Climbing Mount Kinabalu is never a walk in the park. But definitely, you can make an effort to make it feel like one. Given the taxing effort of reaching the summit, one should never fail to look around and indulge in the beauty of the surrounding. It is amazing what you can see just by looking around.
The forests of Kinabalu Park are rich in flowers and plants, around 5,000 flowering plants had been catalogue to present day and many more new species are waiting to be discovered. I tried to be as observant and as keen as possibly I could and here are some of the species I found along the way. I never saw the
layang-layang bird or the ever-famous
Rafflesia but I've already seen them in my dreams. That would be enough for now.
From the Layang-layang Station, we could see a peak of the Mount Kinabalu framed in rich vegetations from the moss-covered trees to the wild flowers cosseted in lush green.
Our trek started way passed eight in the morning and early on, I already spotted little flowers growing at the side of the trail. Most of them were easy to miss either because they were too small to notice or they were covered with moss and leaves. Or could be that climbers are just too damn tired to even notice a tiny yellow daisy amongst the bushes.
The pitcher plants of the Nepenthes are perhaps the most popular plants at Kinabalu Park. There are about nine species of pitcher plants and most of them can be found at the altitude of 2,702 m to 3,200 m. A few species of the pitchers plants have the ability to eat small insects alive with its pitcher. These two were particularly found for us by our guide.
On our way to find the helipad, we found an abundance of white wild orchids growing along the muddy rocks. They were small and too simple to immediately notice but seeing them in abundance made a difference. They look better in person, trust me.
These are the theaceaes. They present almost all through out the trek. But the flowers are more abundant at 3,200 m altitude. Their foliages look like flowers too with all the colorful leaves.
Still from the Theaceae family, I found this at 2,702 m altitude hanging solidly along the trail.
This, I found while we were resting at the 5.0 KM mark. It belongs to a stunted tree.
The forest is also rich with wildberries.
I call this the “pinkblush”. I could not exactly remember where and how I chanced upon these but they really look pretty that even though I was exhausted, I had to stop and take photos.
Of course, climbing Mount Kinabalu will not be as fun and as memorable without encountering these squirrels. They hang around in places where there are food to squander. Advise: don’t feed them with your bare hands! They could nibble them too. ^_^
