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Mount KK : [Part IV] Over the Top!!

Posted by EVo on : 10th September 2009
under : Health n Fitness, Misadventures, Outings, Sabah - Mount Kinabalu, Travel

 

 

This is not a scheduled post.

 

I’m blogging live from China! AHahahha, but since the past 2-3 posts have been all about China, I don’t wana bore ya with more Cheena details.

 

I know many of you wana know if I’m suffering here or not, so I’m purposely EVADING that topic for now. Read about it in future posts lah

 

So this post is gona be about a post that I’ve also been EVADING for a long, long time, 4 months to be exact.

 

Guess what picture this is?

 

As hard as you look, it is not a picture of Paris Hilton doing something funny in the dark.

 

And neither is it a picture of Tan Sri Chua Soi Lek doing something funny in the dark.

 

I’ll give you a hint : It’s about a Mountain.

 

And the light spots you see are….

 

 

Yeah babeh, this is the view while climbing up Mount KK at 3am in the morning!

 

Imagine this. You wake up at 2am in the morning, stumble groggily out of your bunk bed. Outside your room, other climbers are already gearing up and preparing for what’s ahead. There are no lights on, only light from headlamps can be seen. You sense the excitement in the air ; everyone is talking in whispers and some are already outside…there’s no time for breakfast, and everyone moves out and starts….The Summit Climb.

 

It’s an incredibly surreal moment.

 

 

With hardly any time to take a proper photo, all I have are faint memories that start off with a steep staircase and a medium rocky path climb in the pitch black. And unlike the day before, no one could move fast due to the low visibility. Everyone moved together slowly and were literally ‘crawling in the dark’!

 

There was a section that the locals call the ‘Danger Zone’, where angles go as steep as 60 degrees, and only way to go up was with a rope. I really had to HAUL my big ass and bigger-ass backpack up using the rope..No rope = no climb. That’s how steep it is.

 

And some sections scared the shit outta me, where I have to walk on a jagged ledge, and a bad move means falling down the mountainside to a certain death. All hands on the rope man…even a camho will resist the chik-chak moment I tell you LOL. Cos it probably will sound like ‘chik-chak – Ooops – aaaahhhhhHHHH – BISH’

 

It was only past the Danger Zone when I was ahead of the others where I stopped and grabbed a few shots that I could…

 

 

 

 

Then I KO for awhile cos didn’t have breakfast LOL.

 

Not easy lor I tell you. You need balls of steel to do this with an SLR + Flash and a bloody heavy Crumpler bag.

 

I was lucky that I wasn’t affected by altitude sickness and was able to keep a steady pace. It’s important to keep moving all the way even if you’re tired and need to take small steps. Cos if you stop, your body will slow down and it takes awhile to start up again. And that’s not cool.

 

 

Shooting got a little easier at about 5am thanks to the slowly rising sun…but that meant that we had to speed up to reach summit before sunrise!

 

The peak that you see above is not the summit. There are a few of these peaks before the final Peak, pretty frustrating…Just when you thought you reached the end, there is another for you to climb ahead!

 

So we climb…

 

 

 

And climb…

 

 

 

Photography in the mountain is good, because if you’re slow, you can blame it on stopping to take the shots and sound like a very dedicated photographer, instead of saying that your knees hurt, and your half dying. Which was exactly how I felt…Half Dead.

 

I think what helped to elevate my spirit was the rising sun coming up on the east….

 

Nice leh…my never-seen-before footage…i should apply for a job in National Geographic. Can explore the world with Sponsored Lenses, yummy.

 

 

As a rule, and as a photographer, you should always look out for patches of water for that reflection and ‘enhanced ‘cold’ effect.

 

 

 

If you did notice, this also means that we missed the view of the sunrise from the peak   T_T

 

 

 

This is where I stopped to rest my dying feet take shots of climbers coming up from behind me.

 

Can’t see them? Look closer!

 

 

At that point, it was hard to believe….Did I really climb that high? wtf!

 

 

We were above freaking clouds level!

 

With that in mind, it makes 0% sense to give in to my failing legs and go home. All I needed was just rest and pretend to take more shots LOL.

 

 

It wasn’t really that cold. I just wanted to see how I look like with the burglar ninja hood. Hehe.

 

 

That’s Arhnue hiding behind a rock. I think she just completed a successful piss or poop, hence the victorious look on her face. I THINK.

 

Desmond Lim the Chocolate factory boss and Rachel also look pretty happy here..Desmond did, and I confirm this, take a poop on the way up the mountain somewhere in the dark at 4-5am. No worries, no pollution, it’s all organic.

 

 

 

 

 

With my legs partially recharged, It’s time to push it for the final climb!

 

 

 

And finally…so close more…

 

Mountain also got traffic jam one. What is this.

 

So while waiting for traffic to clear….what does a blogger do?

 

And…after 36 hours of stretching my body past its human limits…we finally got what we came for..

 

  

 

Arhnue potong stim cos she was too tired to climb another 10 steps to reach the peak ahahaha.

 

 

And the view was …… Fantastic.omg.

 

 

 

 

I tell you…if you think that people who bring big ass DSLRs up the mountain with big ass bags are semangat…check out this guy who even brought a tripod along. Whoooooaaa. I only use a rock to prop up my camera man…LOL

 

I wonder what the guy on the right side brought up. Sniper rifle ke?

 

 

 

In my world, there is one main rule when you climb mountains. Don’t ever, ever think that the peak is the final destination. Because that was what I had in mind. Reach peak, end of story.

 

But what I forgot was that…whatever distance I climbed up, I had to climb down it as well. Wah damn shit wei already wana die at that time.

 

Find out what happened to Kit Loong in the next Mount KK post

 

Click these for my other KK Stories:

1. Mount KK : [Part I] The Reunion

2. Mount KK : [Part II a] Up we go!

3. Mount KK : [Part III] Laban Rata Go Go Go!!

 

Cheers!
-EVo-