My 25 days course-
Everything was taken from us during registration, ie, our ID, money, wallet/purse, cell phone,cigarrette, etc.
we went for 4 expeditinos and 1 solo during those 25 days besides having some rope challenges [including vertical playground, pamper pole, flying fox, rock climbing and reppeling], rafting, some initiative games, orienteering & morning run.
Expedition 1: 5KM Kayaking 2Days1Night
Things at OB are quite basic ones so we din have dome tents for our overnights. We have to learn knots to build our own tents, cooking with pots and wok, eating rice/noodle instead of burgers like at camp.
Epedition 2: Orienteering 2D1N
forgot how far it was but at least 5KM. we have to carry our own food (canned food mostly) and our rope and tent sheets & personal stuff & most importantly, a gallon of water each person…
we have to follow the bearing found by connecting the check points given by our instructor. we had a formation of 2 "sword"man for clearing our path, navigator, expedition leader, pacer, ironmen and sweeper. I was the pacer all the time coz i am too weak to be the swordman, i will get everyone lost if i become the navigator, am not strong enough to be the ironmen (carry extra stuff), hahaha so i am usualy quiet coz counting my steps & not to lost count.
anyhow, we kind of went off track and had to go down very steep hills where at 1 point we thought we are reaching but when we can see the clearing, the people we saw was only as tall as a centimeter!! we were still high up on the hill and it was a dry waterfall…with big rocks… we definitely not going up so we have to go down, using 1 of out tent rope, reppelling down the waterfall, through thorny plants that were not alien to us anymore at that point. We went down coz we heard our instructor’s signal from down there. we were so happy to hear the familiar monkey sound he made. That is the sound they used to locate ppl in the jungle. we blowed our whistle hard & when he heard us, he asked us to just go straight down. I felt that I appreciate the friendship in the group more after that tracking…
the next day, we track back using a dfferent way & it was less challenging physically but, BUT, we have to walk a mile or 2 on "leeches" path!!! We walked through oil palm plantation and passed a lot of thorny palm trees before reaching the entrance of the jungle where the blood suckers are. during the journey back to base, i got 8 leech bites on my ankles and 1 on the back of my NECK!!!!!! This is one of the reason i like the forest in US better… US dun really have leeches but in Msia, you will ALWAYS find leeches. If you go to Mount Kinabalu, the tallest peak in Southeast Asia, you might find Kinabalu Giant Leech that is at least 6 inches long!!!!! Thank god they are not feeding on human blood.
Expedition 3: Whaler 3D2N (pictures in facebook)
Whaler was used in the older time to chatch whaler. thought it has sails, those people row more. it has 3 sails, Jib, main and Mizen. we have to row when there is no wind. Our dirst destination was like 60KM from base. most of us got seasick especially when we start to sail coz we din do anything when we stop rowing.
There were 2 different group including us that went for that same trip that day. we ate packed luch frm the dining hall and that night at 3AM, people start waking up to
go digging cat’s holes. i am one of those who went for 3 times. There were 21 of us all together & all 20 of us got food poisoning…
The beach were so busy that night. a lot o flash lights, people lining up to go to the spot to do their business. It was really funny actually… at first 1 of my friend who just woke up was told by the one sleeping beside him that Pulau Rumbia (Rumbia Island) is now become Pulau Taik/Tahi (Shit Island). It was really funny to recall things happened during our expeditions.
other than that, P. Rumbia also known for it’s wildboars. They are as tame as domestic cats, so called. you can see their pictures in facebook. It is a major problem to most of the participants coz majority of them are Muslims and they cannot touch any kind of pigs as they are "unclean" animal. dun ask me why coz i am not sure too.
second day, we sailed to a place closer to Lumut town but when we reached Pulau Pangkor, the Island opposite of our base, we faced strong current. There were no wind so we have to row. we rowed for 15 minutes and we din move anywhere… The current were really strong and most of us were tired and some had already gave up. finally when our course director found that it’s not going to work, he told us that we will be towed by the mother boat. i got 4 huge blisters on my right palm from rowing against that current. That night we just slept on the tarp without something over our head coz we wre too lazy to make tents.
third day we rowed all the way back to our base. i kept reminding the rest to row hard so that we can reach before the strong current comes. They rowed really hard and better coordination this day because all of us did not want to fight the current like the day before!! our instructor was proud of us coz we reach far before the other group.
after that really tiring expedition, we were given a break- 3D2N SOLO camping…
we
were given a tarp, rope and enough food ration and mosquito coils for 2 nights. Including 2 candles and 10 matches. It was really cool to be able to stay alone for a while after the hectic expedition. I was feverish the morning when we start the program & was still having diarrhea. that might be the reason why they put me closest to the exit of the jungle.
There were 3 supernatural encounters by my group members. That is another reason why i am not that fond of Msian jungle…God protected me well, i din see anything, hahhaha.
oh, i forgot to tell that I was the only female participant & they put me alone in a dorm that can fit 24 people!! and the instructor even scare me by telling me that usually "those things" will disturb participants who sleep alone!!! He is really of no help.
Expedition 4 :The Final Expedition 4D3N
we had to sea kayak around Pangkor Island & some other place (44KM) for 2D and tracking for 2D on Pangkor Island (climbing 4 peaks)
I was the sea kayaking leader because i took the single kayak (we had odd number) since i am the only one had tried single kayak b4 (thanks to Bear Creek Aquatic Camp) and most others are firstimer in kayaking. My right wrist is still sore from paddling….
we paddled back to the base and reached at 3PM on the second day.
we showered adn rest for 1 hr before the motherboat bring us to Pangkor Island for overnight, where we will start our tracking the next morning. Again, we have to bring our rations, water, tarps, rope & even our cooking utensils!! we reached lunch place 1 hour late. oh yea, the night before it was drizzling. and we forgot to keep the kindling dry so we din have packed lunch for the tracking. we only munch on apples (3 per pax), sugar crackers and some bread since our other stuff need to be cooked before consuming.
we reached the last peak of the day at 3.45 & continue the last trip down the valley at 4PM. at 5PM, our swordmen starting to get nervous because they couldn’t find the way out. the bushes were so thick that their blunt "knife/sword/whatever u call it" were not sharp enough to make us a path out. we all start to look behind us to check whether our instructor is wtill with us because during first tracking expedition he will leave us when we took wrong path. Our instructor was with us all the time this XPDC so we thought we were still ok.
at 5.30PM, Our instructor took over. our swordmen tried 3 paths & failed. Instructor," Biar saya cari! Kalau macam ini sampai besok pagi pun tak keluar!…." translation: Let me find the way out! We won’t even be out tomorrow morning if we continue like this
He tried 4 paths. we went down, came up & down a different path & up for 4 times..still couldn’t find the way out. That was known to be the most tricky part of the jungle…
on out lst time up the hill, our instructor made the monkey noise and to our surprise, the reply came right after that from a reasonable near distance! the other group reached there too!! our bearing showed the right way but we just couldn’t find the way out. we met the other group (6PM) & conbined the groups with 1 mission in our mind-to get the #$&^&* out of there as soon as we can coz it won’t be pleasent to stay in the jungle in the dark.
It was already getting dark…
we started to get our flash lights out… there were not enough for everyone so we have to share with the people in front & back of us. a lot of people were tired, oh, btw, again, i am the only female in this group of 20 participants +2 male instructors. So i got to know more about guys frm the other group.Though it was dark but i still manage to enjoy myself coz I don’t worry at all about being lost in the jungle coz with the instructor in charge, everything shd be fine. 1 of our group member were pulled out during lunch stop coz the instructor knew what was going to happen & felt that he couldn’t make it. He was sent back to the base by the mother boat.
there were 1 injured member in my grp. muscles cramped since beginning of after lunch trip and strained them too.
we had to go through the swamp to get out faster and the leeches were partying on us… it wasn’t the primary concern anymore so by now, don’t really care about leeches anymore. Furthermore, I have not donate blood for a ong time, ahhaaha.
The night tracking, was so much more difficult than day tracking. have to be more careful going down hills. so we slided a lot, crawls too. my track bottom were thorned so i got to throw it at the end of the trip. a few of the guys too got their track bottom thorned.
Instructors finally took out the cell phone & call our course director who were on standby adn told him our situation. The instructor did not ask for the rescue team-guess they are still confident to find the way out…after that they tried to call the female instructor who were waiting for us at the camping site (the monkey sound) & we had to be so quiet to listen for the response but we did not hear teh response. The jungle is too thick and sound from outside is said to be difficult to get in. We were told later that she heard us clearly but we couldn’t hear her response.
We finally got out at 2AM. some other group in the past came out the next day 2PM coz they usually stop tracking at 6PM, camp on the peak & continue the next morning. There is possibility that our instrcutor saw that we still have energy and they felt we can make it through the night, so they continued. That is their first time too doing night tracking.
we did the leech check at the camp site. all the bloody socks-yucks!! some had like 20 leeches on 1 SPOT!!! we used salt to get them off. The guys including the instructors got like more than 30 bites but to my surprised, i only had 9!!!! 3 on my ankle, 2 on my front neck, 1 at the back of my neck near my hair, 1 on my front right waist, 2 on my back waist. and during that check i only found the one near my hair. all others were long gone, left only their marks. Some of the leeches i found were drown in my shoes coz they are waterproof shoes, haaha,
the next morning we were told to get ready at 10AM for the final tracking. We were given a choice to either continue our tracking or quit it coz the instructor said that destination is not important but the experience and through our experience last night, we have actually graduated the final XPDC. We were asked to discuss and come up with 1 answer.
The other group decided to call it a quit coz they were sent and sponsored by their company (compulsory). but my group members paid for themselves except 1 pax so our majority decided to keep going. we left the camp site proud…the other group cheered for us. the mother boat was scheduled to pick them up there soon.
We had hiked for only half an hour when our injured member gave up. we discussed and we decided to quit since we have to make group decision. so, we all went back to base by boat, looking at the hills that we climbed…there were kind of a phobic feeling in most of us when looking at this island. some even said wld never come back to this island (its one of the tourist attraction), some said would form a committee to report to the boss who sent them there about their disagreement to sending staff there, hahahaha
so, actually for that tracking part, we did not have solid food for like over 24 hours coz our last meal was in the morning before the tracking started and the next meal we had was after we reached the base at 2PM next day. My stomach forgot what is food before we reached the base…
for the last 3 days, we did our project for the school, had our BBQ nite, closing on the last day & got our title as an ex-Bounder.
That is my local camping experience…
April 5th, 2007 at 5:01 pm
tis is like some kind of Msia Rat Race… I hate leeches… screw Lumut, go Sabah! so if u r at Sabah OB, do I get discount? free accomodation? haha..
April 8th, 2007 at 11:57 pm
Free accomodation can la, hahaha but, pray hard that i can get in first. If i move there I can bring u around if u visit Sabah. My friend love travelling so she can be ur main guide, haha