Day 6: Descending Mount Kinabalu

Here’s the continuation post from my KK Travelogue. Enjoy!

27th March 2007 Tuesday (Day 6) Part II

These are some of the famous peaks that I managed to identify. They’re all so majestic.

Now take out your RM1 note and tell me which peak is on our note.

I thought we would need the most 4hours to descend from Low’s Peak to Timpohon Gate but in actual we took nearly 10hours!

Look easy? NOT AT ALL!
That was the time where my sis’ legs were failing her. Going down would take a harder toll on your legs because you need to ‘stop’ your legs from going down fast. Knee would start to ache too.

We reached Sayat-Sayat Hut in 1hour 20minutes, a distance of 1.42km from Low’s Peak. We rested for about 10minutes here. This time our guide told the guide at Sayat-Sayat checkpoint “Semua orang berjaya naik atas” (8 of us). We get to view the various certificate designs available at the hut. We’re gonna receive our certificate when we reach Timpohon Gate. Yipee!!! I didn’t know they have phone booth here. FYI, there’s no line for Hotlink customer.

Remember the ‘danger’ area that I told you guys in my previous travelogue where some of the boulder is nearly 90 degree vertical? Well, feast on these.

Here are some (more) beautiful shots taken during our descending route particularly at the path that we ascend during the morning. As it was dark (when we ascent) we couldn’t see the surrounding area but my oh my it was a mind-boggling picturesque course. Again nature stops me from taking a far too many steps to capture these photos.

We reached Gunting Lagadan around 10.05am. We packed our stuff and went straight to Laban Rata for our breakfast. We only ate chocolate before that.

This is the backdoor of Gunting Lagadan that would bring you to a small fenced gate, the entrance to Mount Kinabalu’s summit.

We stayed at Laban Rata Resthouse until around 11am before continuing our final journey.

By that time, my sis’ legs were getting worst. All she can do is to climb down every steps one by one. So now you know why we took nearly 10hours to reach Timpohon Gate. My heart was screaming “Arggghhhhhhhh cepat lahhhh. Cannot tahan the tortoise pace”. Hehe evil me. Eventually my legs began to give up too. Thanks to Jidane for accompanying sis and me.

During that time we met lots of climber coming down too. Some were fit as before and there are several injured climbers as well. Some of them, their legs were even worst than my sis. Double tortoise pace.

We reached Timpohon Gate at 6.10pm. 🎉🎉🎉
Ahhh finallllllllllllllyyyyyyy!!! I felt so drained.
What??? We need to climb up some more? Can I crawl?

By the time we celebrated our feat with victory dance, the other 4 guys that joined us had gone to the airport. We’ve missed the van! Thank God our tour operator prepared a taxi for us to go back to KK. We stopped by Kinabalu Park Headquarters to retrieve our backpacks before continuing our journey back.

I slept all the way back to KK because I was damn tired and because the taxi driver was driving like nuts. I couldn’t bear to watch thus I decided to sleep.

We decided to spend our last night on a luxury place thus we check-in to Promenade Hotel around 8.30pm. We had the most horrible dinner at Promenade’s restaurant (so not worth it).

Muddy shoes… courtesy of Mount Kinabalu.

This completes my Mount Kinabalu journey but hey please hang on for 1 more post. There’s a little bit more. 😛