Dumbo up the Hills - #5: Half-way Up Penang Hill

I was a bit apprehensive when my uncle told me that day that we were going half-way up the Penang Hill. I mean, prior to that, I had only done the Ayer Itam Dam and the "Happy Hill" in Jawi, and both were not very high in altitude. With Penang Hill, even at only the half-way point, it would be more than double the previously attempted altitude.

I almost chickened out of it, but then I thought: I would be attempting Mount Kinabalu in less than three months, which is more than three times the altitude of Penang Hill (the actual altitude of Mt. K is more than six times taller, but the "climbable" stretch is only three times taller than Penang Hill), and here I was, worrying about climbing half-way up Penang Hill?

So I boldly went where my feet have never trekked before. :-)

***

We started when it was just getting light. There are a number of hill paths that will eventually lead to the top of Penang Hill, and on that day, the path we took starts from a point quite near my grandma's place. The first few hundred meters of the path were stone steps that were a bit slippery due to the rainfall the previous evening.


The stone steps, together with another mud/cement path (wide enough for motorcycles) that ran roughly parallel to it, are the access roads for vegetable farmers around that area.


Below is the view of part of the Ayer Itam town (old town, as opposed to the "new town" more commonly known as "Farlim" after the main developer of the area) from the stone steps.


Another view of the Ayer Itam town through the woods.


The stone steps stretched on...


... and on...


... and finally, came to an end here. On the left is a house, and the compound area is rather picturesque, but I dared not openly take pictures of a private residence while there might be eyes looking out the windows or something. :-p


We then switched to the cement path...


... or, mud path, for certain stretches along the way.

At one point, we came to this open area, with a mud path going right through a shack used by the farmers to store their fertilizers...


And from that vantage point, you could almost take in the whole Ayer Itam Valley.


For our reassurance, we came across this huge boulder spray-painted with the words "F3 PG HILL -->" to tell hikers which way to go. Actually, a while back before we reached this point, my uncle had asked a middle-age lady going down the path whether we were on the right path that leads to the middle station (half way point) of Penang Hill, and she had assured us that we were, and had given some detailed directions. The residents of those hill slopes regularly go up and down those hill paths to run their daily errands, some more than one time a day. That middle-aged lady had the look of someone going to the market to buy something, and she was walking bare-footed with her sandals in her hands! I felt embarrassed that I was gasping for air like fish out of water... :-p


The path that we took was definitely not the shortest path to the middle station (that is, the middle station of the funicular train; there's this "bottom station" at the foot of the hill, and a "top station" at - where else? - the top of the hill), but the remaining journey was rather uneventful, except at one point when an Indon worker going up the same path overtook me and turned to jeer me, "Eh, tired already? Come on, go faster!" What cheek!



A glimpse of the rising sun...




An interesting house on the slope...


If your are the romantic type, think mist. If you are the practical type, think haze. =.=



At one point, we came to this fork in the road, and there were these signs nailed to the tree telling us: left, top station; right, middle station. And we took the right turn.



Finally, a glimpse of the middle station...


My uncle pointed out to me something growing by the roadside. The plant looks like grass, each with about five leaves, but it is not grass; according to my uncle, it is a type of CORIANDER! And indeed, it smelled like coriander (cilantro).


We finally came to the middle station. We decided to take the funicular train down, because two and a half hours of hiking was decidedly quite enough for a morning! And my stomach was already screaming for breakfast.


A tram arriving from the top station.


On weekdays, during off-peak hours, you can practically have the whole train to yourself. On that day, there were only three passengers on the tram: a middle-aged Indian man, my uncle, and I.




Next time: to the top!