Diary of Gunung Ledang Expedition on 23 – 24 August 2003

Diary of Gunung Ledang Expedition
on 23 – 24 August 2003
by
Teh Ah Yeow
DID Team XPDC
(August 2003)
Diary Of Gunung Ledang Expedition on 23-24 August 2003
DAY 1 (23 August 2003)
Initially, there were supposed to be 18 of us in the team but one could not make it at
the last minute. In the end, four travelled in their own vehicles and the rest of us
(including the driver) travelled by JPS bus. Everybody was very excited to start the
journey and finally we departed from JPS Ampang at 2.30 pm
Reached Tangkak town at about 5.00 pm where we stopped to have a tea break.
Had to walk quite a distance to find food stalls. The ‘coffee o kau’ that I had was
really good. So was the ‘roti bakar’ that Pang ordered.
At about 5.30 pm, we continue our
journey to Gunung Ledang resort.
Along the way, we were treated to a
breathtaking view of the mountain
range, the highest and most famed of
all being the Gunung Ledang itself.
Seeing our overwhelming excitement,
the driver kindly obliged to our request
to stop the bus in order for us to
capture the magnificent view. Finally
at about 6.10 pm, we reached the resort where we proceeded to check-in and rest.
Team members were told to assemble at the resort ‘s lobby at 7.30 pm to go out for
dinner. Finally at 8.00 pm, the JPS bus left for Tangkak town to hunt for food. We
spent quite sometime walking around looking for food stalls, not knowing that hawker
stalls could be found near the bus stop. After a hearty dinner, all of us went back to
the resort.
A briefing initially scheduled at 10 pm was postponed to 10.30 pm because we came
back late from dinner. The resort’s chief ranger, En. Zaaba gave us an interesting
briefing at the Dang Wangi room to prepare us for the next morning’s climb. In his
briefing, not knowing how fit and how prepared we were, he gave the worst scenario
that could happen, that the climb to the summit could take between 8 to12 hours,
1
everyone should be equipped with enough food supplies, torchlight..etc. Some
members of the team especially those who thought that they were not so fit or wellprepared were a bit worried and frightened and having second thoughts whether they
should attempt the next day’s climb. Ooi, Teo and myself who had previous trip’s
experience had to convince them that all of us should be able to make it to the
summit if we climbed at our own pace and with caution, even though certain
stretches of the trail were extremely challenging. Moreover, since the resort had
agreed to allow us to check-out late, we could afford to take longer than the expected
5 hours to reach the summit. In order to save precious time for the next morning,
registration for the next day ‘s climb was also submitted to the ranger.
At 11.30 pm everyone retired to their room to have a good rest to prepare for the next
morning’s climb... Good night everyone and sweet dreams !!
DAY 2 (24 August 2003)
The early birds were already at the resort’s restaurant for breakfast at 7 am.
Everyone was very cautious and choosy over the food to be taken lest they suffer
from stomach upset during the climb.
By 8.00 am, most members of the team were already at the resort’s lobby and
together they walked to the ranger’s office area to wait for the rest of the team
including the rangers. In view of the varying difference in fitness level between the
members, we opted for 2 rangers, ranger Zakaria taking the role of ‘anchor’ (the one
who leads) and ranger G-Pop, the ‘sweeper’ (the one who covers the tail end).
Warming-up
and
stretching
conducted by ranger G-Pop.
exercise
were
A quick group
photograph was taken and everyone was
about to start tracking
when we suddenly
realised two members of the team were
missing ! A brief panic ensued but luckily a
quick check found that they were actually just
about to go for their breakfast –
they had
2
overslept lah !, must had been dreaming of Puteri Gunung Ledang the previous night
!. The rest of the team members then decided
to track in to Kolam Puteri first (8.30 am) and
enjoy the scenic view while waiting for the two
of them. Ooi volunteered to wait and lead them
in to meet up with the rest.
At 8.45 am, En. Hasim from the Instrumentation Unit,
Hydrology Division gave an interesting and informative
briefing on the DID Storm Warning System at the Kolam
Puteri rainfall and water level telemetric station.
At 9.05 am, 15 members of our team of 18 from JPS (including our driver – Pak Din
who could not resist the challenge and decided to join us) and four family members
(a total of 19) started tracking in to Check Point 1 (CP1). The other three members, I
guess, must have fallen in love with Kolam Puteri at first sight and decided to stay
put.
It took us about 25 min to reach CP1 from
Kolam Puteri and after a 5 min break, we
continued our tracking to CP2 which took
another 30 min.
3
We rested for 5 min and then tracked on
to CP3 (Kolam Anak Gajah). We had to
track through a stretch called “Tanah
Kuning”
to reach Kolam Anak Gajah.
Apart from that, we had to cross through
a stream flowing between two pieces of
big rock with a small rock outcrop
between them. Here, we had to step on
the small rock outcrop while holding on to somebody’s hand to help us across.
A member of the team could not resist the
cool and clear water here and decided to
jump in for a good and refreshing swim.
We rested, ‘makan’ and chatted for a
while before carrying on our journey to
CP4 (Kolam Gajah 2050 ft). Here, we
were greeted with a really breathtaking
and
fantastic
view
around
here.
Members could not resist standing on a
big rock outcrop to pose for photographs.
Proceeding to CP5 (Sungai Segi Tiga, 2200 ft), we tracked most of the time along a
stream, crossing 2 hills where we found the vegetation to be quite unique and
attractive. The journey to CP5 took us quite long, slightly more than an hour. Here,
we rested for about 30 min. Some of us took this opportunity to replenish our energy
by eating some snacks and others filled up their water bottles.
4
Some of the men had a go with the ‘Tarzan
Swing’. To make it more realistic, the ladies
volunteered to provide the sound effect – could
have been better !!. A few of us could not resist
and had to answer nature’s call among the
bushes – a truly ‘unique experience’
The journey to Gua Kambing (CP6
3050 ft) from CP5 took us 30 min.
Here, we had to go through a steep
cliff
using
ropes.
Later
on,
we
crossed a place called ‘KFC’ (Killing
Field
Centre
Kentucky
–
definitely
not
Fried Chicken !!!) where
we had to climb almost seemingly
endless steep slopes complicated by
trees
roots
cutting
across
the
tracking path. Here I noticed that some members were already losing ‘steam’ and
had to stop quite a number of times to catch their breath, sound of very heavy
breathing could be heard. The more physically fit members had to play the role of
‘cheerleader’ by giving words of encouragement to push the rest to move on. ‘Sikit
lagi’ was repeatly heard. Everybody heaved a sigh of relief when ‘kali ini, betul-betul
sikit lagi’ was finally heard.
At Gua Kambing, we rested about 45 min
waiting for the second group to catch up.
Three members of the second group had
some problems, one with her ‘gear box’
problem (sakit lutut lah !) and the other two
had leg cramps. Thanks to Ooi, Aziz and Pak
Din for being a good ‘tukang urut’. Here, we
met a group of students on their way down,
resting. When we came to know that one of the student injured her leg, a gentleman
from our group offered his ‘minyak gamat’ to her.
5
The track from Gua Kambing (CP6) to Botak Hill
(CP7) was extremely challenging. We had to
squeeze ourselves through a small tunnel in the
cave and then climbed up some wet rocky track
with the help of ropes. This was no thank to
yesterday’s rain. The two rangers did a really
wonderful job showing us the safe and right way to
do it. Upon reaching the second level of the cave,
we met with another group of students who were
resting. They kindly made way for us to climb up. It
was
kind
of
‘traffic jam’ here with so many people around. We
took the opportunity to look down at the track and
realised that it was going to be even tougher,
taxing and very dangerous to descend. Thank
God, we were going to descend using JPS
vehicles !!. Teamwork prevailed as all members
pulled their resources together to help one another
overcome this very challenging stretch – hands
were stretched out to help to pull members up and
there were also some pushing from the bottom,
apart from the endless encouraging words to keep
the spirits up.
It was really wonderful to see the
kind of moral support
given to the
three members who had ‘gear box’
and leg cramps
problem to enable
them to successfully climb up the
almost 65 degrees three-storey high
rock face. The initial fear of climbing
the rock face disappeared when we
were greeted by very bonsai-like and
very attractive vegetation at the top of the rock face.
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At Botak Hill (CP7 3650 ft), the rangers
showed us the place to get clean (awet
muda)
water ...hmm... couldn’t help but
noticed that only the men went for it !!.
Ranger Zakaria explained that the name
‘Botak Hill’ came about after a group of
irresponsible campers set a camp fire and
burnt down almost all the vegetation around this area. Since then, vegetation had
problem growing back. We could
also get a glimpse of the summit
from here and it was obvious that
some of the members were already
very excited to reach the summit as
soon as possible.
Yahoo !, we, the first group finally reached
the summit at 3.05 pm after more than 6
hours of tracking. We were the only
climbers at the summit as the other
climbers had already descended. We had
the
whole
summit
to
ourselves,
everyone
was
very
busy posing for photographs – all kind of very
interesting poses from the ‘Incredible Hulk’ to I think was
Jackie Chan’s or Jet Li’s kungfu...arm twisting ....
I guess more to express their joy and thrill feeling of
‘YES, WE MADE IT !! It was WORTH IT !!’
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The weather up at the summit was quite
unpredictable, varying between cool misty
temperatures and hot sweltering heat from
the sun. The first group were at the
summit for more than 35 min before the
second group arrived. While waiting, most
of us took the opportunity to admire the
fantastic view around the summit, looking
into the far horizon, while Mat Pua’at
had a very cosy nap. After taking
group photographs, the first group
decided to descend first to JPS Hilltop
Monitoring Station via the Telecom
Tower to meet-up with JPS Johor
staffs
and
others
including
family
members who were anxiously waiting
for our safe arrival. They had with
them packed snacks and bottles of
mineral water to recharge us after our long exhausting track.
After a quick briefing by En. Hasim at
the JPS Hilltop Monitoring Station,
five JPS vehicles took us down to the
resort where a wonderful lunch cum
dinner was waiting for us at the
resort’s restaurant. – courtesy of JPS
Johor.
We had a quick bath and packed-up before checking out at about 7 pm. The bus
eventually left at 7.20 pm and stopped at Tangkak town to allow some of our men to
do some shopping – actually to ‘ambil hati’ (pacify) their wives.
8
We had another break at the Ayer Keroh R&R as the driver was feeling very sleepy.
A peek at the back of the bus explained it – almost everyone was sleeping very
soundly – some with mouth wide opened !! After that Hamzah was assigned the task
of ‘tukang sembang’ to chat with Pak Din to keep him awake to make sure we arrived
home safely. We finally reached JPS Ampang at 11.10 pm. Thanks, Hamzah, you did
a wonderful job. Then it was back home for a good night rest with sweet memories of
Gunung Ledang.
By :
Teh Ah Yeow
DID Team XPDC
NOTE :DID Team XPDC was formed on June 2003 specially for this expedition to climb
Gunung Ledang. The number of members started at eight (8) only initially and slowly
increased to 18. The name ‘XPDC’ was coined from the word ‘Ekspedisi’
- the
Bahasa Malaysia version of expedition, to instill in every member of the team with the
following qualities :-
X
-
Xdventurous, Xtraordinary, Xciting, ....
P
-
Positive thinking, Preserverance, Proactive, .....
D
-
Determination, Do it ! ...
C
-
Cooperation, Commitment, Caring, Courage, .....
We believed that the above qualities in every member of the team made it possible
for ALL of us (those who attempted the climb) to reach the summit successfully on
24 August 2003 despite the fact that quite a number of our members were not
physically fit and prepared.
DID team XPDC would like to take this opportunity to sincerely express our heartfelt
thanks and appreciation to KESSO JPS Malaysia, JPS Johor, JPS Muar,
Instrumentation Unit of the Hydrology and Water Resources Division, Human
Resources Development Division and last but not least, Administration and Finance
Division for all their support and assistance given to us.
THANK YOU VERY MUCH !!.
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SPECIAL NOTE :This kind of activity is a very healthy activity and should be encouraged as it cuts
across all borders - race, status, age, gender, religion,...etc, apart from promoting
healthy lifestyle to warga JPS. Healthy bodies, healthy minds will in return reaps
rewards - increase in work productivity !!.
It is through this kind of activity that every warga JPS has the opportunity to inculcate
/ instill in them the qualities and spirit of leadership, unity, teamwork, preserverance
(tahan lasak), commitment, caring, positive thinking,...
- the spirit of ‘KITA BOLEH, JPS BOLEH, MALAYSIA BOLEH’
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XPDC Mendaki Gunung Ledang Pada 23 – 24 Ogos 2003
- Anjuran KESSO JPS Malaysia
Cross Section Of Gunung Ledang Trail
Gunung Ledang Trail (6km only)
Resort to CP1 – 25 minutes
CP1 to CP2 – 25 minutes
CP2 to CP3 – 60 minutes
CP3 to CP4 – 25 minutes
CP4 to CP5 – 60 minutes
CP5 to CP6 – 30 minutes
CP6 to CP7 – 45 minutes
CP7 to CP8 – 30 minutes
TOTAL
– 5 hours
Note : CP - Check