Opening
This week’s update was delayed due to in part I was in the jungle and I was extremely busy (I climbed the highest mountain in the entire South East Asia!)
In short, this was also the highlight of my entire trip so far! Sabah and Malaysia in general are underrated.
Day 1
Said goodbye to the beloved Mulu National park, and headed towards Kota Kinabalu
Checked into my hostel. I had an ocean view and private room for myself for the day. After the jungle, I deserved it 🙂
It’s Sunday and it meant it was also the Sunday market. Can’t help but got seafood treatment
We also ordered a couch, for a total of 270RM! The fish was absolutely declious!
We went to the water front after dinner to enjoy the sunrise.
We also got some draft from an Irish pub. ($14.45 + $9.93). Was a fun night!
Day 2
Lazy day to planned activities for Sabah
A very random conversation with a British girl led me to book the last minute climbing tour for Mt. Kinabalu! (1650RM, yes very expensive). Very lucky to get a last minute cancellation because almost all tours were completely booked out entire year!
I needed quite a few gears mostly rain covers and warm cloths. Turns out it was quite hard to find those things in KK despite I went to two malls and went up and down like 3 times. Finally at night I was able to get a dry bag and a beanie from an Army outfit store (for kids who want to pretend to be soldiers)
Day 3
Climbing day. First was to transfer to the mountain base. It was raining hard.
Debrief
Rain magically stopped as soon as we started trekking! All Gods plan!
Almost at the base camp!
The cafe at the top felt like Switzerlands
I actually took 2 beers (23RM for one, consider it’s at the mountain top I think it’s okay)
Tried to sleep a bit, but the adrenalin made it impossible to fall asleep especially given it’s quite cold.
Day 4
We got up at 1am to get supper before our morning climb
Our guide was an absolute legend. He planned our trip extremely well (early start to rest at a secret guard house before ascending in time for sunrise. Gave us hot water and donuts as well and even his flash light since mine stoped working half way)
Just before 5:30am, we reached to the peak
Our guide was so fascinated by all the ice crystals!
Sun has risen.
Finished sunrise, and we started descending
We got back to the base camp at around 7am, rested a bit and ate our proper breakfast at the cafe before we started our final descend!
We didn’t take many photos as this point, at around 1:30pm, we arrived at the bottom.
We invited our guide for beers, but he didn’t want to take it. I gave him $20 as tip instead.
We went to back to KK and rested a bit until 8pm to have our farewell with the group
I think we were all extremely tired and didn’t stay too late before called it a day.
Day 5
Another travel day. I think this was definitely one of the days I should’ve taken it slower. I was mentally tired at this point
I ordered some chicken rice on the plane, unfortunately for such a short plane ride (40min) it’s more of a hustle to rush the food before landing. I ordered the lunch in anticipation of living in the jungle for a while.
Arriving at Sepilok
My dorm was in a very nice resort with heated swimming pool right in the jungle. I do appreciate the fact that almost all the resorts in jungle Malaysia offer dorm as an option. Though most guests are packaged tourists, they also don’t forget us independent travelers.
Without much of a break, I went to straight to the sanctuaries.
I was extremely lucky to catch the feeding
I learned each bear has a different personality. For example, some hate climbing, some hate breaking the coconut and prefer some other bears do it for them. It was pretty cool that all the conservative workers were so knowledge about bears and I learned so much about them. (Maybe I just knew so little about them)
After the bears, I went to see the orangutans!
After the orangutans, I went back to my hostel to chill for a bit since it started rainy. As I was arranging my transfer for the next day, I learned I could still do the night walk at the Rainforest Discovery center nearby.
Thumbs up for how helpful the staff was at my hostel. Not only they tried to call everyone they knew to help me signing up the tour, but also in the end drove me to the night walk to save time! Because I was a bit late. Thanks, Malaysians! (staff at my hostel was simply amazing!)
Went back to my hostel just in time for last dinner call.
It was a great day.
Day 6
Had a nice complimentary breakfast buffet at the resort.
It’s a legit chill day. Drank probably too much beers 🙂 One top of that, a random guy we met at another resort (he’s a tour guide) turned out to be a home brew guy.
Since he ran out of stock, he took an extra half an hour to his uncle’s house to grab one last bottom! This showed Malaysian hospitality again!
Day 7
After breakfast and chilled until mid day to get to my transfer to Sukau which is a wild life protected area.
Another of my highlight of my trip, wild elephants!
We saw lots of monkeys, and another group saw a hornbill which I eventually saw the next day.
After night we decided to go to the weekend (Saturday only) night market in the village.
Called an early day. It’s soothing to sleep in the rainforests whilst rain water flew down from the sky.
Expenses
Obviously this was an expensive week. Nevertheless it was one of the most “productive” week in which I really was glad I spent the money. Worth every penny!
| Week 14 | ||||
| Day | Food&Drink | Lodging | Transportation | Other (tickets/tours etc) |
| 1 | $104.58 | $11.87 | $61.10 | $0.23 |
| 2 | $19.52 | $11.04 | $0.00 | $29.57 |
| 3 | $10.45 | $0.00 | $0.00 | $376.14 |
| 4 | $32.78 | $17.05 | $0.00 | $0.00 |
| 5 | $10.23 | $12.31 | $39.50 | $25.00 |
| 6 | $32.51 | $12.80 | $0.00 | $0.00 |
| 7 | $6.36 | $14.28 | $0.00 | $13.64 |
| $216.43 | $79.35 | $100.60 | $444.57 | |
| Total | Grand Total: | $840.95 |
Your climb up Mt. Kinabalu does seem like the highlight of your trip and I loved the photos and adventures! All of your photos of the animals are so cute as well.
Thanks for liking cute animals!