"KK Expedition Day 4 ~ Poring Hot Spring!"

Continuing on Day 4! Today's agenda was to go to the Poring Hot Spring Area, about 2 hours drive from KK town. For one, I'm glad to move out from Velvet Lodge! That place was beginning to get too cramped and stuffy for me!

Along the way, we passed by some landmarks...


Nice tower

From the looks of it, this *has* to be the government office!

Universiti Malaysia Sabah



Time passes by, and as we got nearer to Poring.....





"Mesius (our guide), is that....?", I asked.
"Yes, that's Mount Kinabalu!" he replied.

Whoa! Our first glimpse of the mountain!

Trying to snap pic of it as we sped along..... Missed!

Holee.....








.....










... the Mountain!!!


Zoomed in.... the mountain top is a pile of hardened rocks.... looking menacing!

Gf, Mesius and Leopard

Come, come, everyone must take one!

Actually, we have stopped by a souvenior shop along the way.... It is perfectly situated at a clearing which offers a stunning view of Mt Kinabalu! (Yeah, actually no need to susah payah snap it in the van jz now... :P)



Lots of souveniors: Shirts, keychains, whatever also got!


Next up, we left to continue our journey to the Poring hot spring area...


Slow moving town.... such contrast from KK city... There are many houses in the hillsides...

Ah, at last... Poring!

Here, we spent 1/2 hour watching a video showing the various plants in Mt Kinabalu and why it is a World Heritage Site... yada yada yada.....

Oklah, cut the crap dy man! We didn't come here to watch video clips! Poring offers two activites: One is of course the hot spring... the other, is a nice trek into this reserve area... where there's a nice little something waiting for us!

Poring houses some of these gigantic bamboo trees! Huge....

And the trek entrance...


Nothing like the sound of rushing water from a river to soothe the mind.....







A relatively short walk later.......







Aha! Canopy walk! ;)




Canopy walks are always fun! You get to be 'suspended' few storeys high! Mesius told us that some ppl actually panic when they try to walk across! And they had to be carried on the back across! Well, I kinda like these things, so lets go!!!



Looking down...

Look carefully at this pic... See what is the angle I took it from! :P

When you're high up... the view is serene..... this place kinda reminds me of Yavin 4... or Endor.... ok nevermind! :P








Ok, everyone reached down safely! :D



After that little exercise... time to go for the hot spring bath!

We chose the Public bath area (free).... fortunately not that many ppl that day... but we have to wait like for ages for the hot spring water to come out from the tap to fill up the bath tub.... yeah.. a tap..... wait la...........................

We soaked ourselves in there till late evening, letting the warm (and sometimes just plain boiling!) water soothe ourselves. Usually, people come to Poring after the climb down from Mt Kinabalu... supposedly, the sulphurous hot spring water provides for a therapeutic bath.

We checked into Fairy Garden Resort that nite. After a good meal and some rice wine ;) Mesius gave us a briefing on the big climb tomorrow morning. Everyone listened intently. Excitement and nervousness fills our hearts.

Next: YES! At last...... The BIG CLIMB!!!