Laban Rata Charge

"Cock-a-doodle-doo, Cock-a-doodle-doo...." We were awaken by the crowing of a rooster. Wow, they even have rooster at such altitude and it actually woke us up on time! Little did we realize that it was the alarm tone set by my friend! And we were so awestruck by the service provided by Mesilau Resort. After a quick rinse and a final round of packing, we headed to the restaurant for our buffet breakfast.

It was such a crowd! You would never feel that everyone there was about to set out on a quest to hike Mount Kinabalu. Everyone was attacking the food as though it is his last breakfast. Next task was to hand over the luggage bags to be transferred to Timbohon gate with a charge of RM10 per bag as there is where we would descend to. The final gathering point will be with the guide who briefed us on some tips and crucial information that we should know. Those bags to be carried by porters were weighed too and i could proudly state that the shared bag by all 9 of us was lighter than the rest, talk about traveling light. We're the practical travelers!

Without further delay, we departed from the gate of Mesilau into heaven haha, of course not literally but you know what i mean. We weren't the first group to depart, hence there were many others ahead of us. I remained the first few to lead the group because of the lesson learnt: to enjoy better privileges, you always have to stay ahead, remember, early bird gets the worm. I have heard of horror stories whereby you don't get to shower with hot water if you arrive late, i definitely don't want to suffer that fate!

The hike was fairly easy. We took our own sweet time as I was advised to snap as many photos as possible along the way. Mesilau route is famed for its scenic beauty hence there are more and more climbers opting this route instead of Timbohon route that is way much shorter, 3km in fact.


Along the way, I stole glances at the many peaks surrounding Low's Peak. It was a very cool day and thin blankets of mist surrounded the peaks.


Even the plants and trees are different. They reminded me of giant bonsai plants magnified 10-50 times. For every 1km, there is an RnR stop for climbers to take a breather, fill up their dwindling water supply and to rest their aching legs. Hence, it was a great milestone achievement when we hit our first km. Everyone was cheering to give confidence to each other. It's amazing how people unite under harsh circumstances, that is the beauty of mankind.

As we gained more altitude, the air turned cooler and the wind got stronger. In fact, from time to time, we could hear the wind howling phase by phase, sounded exactly like waves crashing onto the shore and retreating back into the sea. At times, it sounded as though the rain was traveling towards us from afar, which turned out into false alarm. Imagine, being in the forest at such an altitude but you have beautiful lullaby that sounded like sea waves, how calming it is. Slowly, we were able to catch glimpses of Low's Peak and the barren, bleak stone wall.


The mountain peaks didn't look friendly and inviting at all. They seemed to exude this arrogance, challenging us to conquer them. They seemed ever so stony, grand and cold. We felt extremely minute and insignificant being surrounded by ruthless stony stares. The higher we got, the less shelter there was. This means the wind mercilessly attacked us, trying its very best to blow our enthusiasm, zest away. It even seemed as though the wind was coercing, persuading us to go back to where we came from.



You would tend to forget that you're still in Malaysia when you look at your surrounding. There are trees with brown reddish leaves, yellowish leaves and different shades of green. The trees are unique too, unlike the tropical, huge trees that we see normally in jungles in Malaysia. Some trees even arched above the trail as though they were saluting us to have reached so far.



Everywhere I turned, I was greeted with scatters of clouds and plains of green, red and yellow. I really felt out of the world. I was so immersed in the beauty. The absolute quiet made me hear the wind and the rustling of the leaves. They were singing a symphony, a symphony that sang the greatness of us arriving this far. For a moment, I stood there, engulfed by nature, soaked in the beauty so overwhelming.




After the stretch of bowing, saluting trees, we were greeted by steep steps. These steps went up and up and up and up. How encouraging!



We climbed, dragged our tired legs, pushed our heavy buttocks and panted profusely. The only encouragement is the peaks that started to look bigger. From a far spot to something discern.


After KM5, there is this most scenic RnR, perched very near the edge of the cliff overlooking the whole Sabah state. Wind was howling like mad. I had my hair all over my face. I turned 360 degrees and I was greeted by picturesque scenery. It would be heavenly to have a coffee shop serving hot brewed coffee here. Yumieeee, I dreamt on.




We were inching closer and closer to our destination. "Ain't no mountain high enough.." that song ran through my head. More and more steps, never ending steps, exhausting fleet of steps, when would the steps finally end?





After plowing across boring stretch of steps, I spotted the first sight of civilization! It appeared in the form of a roof! My heart skipped a beat, my eyes lit up and my steps turned lighter. This is it, after suffering for 6 hours plus, we were going to make it there soon!

Somehow, those last few meters seemed so dreadful, far and long. I wanted to speed up my pace but my legs just wasn't co-operating. They were very stubborn, plunged deep into the soil and every step I took I had to use great force to pull them out. After much determination and mental strength, we saw Laban Rata Restaurant. I could wait no more, barged into the restaurant and plopped onto the chair closest to the windows to enjoy a bird's eye view. I ordered a pot of hot Milo.

Dreaming of Laban Rata

Finally, the day has come. The van arrived on the dot to pick us up and chauffeur us to Mesilau Resort in Kundasang. It was quite a long ride. I was extremely drowsy as i lacked sleep the night before. We booked a room in Akinabalu Youth Hostel and what i can say is, Sabahans are really healthy folks. They wake up real early to start their new day, approximately 4am. By 4.30am or so, i started hearing cars wheezing past the hostel. It was such a nightmare! If you want to totally give up sleeping, i believe you can just lie on your back and count the number of cars passing by. This is the room in Akinabalu Youth hostel. Even though the bed frames creak with your every move, squeaks with your every toss and turn, the rooms are clean.


Along the way to Kundasang, we drove past plains of plantations and forest. The greenery that greeted us was never ending. Waves after waves of forest flooded into our sight. I was struggling to keep my eyes open as the bumpy ride was like a lullaby to me, putting me to sleep. We were told that 2 tables had been reserved for us at Bayu Restaurant in Kundasang for our lunch.

Upon reaching Bayu Restaurant, we immediately placed our orders. All of us were starved. Bayu Restaurant is quite a cosy restaurant run in a small scale. It is trying very hard to provide variety to its menu.

Next stop after fulfilling our hunger pang was a cow farm! I admit that i was not excited at all about it. What is there to see in a cow farm, it sounded boring to me. How wrong was i. I was skipping all over the place squeezing to look at the cows waiting in line to be milked. The cows roamed free on the meadow grazing and relaxing. At the same time, some are queuing up to be milked by the machines. They are so obedient. It is either the lure of the food provided while milking process is carried out or they have been trained to rush in whenever the gates to the queue is opened.



A must-not-miss is buying fresh milk produced in this cow farm. We went over to the production line where machines were working very hard to sterilize, pasteurize and package the milk. A small box of milk, i think it's half the size of those normal cartons sold in supermarket, costs RM2.00 and RM2.50 for chocolate flavored.

We carried on with our journey to Mesilau Resort. The air was getting cooler and cooler as we are going higher and higher in altitude. It was such a relaxing, calm ride. The driver dropped us at the parking bay and we followed a park ranger who led us to our rooms. When we saw the slope leading to our rooms, we took a deep breath. It was such a steep slope! By the time we heaved and hoed our luggages and reached the top of the slope, we were out of breath, panting heavily. Gosh, how are we going to conquer South East Asia's highest peak when we couldn't even bring our luggage bags up this slope! We started to have second thoughts.

I headed straight to the shower room. The water was freezing cold. Just washing our hands under running tap water sent my fingers numb. I was very thankful for the hot water they provided. Unfortunately, those who were late were not fortunate enough to enjoy hot water. The lesson that i learnt was : always go for the bathroom for your shower in place like this, you never know when the hot water supply will run out.

We wandered around Mesilau Resort. The chill wind sent shivers down our spines. Air was so cool and fresh, the aroma of leaves and the flowers wafted through the air. It was so ever refreshing. If only we are able to smell natural fragrance like this in KL city. Our dinner was in the Restaurant in Mesilau Resort. The buffet style dinner really caught us by surprise! We never expected to be able to enjoy sumptuous dinner before our deadly climb the next day. Of course, we attacked the food like scavenges.



After sweeping in plates after plates of food into our mouths, we decided to give our tummies a rest. We headed back to our room. The atmosphere was serious for a moment when all of us pondered about the ascend the next day. All of us wanted to call it off and just enjoy the stay in Mesilau Resort. We were practically buoyed by all these worries and concerns to sleep.

Pre-KK symptoms

1st May 2009, a very special date in my calendar. It is when one of my dreams will be fulfilled. Amidst the excitement exuded from my exterior, there is a lot of trepidation and concerns inside. Will my injured ankle fail me? It has been more than 1 month but my ankle has not fully recovered from the sprained ligament. Will my condition allow me to conquer Mount Kinabalu without hiccups?

Besides the adrenaline rush of scaling Mount Kinabalu that thrills me, it is the idea of going on another trip with my besties. Since schooling years till now, we have gone through a whole lot. Who wouldn't have when you've walked through around 10 years together. From the innocent, rebellious teenagers to the matured, wacky young adults. We witnessed the transformation of each and everyone. Gosh, no idea where the sudden nostalgia came from, *grins*.

Anyway, my heart has flown to Kota Kinabalu where the grand, serene highest peak awaits me. Do tune in for the details next week. There will be a great story to be told.

Nuang-Lolo Camp

On one of our practice sessions for Mount Kinabalu, we picked Gunung Nuang, Selangor's highest peak. However, due to my injured ankle and due to my buddies' nature of enjoying instead of going through gruesome training, we decided to stop at Lolo Camp instead of heading to the summit. I know, i know, it defeats the purpose then but i would rather give my ankle a chance to recover than deteriorating it more. I need only 1 more week for it to fully recover, that is according to the doctor, let's pray that he is right.
We arrived at base at around 8.30am and started out on our hike at 8.50am. We had read from blogs that described thoroughly how the trek to the peak of Gunung Nuang is. The first stretch is purely steep muddy trail to Lolo Camp. There are no steps but slope all the way. In fact, if you have a 4x4, you can even drive to Lolo Camp. This slope is perfect for my ankle as climbing steps would be a tad too risky as I could land my foot on an uneven surface and twist it again since my ankle is very vulnerable at the moment.


The stretch seemed never-ending. Due to the rain the night before, most of the trail was muddy. That impaired our advance and slowed us down as we didn't want to have our shoes covered with mud. The trail went on and on and on. Most parts are steep and we had to toughen our calf muscle to ascend. The challenge here was more on mental strength as it could get really boring. Somehow, we survived :D.

Lolo Camp is dirty! We were greeted by rubbish dump and rubbish piles scattered everywhere. It really didn't make us feel like lingering long. We tried to look for a quieter spot away from the workers who were doing some construction work. We found an isolated spot right beside the waterfall. It was narrow but that's the best we could find.


Without further delay, we attacked the food we brought. You would never be able to guess what our main course was. KFC!! To go with KFC, there were tuna sandwich, watermelon, longan and lychee dessert and hard-boiled eggs. What a sumptuous feast right in the heart of nature.


After spending 2 hours by the waterfall, we headed back to civilization. Below are some photos along the way down.

Project Sun Tan Part IV

As though 1 day of sun-tanning was not sufficient, we decided to go on another island-hopping tour. Well, what's an island trip if you do not soak yourself in sun rays?

Our first stop was Maya Island. This is the very famous island where the movie "The Beach" was filmed. I guess you know what movie this is. I have not watched it so nothing looked familiar to me. When you stand on Maya Beach overlooking the breathtaking sea, you feel as though you are out of the world. You have fine, white sand underneath your feet, sky blue glistening, glittering sea water calmly and gently rushing onto the shores and towering, gigantic mountains enclaving the crystal clear water and the sandy beach. It felt too much for me to take in, too hard for me to believe that this view was for real. How could there be such a view! Sadly, the throng of tourists and the noise pollution that ensued drew away most of its beauty.



We ventured into the heart of this small island only to find ourselves in a deep ravine. You would feel as though you were in a lost world with dense forest and strange-looking trees all around you.

After the brief stop at Maya Beach, we were brought to a lagoon where the water level will rise another 20meters during high tide.

For lunch, we had at Monkey Beach where there were supposed to be throngs of monkeys on that island. Too bad, due to the weather (it rained!!!), that plan was postponed. Instead, we headed to our next destination, Bamboo island. We were left with no choice due to the heavy rain. It was astonishing to experience heavy downpour in open sea. Due to its vastness you can spot clear sky on your left but surprising blurry view on your right due to the rain.
All in all, the only highlight of this island tour is Maya Beach where our breath was really taken away. The rest was quite a disappointment, sad to say.
The next day marked the last day in Krabi. We did not have much time to travel too far hence we opted for an elephant ride and another session of traditional thai massage.

Below is our dear elephant darling whose name is Moon. She is such a good girl, she would obey the instructors's every single instruction. Even though she would be curious and mischievous at times by being distracted by new plants or leaves, she would put it aside and carry on with her journey.

How comfortable would it be if we are always surrounded by greenery and mountains and clear blue sky. This is paradise!

Well, this marks the end of my krabi trip. It had been enjoyable. There are so many more attractions that we didn't manage to cover. It would be awesome to be able to go back one day to cover those areas!