One week after returning from the northern tip of Borneo that is Sabah, I write these memoirs, of the trip to reach its peak...Monday was train-rafting day.
Well we had a choice. Either navigate the white-water rapids on the Padas River (which came highly reccomended by the way) or the 4 of them could take a 1-day SCUBA-experience course while I tagged along on 2 fun dives since I was the only one certified. We let the girls decide and they chose the former.
Lucky for us because it was an experience to remember.
We realized that the Padas River was not just around the corner. Infact, the early 7am bus pick-up took us on a 1.5hr journey to the quaint town of Beaufort down south before we had to catch a rickety 2hr train ride through lush rainforest to the startpoint at Kg Panggi along the river.
Sabah State Railways (SSR) runs the only line in Borneo. Formerly known as the North Borneo Line, the SSR runs thrice-a-day services from KK to Tenom on old, 1970's, single-class diesel locomotives that are so bone-shaking and uncomfortable, you'll be happy to settle for the lousy trains that its counterpart Keratapi Tanah Melayu (KTM) offers on the Peninsula.
But stangely, aching backside aside, the train ride was a nice way to spend the morning. As well as travel the way the locals do, with the locomotive meandering its way through the jungle and the kampongs at every stop. For a while, I felt abit like Paul Theroux, who likes to write about his travels from a train perspective (Riding the Iron Rooster, The Old Pentagonian Express, The Great Railway Bazaar) and I could tell why the romantism of such a languid old-school journey can be so appealing. A few people get to see this side of Sabah, very much the 'other' hinterland apart from the famous Gunung that is Kinabalu. And at every stop, I scrutinized the people that got on and off the train like ants breaking a long convoy in a temporary diversion to a food source.
I mentioned earlier that these SSR trains have a single, uncomfortable, non-airconditioned class. And its very much a free-for-all at the boarding station where you have to push and shove your way for seats. Unless of course you prefer going
al fresco, there are open-air freight carriages available where a
tete-a-tete next to sacks of potatoes under the blazing sun for 2hours awaits. That was what happened to a group of 40 Koreans on the way to Padas who insisted on sitting together. But they seemed to enjoy the ride and I would have joined them just for the heck of it.
Finally, 28 butt-soring stops later, we reached Rayoh where we had to get off the train for awhile to off-load our stuff and change into rafting attire. Rayoh was going to be the end-point for the river journey later so it made sense to leave our dry clothes at the communal hut before proceeding with the train again to Panggi.
At Panggi, we had a crash course on rafting dynamics. The key, it seems, is to continue rowing even if you hit the rapids in order to stabalise the raft and not let the wavey currents toss you like a rag doll. The Padas River and Gorge consists of Grade 4 rapids (world-wide rapids are graded on a scale of 1-6 with 6 reserved for the pros) so it was not entirely a walk in the park. And with names like Headhunter and Washing Machine on certain fast-flowing, boulder-strewn stretches, you sort of get the idea of what to expect.
Well the 5 of us gave a good account of ourselves as far as rowing was concerned, if our rafting guide Jerman is to be believed that is. Not a single one of us got thrown into the water. And thankfully, our dinghy didn't get flipped over like 2 other boats, sending the single-man rescue Kayaks tailing the
Rubber Armada scuttling to rescue the shell-shocked 'swimmers'. In fact, after Scooby Doo (see T-shirt map), we actually became quite proficient in the art of group paddling and crashing head-on into 4 foot waves.
And so, 2hours and 11km later, we survived Padas well enough to have a hearty BBQ lunch at the Rayoh hut where we changed out of our
Teh-susu clothes. It was then back on the old 'Express', which by the way, finally broke down 40mins from Beaufort, after we had remarked, rather ominously actually, how surprised we were it didn't give up the ghost much earlier.
But it didn't matter because by then, we were much too pooped and snoring in our hard seats to worry about the 30min sojourn in the middle of nowhere.
In our hearts, the Gunung awaited tommorrow.
Labels: Travel