted on deciding to go due to issues like time and $. But gosh, was I glad I did not back out in the end!
Give me beautiful man-made objects- skyscrapers, fountains, cars, towers, castles…anything and still, it will not match up to nature in all its glorious beauty! Something inside me just wants to burst out with joy whenever I get to enjoy beautiful places like these…places whose natural beauty is untouched.
Of course, not everything was untouched or unspoilt. The track up to Mount Kinabalu is man-made for convenience sake but i’m not complaining. My only gripe is the construction site at quarter way up the mountain. Read somewhere in the newspapers later that the project was brought to a halt in order to prevent further damage to the natural surroundings of the mountain.
Had a really great time with Maureen, Vincent, Wei Ling, Kah Yen and Rena. Who would have expected then that me, mau and vince would be housemates soon too! hehe…for those who don’t know, i would be shifting in with mau and vince. Would miss my hostel though! *sobz*
Pics with my ramblings now!
“Now, everyone can fly…” That’s Air Asia’s tagline :P And i must add, everyone who plans coz cheap or free tickets only go out to those who book them half a year earlier? Ohya, don’t know why the staff there did not allow us to take pictures while going on board. Managed to sneak some while they were not looking!
WeiLing and I were at an earlier flight (at least 1 hr before the rest), so we waited at one of the airport’s eateries in KK.
KK’s cheapest and bestest inn around! Forgive my england…
The travel to the base of KK. We stopped at a small tourist area where you could take pics of the mountain behind you and buy exorbitantly priced souveniors
At Poring Spring, we went for the canopy walk, enjoyed a cool waterfall and a sulfur water soak!
But why come to KK? To climb the highest mountain in SEA of course! :P But since we were day trippers…would it be possible to reach the top? People who usually climb KK would stay overnight at Laban Rata (6km). The whole route is 8.5 KM, height 4095 metres plus. Even our guide told us that it would be hard to reach the top so quickly and come down in time due to our lack of ahem stamina..heh..The climb up was to start at 7-7plus am and we were to reach the bottom by 4pm! So, this is what happened:
Yay! Ready to start! Hearts pumping and legs itching to get it going!
Start! no time to take much pics except for the few stops…At the 3 KM stop. 5.5 KM more to the top!
At Pondok Mempening which means Dizzy Hut! haha…Good thing it was not Pondok Mempengsan (Fainting Hut). Maybe by the time climbers reach here, they would feel dizzy :P
Mouth dry and kept drinking lots of 100 plus during the first 4 Km or so…not so bad after that but i was beginning to feel hungry! Ate some chocs :) When almost reaching Laban Rata (food and rest stop), a guy coming down came up to me and said ” you know up there, there’s a Hard Rock Cafe.” Ok, great some incentives now to keep going! After a little while more, another group of guys said ” Oh, there’s a lot of cafes and restaurants up there you know?! MacDonalds, KFC, Burger King..got Ramli Burger also!” Even better! I was like ok, just a little bit more and Ramli Burger here I come! So, used every ounce of strength i had left to climb up to Laban Rata while thinking of a nice hot Ramli Burger ;d Well, little did I know..they all tricked me and i was not their only victim :( Did we really looked thaaat hungry? There was no hard rock cafe, macs, kfc..not even ramli burger!!! wahhhhh cry! In the end, we shared a plate of fried rice lah..heh
Ok, so we were at laban rata but our guide was still behind with WeiLing. If we were to continue up to beyond here, we would need a key to pass through. To cut the story short, we begged them for the key as our guide said that we should go down already coz “tak ada masa sudah.” which means no time already. But it was 11.30 am when we reached there! So…begged and begged till we got it :P Dashed off pass the gate only to be stopped by our guide (who caught up with us after having his lunch..boy these ppl are fast or wat). Reached 8 KM i think and we HAD to get down even before reaching the top as it was 1 plus pm. .. :( But was glad that we went pass the gate coz the trail was different from before, more rocky and challenging. Had to use ropes to balance!
Time to go down *sobz* After going down, we rested again at laban rata…and stormy skies started to form and it was like how i felt…a little gloomy. hmm…but i guess Aurelia can’t stay gloomy for long too :P Droplets of rain fell and we had to brace ourselves for the climb down by adorning raincoats which made us look like cute penguins..heh
The descent was quite fun actually, coz we could go really fast and encourage the other climbers too! Too fast oso not good tho’ coz poor Mau sprained her leg half way down…worst thing that was my legs began to ache! And since that time, they ached for three whole days!!! blahh
Beatiful mountain views from our inn
Finally, time to go home…time to face other mountains!
