Sunrise at 4095m

Here comes a belated and shorter-than-I'd-like update. It might also lack somewhat in coherence, as I'm on limited time and don't have time to do any editing. I'll try to write more once we arrive at Sandakan on sunday.

The Dusun village of Kuai
Second day we traveled by minivan and truck to the semi-remote village of Kuai, home to some ten families (75 people, draw your own conclusions) of the Dusun people. We had been told about their generosity and hospitality beforehand, and after having had a dinner in one of their homes, they brought out the rice wine and became true to their reputation. We could've stayed there drinking rice wine all night, as the locals - including our guide and our two mountain guides did - but being neither athletic nor used to high altitude, we decided to go to bed fairly early. I woke up a couple of hours before dawn; a consequence of jet lag combined with humidity and temperature and went out to take some low-light photos of our mountain, while enjoying the loneliness and strangeness of everything. We ate breakfast at the same home that we had dinner, and were rather surprised to see that the rice wine party was still going on. I got the impression that many of the men might very well be alcoholics, but apparently their drunkeness never turned into arguments or fights, and, in the end, who am I to judge? After breakfast we went on a short trip through the surroundings of the village, which gave us a little taste of what was to come. The village is beautifully situated amongst the valleys and ridges at the base of Mt. Kinabalu, and slopes are steep and a plenty. According to our guide, the village - which is actually inside the Gungun Kinabalu national park - were given some land from the government a few decades ago, on account of them having lived there since before it's installment. The houses of the village were basic wooden houses built on stilts (for ventilation). They seemed to be fairly self-sustaining, growing their own rice and also fruit - mainly pineapples, which our guide claimed were the best in the world, but sadly we never got the chance to try.

Ridges, ridges, ridges
We arrived at Gungun Kinabalu national park in the afternoon, and had just about time for dinner and stocking up on supplies and boiling water before it was time to go to bed. We started our first day's trek up the mountain at about 10am. It was a meagre 6km walk, but one with 1.4km of elevation. The trail was generally very good, and there were signs at every 500m telling you how slow you were going. A lot of high steps comprised much of the trail, since the incline would've torn all the dirt away otherwise. There weren't much in the way of wildlife or flowers to look at, which was probably just as good, seeing as we were mainly staring down at our own boots, concentrating on taking just the next one or two steps. It was a hard but good climb, and it took just under 6 hours, during which I consumed no less than 3l of water and fluid replacement. The altitude was very noticeable, mainly through heightened blood pressure and my heart trying to beat a path out through my chest. I had no major problems however, and didn't have to suffer from altitude sickness.
When we arrived at the Laban Rata guest house, situated at 3272m, we had a buffet dinner waiting. After wolfing down several portions, it was time to go over the gear, kill some time and then go to sleep. I fell asleep at 6pm, thinking that I should listen to some music while taking a short nap. It was just as well that I did fall asleep, which will be made clear shortly.

To the Summit!
I woke up at about 1.30am, and it was almost time to rise and shine to cover the last 2.7km to the summit. This time I only brought my camel back (2l), my warm clothes and my camera, leaving at least some of the weight behind at the guest house. It was pitch black for most of the climb up to the summit, and we all made good use of our head torches. The first part consisted of what we had already gone through the day before - a good, solid trail - but this time with even more steps. After about a kilometer the climb started to become more interesting. For the rest we walked and climbed on bare rock, often helped by ropes lying across the surface. Often you didn't need the ropes, but they were good to have. If only the other tourists could've understand a couple of things, it would've been a complete blast: 1) don't climb close behind someone else on a rope, because everything you do might make him lose his balance, and 2) don't look directly at someone while wearing a head torch which is pointing straight ahead. (Morons.)
The altitude was definitely becoming a real issue, and walking and climbing was extremely slow and exhausting. Still no sign of real altitude sickness, I trudged on. One of my companions on this trip - Pete - had the day before claimed that pills that help with altitude sickness try to increase your rate of breathing. I took this idea to heart, and for the whole climb tried to breathe deep, at a fast pace and very distinctively. I really believe that it helped, because as soon as I stopped doing that, dizziness was upon me. It was a very interesting experience.
We arrived at the summit around 5.30am, well in time before dawn. Gathered around us were about 100 other people. After having gone the rounds and taking our pictures with the top sign, we sat down and waited for the sun to rise. This part was, I must say, a bit of a disappointment, because even though it was clear, about 5C and only slightly windy, the sun arose behind a huge cloud. No pretty pictures there. This didn't really lessen the experience though, because walking down again in broad daylight, we got a great view of the beautiful granite massif. I can't really wrap my head around the view at this time, and much less describe it, so you'll just have to take my word for it and look at the pictures later (as if those could make it justice.) One thing is worth mentioning; as we were climbing in the dark, we had no clue as to what was more than 10m from the rope we were following. In broad daylight, I could see that the rope passed just about 50m from a precipice, dropping some 100m down into a deep gully. This gully is called 'Gully of the Lost', or something along those lines, after a troop of british soldiers became lost there some decades ago. It was absolutely stunning.

Onwards and food
I will have to stop here, and continue with describing today's jungle trek and tomorrow's river cruise and night walk in the jungle when I arrive at Sandakan. I'll only mention that my appreciation of the malaysian food continues to grow. The food we had at and around Mt. Kinabalu was touristy and boring, and only made slightly better by Han (our guide) fixing chili sauce for me. That chili sauce is readily available in all cheap local restaurants, and goes with almost everything. Neither did those expensive restaurants have proper kopi. It is the local restaurants that continue to impress; you can have as lovely a meal as in almost any restaurant at home for a bargain price. Yesterday I had a lovely fish curry, at lunch I had fried wet noodles with seafood, and for dinner sambal udong (prawns with prawn paste). I've also managed to try the infamous durian fruit, which smelled less than I'd thought, and had a quite weird oniony taste, which I think would grow on me. I've also tried some rambutan, which have just come in season, and lovely mangosteen - much better than the ones I had at KK. Mangosteen is definitely my favourite so far.
There's much more to tell, but it's time to have a beer and go to bed. To anyone who's in doubt, I
ll just state that I'm having a marvellous time, and I don't want to go home - yet.