Advertisement
Published: March 9th 2008
Edit Blog Post
gunung kinabalu
just before sunrise, it was bloody frezing!!!!!!!! We spent a few days in Kota Kinabalu some of them rather wet, the monsoon rain is still coming and it is pretty predictable that it will be raining around 4pm most days!! One particular day we treated ourselves to a trip to the cinema ( we saw Jumper)it was fine when we went in but it was hammering it down when we came out and it wasn't letting up. We were the other side of town to our accomodation with no water proofs or umbrella, we were going to get wet, VERY WET!! We need some food as well and thought is better to eat before getting soaked. the KFC across the street was the closest place, so when there was a gap in the traffic we made a run for it still getting a bit damp! As we sat eating our Chicken and chips a standing wave developed outside in the street and all the drains/ run off cgannals were overflowing. Eventually we did just have to go and resigned to getting soggy!We laughed all the way back to the accomodation at time through shin deep "puddles", there may also have been a bit of 'singing in the rain'!!!!!!!
hanging around
1bannana, 2 bannana 3 bannana more...... KK's water front has a beautiful sun set view over a group of national park islands(the name escapes me at this precise moment) However if you take too deeper breath in you might inhale more than you bargined for! The stench of sewage was farely strong and as for actually looking down to the water you could see why as poo and sanitary towels floated past. that didn't however stop the local kids from enjoying a dip.
We took a day trip to Sapi, one of the islands within the national park. It was a lovely day relaxing on the beach and snorkelling with the very friendly fishes, some of whom thought it would be good to see what we tasted like!!!nibbling our toes and fingers. On the beaches there were some big monitor lizards roaming around which were quite cool. We also scrambled a bit around the island and got a beach to ourselves although the coral wasn't so good round there there were plenty of shells to forage!!
On the boat ride back we had to go to one of the other islands to pick someone else up, just after doing so we saw a pod of about
15 dolphins which was a very special and privelaged end to the day. :-)
We spent a couple of days trying to sort out our trip up to mount Kinabalu, the company that run the accomodation half way up have a complete monopoly of the park and charge extortionate amounts to have the privelage of staying in there places. Some what begrudgingly we agreed to pay there asking price as we really wanted to do the mountain and wasn't it worth it!!
We started up the mountain on the 5th march as part of a group of 6, which eased the price slightly. As we made it up the GIANT steps (all right for paul he's got long legs!!!!!!) our group gelled pretty well and the chatter within the group managed to divert attention from the lack of views(the cloud was hugging the mountain) the rain and at least some of the giant steps!!
We made it up to Laban Rata (3000m) in about 4.5 hours and cheekily took hot showers (all but hele) and whiled away the hours sitting in the slightly warm cafeteria drying our clothes and playing cards before trekking another 200m up th hill to our freezing dorm, fed watered and ready for bed. You might have thought we'd have slept but some people were nocking about until 11ish and then some were up again being sick in the night and from about 1am there was a constant mumble of people milling around. We got up at 2.30am and were walking by 3am. you could see a stream of lights snaking its way up in front of us, although we passed some groups on the way there were still plenty in front, there were plenty of people doing the climb! The pace going up was pretty slow due to the altitude but we kept it constant and made good time to the summit, arriving at 5.40am with a bit of time to kill before the sun rose. IT WAS BLOODY FREEZING (in pauls words!)(i think i had the advantage of my down jacket ) with quite a strong wind blowing. However we stayed on the summit about a hour and had amzing views of the sun rising over an inversion which covered most of borneo.
After an hour of freezing our butts off we descended at a steady pace, wanting to enjoy the time we had up there, but once we got into the tree line we headed for breakfast at laban rata at a pace and enjoyed a short nap aswell. the walk down was pretty intense on the knees especially after 3.5hrs of it, and to top it off the last 100m was uphill!!!!!!!!!
Once back at HQ we al had dinner before saying our final goodbyes and heading off in seperate directions into the rain.it was kinda sad as we'd got to know each other quite well and enjoyed the different company.
that evening we took it easy and had a reasonably early night in preperation for the trip to sepilok the following day. that however wasn't quite as simple as it makes out in the guide book.due to elections and the start of school holidays all the buses were full and some people had ended up waiting for hours with no luck. We on the other hand didn't fare too bad, we caught a bus to ranau where we needed to get some money out then met 6 other travellers who'd been waiting hours. after a while we grouped together to try and charter a minivan. the best we could do was get half way into a "town" called telupid (a few restaurants and stalls about the size of a football pitch) where luck would have it there was a minivan prepared to take us but it took some hard barganning to get a good price.
3hrs later and some 6hrs after leaving rose cabin we arrived in sepilok jungle resort.
following day we went to the orangutan re'habilitation centre to watch the feeding of the released orangutans who come back out the forest to enjoy some bannanas and milk!!
It was brilliant their faces convey soo much emotion and they are very human like in their characteristics (in fact with there sparse hair muscular backs and laid back attitudes there were a couple that couldnt help but remind you of max and boothy :-). They "hung " around for about an hour and then dissapeared back into the forest and sat among the trees whilst the pig tailed macaques finished off what had been left. We also went to the afternoon feeding which was a lot nicer as the tour groups tend to just go to the morning feed so it was a bit less touristy. Another amazing experience to log in the memory bank, Borneo has been a very special place to come to and we havn't even done half the stuff you could, everything about the place just feeds the emotions, not all of them are good though. tody we drove for 6 hours and saw nothing but palm plantations most of the way to the horizon. to think of the rainforest that we've been in and how that would once have covered that area is a sobering thought of our effect on the planet!!!!!
those 6 hours have lead us to tawau where we are now and hopefully in the next day or so we will be crossing into indonesia!!!!!!!!!!!
pictures will follow i promise, but for now lve n ugs
Paul n Hellyxxxxxxxxxxx
have gary and joy got a house yet??????????????
Advertisement
Tot: 0.243s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 8; qc: 43; dbt: 0.0635s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
dave
non-member comment
bloody hell you two its took ages to read them its a good job im at work gettin paid for it while control find us an ambulance that works. sounds like your havin a ball, i look forward to seeing some snaps when you get the opportunity. ds