Gunung Tambuyukon; 18-21 December 2007

Gunung Tambuyukon has earned its place as the most challenging mountain I have attempted thus far.

Ying Oon, Marc-Andre and Isabelle were my companions, and Andry Nail was our guide. Except for our guide, each of us brought home battle scars that would draw strange looks from everyone. The trek up the mountain was indeed tough, but still manageable. Having lived through numerous other mountains (and lived to tell the tales such as my Nuang mishaps), I, for one, never thought that scaling Tambuyukon was as impossible task. I didn’t want to turn around and go home even in the most dire of situations. However, Marc-Andre did harbour such ill thoughts on perhaps the worst day of his trekking life (so far) when we were all wet and shivering under a heavy downpour. Even so, he stuck on till the end, and we came out victorious. During the early parts of the trek, Marc-Andre assessed the situation and said, “Maybe this is all too advanced for me.” Perhaps. But by sticking to the end, it has made him, and us all, a whole lot tougher.

Walking into the rarely trodden paths of the mountain was like going into a battlefield against the legion of tiger leeches. I suffered the most wounds compared to my comrades. Within the first hour of entering the leech infested land, I had 11 on my shoes, 3 in my shoes, and 1 had bitten me. I stopped counting after that. When we reached the campsite for the day, Ying Oon had a personal record-breaking 22 leeches in his shoes. On my second day, during he heaviest downpour on our trek, I was bloody all over. It’s a long (and a rather hilariously embarrassing) story; it’ll only be old during campfire sittings. On the fourth day, the four of us have been well-trained. We could easily pull off the invading leeches from our socks, shoes, or flesh. We’d roll them in our hands or between fingers, and then flick them off into the unknown. Andry Nail, our guide was quite vicious. At times, he’d send those leeches that pick on him to a fiery end while we cooked dinner.

Leeches were but one of our enemies along the way. There were so many more obstacles.

We traversed with with feet slanting at an angle on narrow paths on the sides of sloping hillsides. We trekked steep slippery slopes in inclement wet weather. We trudged on even when socks were soaked and shoes were filled with pools of water. We climbed over twisted roots. We pressed our hands against mossy trunks. We stuck our fingers and feet between cracks of weather-blasted red rocks to reach the summit the mountain. And what do we get? After all the hard work, we had no spectacular views of the valleys or distant mountains. Because of the incessant falling rains, we had to forgo our planned 2am trek to the summit to catch glimpses of Kinabalu against the rising sun. We launched our summit push only at 7am that morning. Arriving at the summit in late morning only meant we had a whiteout; we saw nothing but a blank canvas of white. We got to see the landscape at the top of the mountain, and it was not what I had expected. And we have a signboard to welcome us at the end of our journey. But no, not like the ones we have seen on Irau or Kinabalu. On Tambuyukon, the signboard was merely a wooden marker about 20-inches long hammered into the ground. On it, one would find inscriptions painted in yellow. On one side, it was 14KM. The other: 00KM. That was our only proof that we have reached our destination–the summit of Gunung Tambuyukon.

Our return brought us back the same way we had used to get to the top. As we walked, we would often turn back to look at the route we had used. Thoughts such as “did we do that?” or “how did we get up there?” would flash across our minds.

I knew I’d be trekking in torrential rains, but little prepared me for the difficulty that came with Gunung Tambuyukon. When I asked Dallius why he never warned me about the difficulty, his reply was that he tried. He did ask if I knew it was raining. And everytime, my reply came back as a “Yes.” He thought I was so sure of facing the mountain that he didn’t try to dissuade me. And so I forged on ahead and went up and down the mountain. Though I didn’t get the sunrise and summit view I expected, there were a number of firsts on this mountain that make this a memorable trek. All in all, I’m glad I’ve done it.

The cost of the trip was approximately RM600—covered the cost for all transportation, guide and park fees. Food was an additional expense and had to be supplied and carried by each trekker.

WHO'S WHO WHO WENT ON THE TAHAN TREK

Tan Meng Chwen
Tan Ying Oon
Marc-Andre Plouffe
Isabelle Choquette
with Andry Nail, our guide