“This trek should take between 3-4 hours, and you’ll see…well, I don’t want to spoil it for you.” Said the guy behind the counter after he typed in a load of pins on my offline map. “Your shoes ARE going to get muddy, and there are some slippery bits on the way down, but we have ropes you can hold on to on those parts.”
“Is it quite a dangerous trek? I did a rather suspect one when caving in The Philippines, and now I’m a bit wary.” I asked him.
“Oh no! Compared to what you told me about that trek, this one will be a breeze.” He replied with a smile.
Well straight off the bat, before I even write this, we both know that isn’t going to be true…
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I wasn’t feeling that social. I can’t explain why; but I didn’t want to interact or even make eye contact with anyone in the hostel. It happens I guess. I recognise the signs now and keep myself to myself until it passes. This also meant that I didn’t want to go on a group trek with people. This hostel was huge, and everyone seems to be friends with each other, leading to massive groups. That wasn’t the best idea for me at that moment, so I was looking forward to being alone with my thoughts while going up mountains to see viewpoints.
I got lost almost instantly trying to follow the map to get to the trail. I took the wrong turning and it was a very steep hill up a road. I ran up the road only to find that it was a no through road. So now I was a bit out of breath by the time I got to the start of the trail.
I saw a Singaporean family looking equally flummoxed as to where the trail began. There were no signs throughout the trail (let’s blame something else except me!) and once we all got to the top of a hill I could see nothing. Fortunately the adult son found a rope that we could use to pull ourselves up to where the trail began, and we were all set.
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The Singaporean family said they would be slow, and wished me the best of luck. I wandered off excited up the steep track, but I’m getting older now, and underestimated my fitness levels. Long story short; I was cream cracked after 15 minutes, and judging by what the hostel guy said I was still less that halfway up, since there was supposed to be a resting point at the halfway point.
“Jose Cristo Estevez…” I thought to myself as I climbed over another tree root that was blocking the path to go up once more. “Where the fluckaduck is this resting point? I’m running out of energy here…”
Suddenly everything opened up, I assumed it was the resting point, but luckily for me I bypassed the resting point and was already at the top. I had to go slightly to the right and climb another five minutes, but I found the viewpoint and took a few pictures. BOOM!
After chatting to a Belgian couple and a German couple for a bit at the viewpoint, the anxiety kicked in again and I wanted to go off by myself. So off I went, off on the easier part of the trek. Although it was going down and it was relatively slippery. So it was a bit slower, but after a while, paying attention to where I was stepping, I soon got near the end of the trail and down to the springs.
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“When you get to the springs, there will be two paths.” A flashback voice that sounded like Rafiki said, although it was actually the hostel guy. “There’s an easy path, or if you are feeling a bit adventurous you can walk on another path by the springs.”
So off I went down the springs, going over the rocks through the water and taking some photos. Soon I was far down the springs and I couldn’t see either path. There were supposed to be two, and one of them was by the rapid springs. I checked my offline map and the springs were getting further away from the supposed trail path, So wherever I was, I needed to keep going…
After five minutes I found a ten to fifteen metre drop down a small waterfall. There was a rope next to it, so I assumed I was accidentally on the ‘more adventurous’ path. I breathed a huge sigh of relief knowing I was on track as i abseiled down. I was even more relieved when I saw what looked like an opening for a pathway to a trail if I climbed up. “Fuck this! I’ve done enough dangerous stuff today, I’m taking the easy route now!”
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Except one minute in it was clear this wasn’t a real path, and I was on a very steep and slippery path going down. I found a semi-path back to where the spring was and I slipped, landing on my wrist. I heard a noise and swore silently to myself thinking I broke my wrist. It was instantly sore, and I was in bottomfudge nowhere and had to get up. Luckily, I rotated my wrist and could tell it was just sprained (the pain actually went away after five minutes, which was a result!) and climbed back down the unsteady rocks to get to the spring to see the only way I could go was down, and the path was VERY dangerous. Like you slip on the wet rocks and you fall down the five metre drop, most likely onto some rocks.
I went back up the bit I’d climbed down twice, and I clearly had nowhere to go other than down this drop. So I did it extremely tentatively. I stumbled a couple of times, but I took my time and got down, which was followed by another path that didn’t look sturdy. I got past that and the rest of the drop was straightforward.
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“OK, where the fuck am I now…?” I thought as I got to the end of the drop. I was at some sort of road, and judging by my map I needed to go left regardless as right would take me further into the jungle. So even though it looked like a strange path, I went left. It turned out to be the best decision I ever made as I ended up going through the farm and I was back on the trail. Apparently, the right turn was the trail going back on yourself, so how on earth had I ended up so far away that I’d somehow met the trail again at a 90 degree angle…?
From there the trek was normal. The views were spectacular, and I bought some tea because all the hills were full of farms producing strawberries and tea. Then I hitch-hiked back as it is normal to hitch-hike in the Cameron Highlands. It was a long trek, albeit one that kind of went off the path a bit, but I wouldn’t change it as I had a great time!
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