I woke up early before 7am, used the internet and and did some research into climbing the mountain, apparently it was possible in 1 day but it would be cheaper with 2 people. I made up a leaflet to find someone and was going to post it on hostel noticeboards around the town. The person on reception read it when it printed out and said they didn't think the 1 day climb was allowed anymore so I went to the tourist office which had just opened as it was 9 and they said it's not possible but to be sure I could go to the office of the company who organise the climbs in a shopping centre not to far away which I did and they confirmed that it was not possible anymore. I went back to the hostel and decided to book a flight out, there was a cheap flight on Friday but that would mean missing Chinese new year celebrations. Thursday had no flights and Sunday was too far away but tomorrow had a cheap flight so I booked it, only the website was terrible and kept crashing so I didn't get a confirmation but I had been on the payment page and done everything so maybe it had worked. I left having spent an hour so now it was close to 11am and I went down to the harbour to catch a boat to the nearby island. On the way I googled how to fix my step count on Shealth as it was still reading 0 for today as it did for yesterday. I uninstalled the updates as it said and when I went back in I had lost all of my data. I was in such a bad mood now, first I couldn't book a flight and now I'd lost 7 months of data some of which I was going to use on this website. At the harbour I didn't understand how to get a boat, they kept leaving sometimes with just one person, and some people tried to charge me 40 ringgits return which I knew to be wrong. Eventually a family got on a boat and allowed me on and we went across. They took a few pictures including some of me and it was only 5 ringgits. We got there and it was a wooden bridge with houses on stilts making up the village. I decided to walk around the island as it didn't look big, maybe 10km across. I started round the coast and the path kind of ended so I carried on up a hill but it became overgrown and was not so easy to walk through so I gave up after a bit and walked back to the path I was on before and had to go through a gate in a fence to carry on. I took a path on the other side and headed out towards the main part of the island. The path was not that well maintained and was overgrown which made it hard going and slow and after a while I wasn't even sure there was a path. There were some nice views from the top of the ridge going back into town and also some of a beach later which I thought if going to but I decided to get the walking done first and relax later so I aimed for a lighthouse. The path all but disappeared and I was having to go round trees and move branches and vines out of my way. I was considering possibly changing direction or something when I saw a clear path with steps as well so I went that way, but after a while I checked the map and it was going away from the lighthouse and time was getting on as well. I decided to go to a beach nearer by instead since the lighthouse was quite far and walking had been slow because of the paths nor being good or existing. Again this path petered out and I was going round trees and bushes when I got a sharp pain on my hand. I thought it was a spiky vine but I had another pain on my leg and I saw a flying insect which looked like it was attacking me along with some others. Another one stung me and I headed away from them and down the slope, managing to get away. I was worried if there were any effects from the sting but there turned out not to be, but now I had lost the path and so I carried on towards the beach and the walking got harder as I had to scramble a lot and climb over plants and push branches aside. I'd picked up a few minor scratches and decided to take a stream path down as it looked easier. It was quite a good move as there was less vegetation and the rocks were not too slippery since there was not much water. I came to a place with a big pile of dead wood which I climbed over and managed to hold on as it collapsed below me. After that the map said I was going the wrong way so I changed direction and made my way through more jungle before I came to the beach. I was hot, sweaty and a bit tired so I was going to swim when it started raining. I tried to waterproof my bag and leave it under a tree then I had a quick swim. It was around 3pm now and I wanted a quicker way back so I decided to walk along the coast and in the water a bit. I stuffed everything into my bag including my shoes and broke one of the main zips on my bag which was looking pretty worn and filthy anyway. I managed to close it and the first part of the walk was ok despite the rain, it was nice to see where I was going. The stones were hard to walk on and going round headlands was not always easy but I saw some flying fish right next to me and later some fish which hopped up onto stones and on land and looked like they could be one of the early species of life on earth. After a bit the headland on the map was long and it looked much shorter to go across the land so I changed direction and started going up the hill. This was much harder as gravity was against me and there were lots of spiky plants I couldn't hold onto. I couldn't find any good routes and ended up climbing over large bushes and through trees which was very hard going and I got quite a few scratches. About 20 to 30 minutes of that and I reached the top and then it was a bit easier going for a bit before I found a path. I was walking along the path and I saw a monkey, then a person cutting wood and then another monkey. Time was getting on but at least I was moving faster although it was a bit slippery going downhill as the path was muddy but my trainers were doing ok. I got down and there was water and trees but no path or boats so I went back a bit to another path and none of them went the way I wanted. I carried on and then went along what was an old path in the right direction but after a while that disappeared and then I found a pipeline for water and followed it to a storage tank and there was a good stone path for a bit. That became a mud path before disappearing, it was like people had stopped using paths and maybe just took the boat everywhere. I could hear noise from people ahead and maybe some boats as well so I headed that way and it was ok for a bit until I got to a swamp (my nemesis). I tried to get through but there were dead ends and I tried a few different routes before finding a path which took me to a village just a bit further round from where I'd been dropped off. There were lots of kids playing sports, mainly volleyball and I walked through to a jetty where I found a boat to take me across for 10 ringgits. Once across it was around 6pm so I decided to see the sunset and went through town and up a hill past a small clock tower that had been written about a lot and along a road I came to a viewpoint in time to see a bit of the sunset. I headed back to the hostel, showered and tried to book the flight again and it still didn't work. I went out to get some food and ended up at a night market area where there were Chinese new year celebrations so I went round the stalls and got a bit of food then sat down and watched the show which looked like a competition as people with numbers on were taking it in turns to sing and there were 3 judges. I went back to the hostel and I had the last of my whisky and coke and did things on the internet like cancel my couchsurfing request for Manila as someone had offered for me to stay with them but now I was arriving 2 days earlier. I chatted to a few people, bought a Tiger beer and met the owner called Alan who was Scottish and had been renovating this place since he bought it a few months ago. I was tired so didn't stay up late.
0 Comments
|
|