Seeing the WHOLE WORLD.

Tuesday, 26 February 2008
/23:52

Gunung Stong 1399M. =)

~wad a lovely place, embracing mother nature, enriching geography, enjoying the great companionship.

well, its quite hard to lose e diff sights n feel of the majestic highland even though being back on concrete singapore. somehow on rather u look at things differently, n ya seriously i almost thot buses were alien too! lols..

hmm, ya set off last fri frm kranji mrt, squezing wif e evening 170 crowd & a 50litre bag.. seems that customs had implemented e self-clearance system, was quite a breeze. Once over to malaysia side, met up n had dinner at city square b4 chop chop boarding the departing train at 1900hrs. Ok, tis is my 1st time taking a train in malaysia so was basically fascinated?

There began e 12hrs train ride. playing cards, chatting, hoping frm carriage to carriage, exploring the dinner car ~ jus abt lik lilo kids excited abt going on hol.. =D the train was delayed by quite abit n since woke up quite early, took in the sights n breeze.. the morning dew was simply gorgeous, we jus pulled open the doors n phoof its lik instant-shiok aircon! Along the way, passed some beautiful landscapes, gunung musang or smthing..

At last we arrived at Dabong station. we were introduced to our guide whom we called as uncle.. Due to the train delay, we hadta go caving 1st instead of scaling the highland. & to tell i'm reali amazed by the sheer size of these caves. uncle explained to us abt the limestone creations, habitats, soil, etc etc.. amazing amazing how water can do.. oso got to experience the darkest of dark, within the caves.. its lik experiencing these places we onli see on national geographic.. superb!

Aft caving, had lunch at station b4 going to the foot of gunung stong. trekked up to the base camp of e waterfall which is abt 400+ M above sea lvls.. mm, it's pretty much commercialised cus u see huts n stuff set up there.. chilled at the waterfall area, n e water is freaking cold! we oso found tis amazing spot near e base camp where the 1st words is usually "OMG"! its damn damn cool la, cus at tt spot u can lik look down n see the valley, plantations, etc.. - zai zai..

~that OMG feeling!..

Spent e nite there as too late to climb to summit. was looking fwd to a great dinner aft all e can foods we brought, but damn it rained.. n hais, once agn scrambling into e tent to con'd.. oh well, its nature.. hahas, woke up in e morning to chilly conditions.. it wld be nice if there's a jacket, hahas. Had breakfast b4 going to the nice nice site we saw ytd to see the sunrise, seems lik the other grp of singaporeans tt came wif our grp was alr there, armed wif tripods n cameras.. lols.

Sunrisen. Time to scale to the summit, uncle said it wld take 8hrs up n down. ok, initial thot was it maybe shorter, but well the route taken was reali 4hrs up! its nice looking at the flora, trees, ferns.. even came across a wild boar's hoof print! n got tis macham long thick fallen log which we walked on it.. mm, interesting..

Well, aft an "interesting" climb we reached e summit 1399M!.. heehes, n hungry ppl we are dig into an eye-opener lunch - Army rations!.. hahahas, overall can pass la, taste was gd 4 meat items but not so 4 vegetables..n oh there were squirrels there too, very de cute sei..

Began our trek down to base camp. seriously the uphill part felt much better than e down.. n ya 4get to mention earlier the "kampung adidas" which i bought at RM4.50 was zai lor, e grip power sia.. But nt e comfort level, -blisters.. Arrived back to camp closing to darkness so hadta quicken or else the onli things we wld see are the backs of e ppl in front of u.. the descend was much better as e heavy bags were more or less emptied but once agn more slippery due to e earlier downpour.. - Challenging la, i wld say.

Came down to foot, wif nite alr fallen. had a quick shower, boy was it refreshing! boarded e truck to send us back to e train station area, jus in time 4 dinner.. N nasi goreng it was. lols.. The train was once agn delayed by abt 45mins so chatted wif uncle. he was reali a nice man, going all out to make sure we feel comfortable, explaining wad he noe of the jungle, jus going e extra mile.. =D he even recommended we visit east java indonesia to see e volcanoes!

The train came n its time to bid our goodbyes.. I wld always rmbr his enthusiaism 4 nature..=p tis time e journey was 'quiet', guess everyone was alr shagged frm e climb.. the bed onboard felt so much lik home, wif e jerking lik a rocking cradle.. hahahs, slept a 6-7 hrs too.. mmm, lik i said " a train journey is nvr abt e destination, its abt enjoying e process.." hahas, i sure did enjoyed e process + e destination!.. =D

1015hrs, we pulled into johore bahru station.. time 4 some 'urban' venture.. lols, breakfast den wenta watch stepup2 at city square.. RM6, tts a third of ours? lols, but sry to say la e quality was abit compromised baa.. oh well.. ltr did some shoppin ard b4 heading back to spore..

Overall, i reali reali did enjoyed tis trip.. n yeap taking a train is quite fun acty.. I oso understood much abt nature thru the experience itself.. =P

CHEERS to everyone!, thank you everyone 4 making tis trip a memorable one!.. =D