Mt Kota Kinabalu

Everyone was excited and itching to crack open the chocolate, what better reason to climb a mountain than to eat as much chocolate as you like??? Little did we know what was in store for us.

We started at 1830m above sea level. By the end of our first day we would have climbed to 3300m and walked 6km. We set off at 10am and arrived the hut by around 3pm. There were some moments people said “I can’t do it” but in the end everyone made it to the hut. After a good feed we were in bed by 7.

1:45am the first alarm went off. I can say I was glad to get up as nobody had slept very well, (this was probably something to do with the altitude). We got on all our thermals and other layers and wondered down to breakfast. A few slices of toast and a cup of tea soon warmed us up and before we knew it our guides were giving us the thumbs up… It was time for the final accent.

The aim was to make it to the top for sunrise. So we had 3 ½ hours to climb 2.7km and got up 800m. Everyone started quite slow and there was lots of stopping to catch our breath. The first km being mainly steps. Then it got a bit steeper and we needed ropes to help pull ourselves up. The last km was the worst. It was a little windy, which made it quite cold, and the summit seemed to get further and further away. But we made it to the top. Not quite in time for sunrise but still it was very rewarding sitting at the top above the clouds.

Seeing Hayley in a Orangutan outfit at the top was enough to put a smile on anyone’s face. (I should explain that…) We climbed the mountain during Orangutan Awareness week and so Hayley (she works for ‘Orangutan Appeal UK’ joined us for the climb and wore an Orangutan outfit (she’s crazy!).

We spent about 40 minutes at the top as the sun rose and started to warm everything up. Then it was time to start the decent. It took us 3 hours to get back to the cabin where we had second breakfast and a quick 20 minute power nap. Both Jo and I were very tired at this point and decided the best thing was to get down as quick as possible. So we went on ahead. We were making good pace until about 3km from the bottom. Both our legs were like jelly. We weren’t out of breath anymore but our muscles were physically tired. We stopped for a breather and Tracy and Steve caught us up. So we walked the last 3km with them. We reached the gate at around 3pm. In 12 hours with only a few breaks and gone up 800m then down 2.3km and walked a total 11km (makes me tired just thinking about it…).

But we did it!

There only sad thing was on the return journey in the car, 9 out of 12 people were ill. At first we thought it was altitude sickness. But after people were still getting ill 2 days later we put it down to a bug we all picked up.

This is by far the most strenuous thing we have every done and if anyone decides to do the mountain in the future I would defiantly recommend taking 3 days to do it not 2. Would I do it again ‘Yes’ (George) and ‘No’ (Jo).