K-Log #6: .. humbled by the Mother Nature

Day 2: Smart as we all are, midway to the park HQ, we decided that the short route is not good enough for us. We decided that if we want to conquer the mountain, we want to do it with style (a.k.a through the longest route possible). What we thought to be a manageable 8.2km walk turned out to be a disaster in the making. Well at least for me.

The first half is not that bad. It went straight up for about 1.5km and then down for about the same length (talk about some wasted effort, duh!). Passed a nice hanging bridge, the path led us up and up and up. After countless of "ambik gamba" break, the climate and the terrain start to turn against us.

It is known that the higher you are, the less oxygen it is in the air. As much as I *thought* that I was mentally prepared to face such condition, it still shock me that I was literally breathless and have to stop every few steps to grasp for air. To make thing worse, even my thigh turned against me. Needless to say, everything went downhill from there (despite the direction that we were heading).

What supposed to be a 7-8 hours walk ended up to be 10.5 hours walk for me. Soon enough day turned night and we all have to walk in pitch dark in an awfully cold weather. With no mood to move on, I completed the last 2 km or so in auto-pilot mode.