There's a lovely postcard in every souvenir shop in Malaysian Borneo of the beautiful Mt. Kinabalu--South East Asia's highest point--that says I came, I saw, I conquered. As for Andrew and my ascent up the mountain, there was absolutely no conquering. Not even a tiny bit. Although we made it up and down in one piece, the mountain sorely humbled us.
It was Andrew's idea to come to Malaysian Borneo, he wanted to see Orangatans and rain forests and I had the bright idea of climbing the mountain. "It'll be fun!" I said to Andrew's grumbling, "And the exercise will do us good." This climbing thing is a bad habit of mine, which I did traveling through Europe as well. If there's a mountain, a clock tower, a really high ladder within a kilometer I am drawn to it like a fat kid to apple pie. I don't know what it is, I guess I like the idea of seeing a city or country from a bird's eye view. I should have learned my lesson in Switzerland with my 12 hour descent down Mt. Eiger, but somehow I tend to block these treacherous experiences out.
Anyways, the lovely Lonely Planet explains in detail what the climb is like so we should have known....but it also says that for it's size Mt. Kinabalu is one of the easiest mountains in the world to climb. Do not do what I did and read that as it is easy to climb...No, it's just easier than say that other really tall mountain Everest or something. Treacherous two day climb up a mountain in freezing cold weather with the possibility of rain? I'm in!
It takes two days to get the top of Mt. Kinabalu (we met a guy who did it in 1 day, but he was a nutter and he was English so I highly recommend not following his lead). The first day is a really steep hike, not so much a climb, with hundreds upon hundreds of steps for 5 hours (about 6 kilometers and 11000 feet up). This is a bit misleading, seeing as you start about halfway up at 6500 feet (I told you it was the easiest mountain of its height) but it's still frickin high and a lot of steps! Until we came down, I really did not realize how many steps there were (there I go blocking out the treacherous parts again). Not only was it a difficult climb, the second we got on the trail it started pouring. And it proceeded to pour for our entire ascent, with the clouds literally shitting on us during our last 45 minutes. Needless to say we were not happy and very, very wet.
I, being the responsible one in the relationship, told Andrew to pack an entire new set of clothes seeing as this is a rain forest and there's a very good chance it will rain (I wasn't expecting the whole time, however). I saw him take out the clothes, but somehow they did not make it into the bag. About 1 hour up the mountain he tells me that the shorts he is wearing are his only pair of shorts (I can barely hear him through the downpour). Not only that, we get up to the top and it turns out he didn't bring new underwear or socks! Somehow a 'whole new outfit' was interpreted as a new t-shirt. Well played Andrew, seeing as it was 45 degrees where we stayed the night. He ended up having to buy a $10 pair of glorified boxers that he put on backwards and proceeded to rip in half almost immediately. Looking back it was pretty funny (who I am kidding, it was funny immediately).
Because the mountain covers in clouds almost immediately after the sun rises, everyone recommends waking up at 2:30 to make it up to the top for the sunrise. Actually, that's leaving at 2:30 so waking up even before that. Considering you're so tired from hiking uphill the first day, it's pretty easy to go bed relatively early. However, staying asleep is a challenge because there was no heat in our room and we were SO COLD! I was wearing every layer I owned (which by the way was the only thing I had to climb up to the top) and I was still cold under 2 blankets. I was almost happy to get up at 2:00 to start the climb to move around and try to warm up.
So it's 2:30, it's 39 degrees, and Andrew and I and about 200 Chinese tourists begin our ascent up to the tippity top. We have 2.5 kilometers to go, but these are the toughest of the lot. The steps begin at a far steeper grade than before and the atmosphere begins to thin. Breathing becomes a chore and our legs are severely sore from the day before. Oh yeah, and it's pitch black out. The first little while is an extremely slow pace due to all the other tourists, since there's only 1 path and we're all going the same place. With everyone's flashlights we resemble little ants walking up the mountain and you can see the path ahead clearly from those who started before you and it's not encouraging.
After the steps, the rope part of the journey begins. The ropes aren't scary, as they are more extremely exerting. Ropes = steep and steep = tiring. Ropes follow you the entire rest of the way, but you don't have to use them but 3 or 4 times (presumably because they show you the path so you won't fall off a cliff!). At this point, Andrew and I are literally stopping every 5 steps for a 'breather.' Three and a half hours later (and me almost giving up with like 10 meters to go) we're at the top. Just before the sunrise. And what a wonderful sunrise it is.
According to our guide, Nail (pronounced NEAL), it was one of the clearest most impressive sunsets he's had in months. And we totally deserved it, considering the crap climb we had the day before. There was barely a cloud in the sky and you could see for miles. And when the sun rose, it colored the few clouds there were red and orange. Supposedly, from where we were we could see as far as the Phillipines, but I couldn't be bothered at that point to go to the other side of the cliff (it was hard enough to breathe sitting where I was). 13000 feet (4095.2 meters ) later, we made it. And it was a glorious feeling.
But then I remembered we had to go down.
It took another 2 hours to get back to the lodge. In the daylight, it wasn't nearly as scary, but it still wasn't easy. We got back at 8:30 in the morning, ate some breakfast and headed down again. We had another 4 hours of hiking down hill to go and we had already been at it for 6 hours. One of the hardest things physically I've ever had to do was make myself get up from the breakfast table and begin the descent down the mountain.
Up until the last hour, it was actually way easier than I thought it was going to be. Granted going down all those steps (I believe I read somewhere there's 2500) is very painful on the knees, it's not nearly as exerting on the lungs so you go a bit faster than on the way up. Unfortunately, Andrew's mogul knees gave him a big 'FUCK YOU FOR DOING THIS TO ME' about 3 hours in and he was in severely bad shape for last 2 kilometers. I felt really bad for our guide because we were going at a snail's pace by the end, but he didn't seem to mind.
It's all over now (well my sore muscles wouldn't agree with that) and looking back I'm really glad it we did it. We still are living in fear of steps (any steps, including sidewalks) and getting up from chairs prove a challenge, But would I recommend it? Yes. Would I do it again? HELL NO. It's definitely a great, beautiful, challenging and rewarding experience...But I'd recommend a walking stick...and a big tube of Bengay.
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