Christmas at Pulai

Sun was up, warm breeze caressing gently over our face, thus set the stage for yet another great day out on “Sister Pulai”. It’s our second time out here on Gunung Pulai, and we were greeted by the rustling leaves fringing out towards the service road leading up to what seems to be a good 5 clicks walk. It had been raining substantially for the past few weeks and we were glad the rain finally let up on this fine morning.

We made our way pass rusty run down sentry post, sneaking our way around the rusty old gate and emerging from the other side. A mild  30 degree slope stretches those tight calfs of ours and we paced our way up to the 1st checkpoint – The archway of Gunung Pulai. Through the archway we were greeted by rows of delipilated motar laden walls to what seems to be left over from post colonial times.

We took a five mins break and marched on to the final leg of the long trek ahead. Along the way, creatures of the forested cheered us on as we paced ourselves up the never ending  winding slopes. Along the way we met many locals carrying bottles and jerry cans of fresh spring water down those steep slopes. Such is the highly priced gem of mother nature, which according to locals are rumoured to contain minerals that may raise the vitality of ones health.

The arching road finally ends when we finally came to a newly constructed wooden bridge which marks the last leg of the trek up Pulai. Here the forest is less dense and you and feel gentle gust of cool breeze blowing down from natural wind tunnels. Perhaps due to heavy weather lately, some of those young trees were uprooted, splinter huge branches along the way.

One click from there laid the notorious windings 70 degrees road up to the peak of Gunung Pulai. My husband collected some spring water sprouting from the granite slopes with his filtration bottle and tasted the cool freshness of this good mountain. We pushed our way up those tiring bends and was finally greeted by the sight of endless green forested overlooking the road which we have travelled. Thus marks yet another great morning climb at Gunung Pulai.