She Was in Kota Kinabalu (Pt.1)

Finally went on a holiday again, this time in my home country Malaysia. For the first time in 24 years of my life, I visited the East Malaysia, so fun! Main reason for the visit is to climb the highest peak in Southeast Asia, Mount Kinabalu. Never thought I would be able to do it, but more on that later.

There will be two parts to this holiday post; first the mountain, then the sea. Note that I went with an organised tour by an acquaintance, so while it's not exactly like most formal tours, there was an agenda set beforehand. Also, will give my 2 cents about climbing Mount Kinabalu and the experience itself in a separate post.

I'm blessed to be able to go on this adventure with my close friends and boyfriend. Pretty fun as it has been long since we are able to go on a holiday together seeing that we've been living in different parts of the world for the past few years. The company definitely made it extra fun, hehe.

Transportation:
As this is a tour, we usually move around with a chartered bus/van. For most other places we visited, we were moving on Bus No 11 - our feet, haha. Of course, this was the only mode of transportation for the mountain part of our journey.

Day 1
KK Town
Pekan Nabalu
Kinabalu Park
Mersilau Resort

Base:  Mersilau Resort
Location: 3/5
Environment: 4/5
Room: 3.5/5
Definitely one of the better accomodations around the area. We stayed in a decent bunk bed hostel. There was a living room in the "longhouse" that had 2 bedrooms of 4 and 2 bedrooms of 8. Adequate bathrooms with proper shower. F&B was quite good with decent spread of dinner & breakfast. It's also quite nice to walk around and enjoy the scenery - take some photos!

 Our 6-person hostel room in Mersilau

We touched down in KK around late morning, had a quick lunch in KK town and some last minute shopping. It's essential to note what you have/don't have for the hike as from this point onwards, it will be hard to buy the necessities especially hiking gear. We got some fruits, snacks and water to bring on our hike. Also tried the famous Yoyo pearl milk tea, KK's own chain of bubble tea. Didn't really fancy it cause it was too milky but the mini pearls were yummy. Next, we started our 3 hour drive to Mersilau Resort where we will be spending the night before our hike.

Stopped at Pekan Nabalu to capture some photos of Mount KK. Really pretty scenery especially on a sunny day. If you missed the KK town stop to buy your hiking need especially food/drinks, you still can get some fruits here. Bananas are a popular choice. Continued the journey to Kinabalu Park which is the starting point for one of two trails onto Mount Kinabalu - the Timpohon trail. As that's the trail for us to come down from the mountain, we needed to transfer by van up windy roads to Mersilau, which is the other trail, and the trail we have chosen to hike up. Stayed for the night, and was super nervous for our hike the next day.

Pretty sight on the way to Mersilau, reminds me of the little cottages on the Salzburg hills

 The view of Mount Kinabalu from Pekan Nabalu

Day 2
Hike from Mersilau Resort to Laban Rata

Base: Gunting Lagadan Rest House, Laban Rata
Location: N/A
Environment: N/A
Room: 2/5
Right, so it's a bit hard to give ratings for this base simply because it's kinda the only place to stay on the mountain so there's no relative comparison. And it does not make sense to compare to anywhere else on flat ground, haha. It's not the most comfortable place to stay, but given that we're on a cold mountain, this is really the best one can get. It is COLD. No hot water, no heater in the place. I would say the temperature at this part of the mountain is between 5 -8 degrees celcius, but since I'm shit afraid of the cold, it's extra cold to me especially when the wind blows. All in all, you will be thankful to even have a roof over your head in this situation.

The sight of Laban Rata greets you! It's that yellow roof building on your left

Woke up early to prepare ourselves. Left our main luggage with the resort who would transfer it to Kinabalu Park. Prepped our porter bags and our own backpacks. At 8.45am, we started our ascend towards Laban Rata. As we were briefed before, we need to consider our own pace especially at the beginning of the journey since it was quite significantly steep uphill and downhill. I like that terrain though because it provided variety, otherwise I would be shit tired/bored. Started the journey pretty slow because I was worried about the altitude sickness. Get a good pace, and it's really easier. The terrain was mostly a mix of rough steps moulded out of red soil, some parts had proper wooden steps installed, other times we were treading rocks and small streams. The scenery was quite amazing especially at the elevation where the bonsai trees started growing.

 So semangat before first leg of climb

Hikers unite

 Closer to the summit! Not really.

 Hikers still energetic.

Pretty waterfall dotting the trail.

We reached Laban Rata around 4.45pm, so that was a good 8 hours of hiking with rests at some of the huts. SO TIRING! And we had to hike another 10 - 15 minutes up to our base for the night, Gunting Lagadan. Slept early that night since our hike is expected to begin at 2.30am.

So out of breath at this point of time.

View from Laban Rata

Day 3
Hike from Laban Rata to Mount Kinabalu Summit
Hike from Summit down to Kinabalu Park via Timpohon Trail

Our hike was suppose to begin at 2.30am but it started pouring at 2am. SUPER BUMMER. We thought that was it, and we can't hike up the summit because it's usually prohibited to climb after the rain. Plus, we met some hikers along the way who told us that they didn't manage to complete their hike as well. But lo and behold, by some amazing blessing we were allowed to climb in the morning. So we got some extra sleep, and some light as well, haha.

Started our climb at 7.30am and it was challenging because I was feeling so cold, and the terrain was not the most forgiving. Come to think of it, it probably is one of the prettiest trail because we were scaling rocks while water streams form due to the downpour - like climbing a waterfall. Scenery was also gorgeous because of the habitation at that height; pretty flowers and bonsai-ish trees adorned the trail.

 This is just barely making it.

You have happy hikers and struggling ones holding onto ropes for dear life.

We reached the Rope station which was probably the hardest part because we had to depend on ropes to hike up, and it's a long long way down. Massively challenging for me because I am afraid of heights thus I wanted to do it quick but the altitude sickness and lack of oxygen really got to my pacing. Really, the ascend up the summit was so mentally challenging I was ready to give up if not for the boyfriend and my friends. At 11.30am, after God's grace and so much motivation, we actually reached the coveted peak of Mount Kinabalu. As I type this, I'm still in disbelief, especially since we could not spend much time there since we have to hurry down the mountain. Took some photos, reveled in the awesome scenery, and made our way down.

We reached Laban Rata at 2.30pm, had a quick lunch and prepared for our descend down via Timpohon trail at 3.45pm. Again, this was a challenge because the trail is downhill all the way, and made it so difficult for our knees and soles which were tired from the climb. I don't know how, but we made it out of the forest by 7.45pm. We had an hour of darkness in the forest, so thank God for headlamps.

I never knew how sweet victory felt like until we reached the doors of Kinabalu Park Resort, all stinky, muddy, tired and ever so satisfied.

That night, we headed back to KK town with an experience I less than vivid in memory, but definitely unforgettable.

This is generally the reaction everytime we manage 500m whether uphill or downhill, haha.