We then progressed to the canopy walk at Poring Hot Springs. This is not for the faint hearted – it’s a long way up and the board (just one plank wide) does wobble from side to side a bit. Definitely worth doing, though. We gave the springs a miss – it would have taken too long for a pool (bath) to fill for us as we had diverted to see the Rafflesia. Instead, we enjoyed a long cold drink at the bar and made friends with the local feline community.

In the afternoon we visited the Mountain Garden, where there are wonderful specimens of rare and beautiful orchids and pitchers plants among others. This is the closest we came to Mount Kinabalu. We did seriously consider the climb as it is one of the most accessible mountains in the world, however time just flies when you are on the holiday of a lifetime. It would be foolhardy for a normal person to attempt the climb in 1 day and 2 days out of the holiday would have meant missing something else. One thing impressed on us by Herman, though, is that if you do climb it, make sure you take notice of all the safety and preparation information – tragic and unnecessary fatalities to climbers have been known on the mountain.

There’s not much to the national park except for the mountain and the main path has been well constructed with a number of water stations and seats which are handy near the start where you are still in dense forest and it can be really hot.

The park entrance is at 2000m and the normal ascent involves going up to the incredibly ugly Laban Rata hut at 3500m to stay overnight and then heading to the summit for sunrise, then back to the park entrance the same day. No-one is allowed above the Laban Rata Hut without a guide being present although this is not strictly enforced as guides have to look after a number of people and the route is well defined. The route has large ropes secured to the ground to follow / aid you and on the way down its tempting to run your hand along the rope – this means youll either get rope burns on your skin or destroy a pair of gloves in the process – I would advise taking an old pair of tough gloves for this, such as gardening gloves.

It’s a typical tourist thing to attain summits by sunrise but this is more because they want to get you back out of the park that day rather than because its necessarily spectacular, in reality its damn cold at 4 in the morning and a tough slog up the hill so fitter people are best to leave it till later to start their ascent. If you don’t make it to the summit the views from the path are excellent once you get beyond the forest cover and also has the advantage that you wont be jostling for position on the summit peak.

When going up or down the trail below the hut try to get away from the groups of people as they scare most of the wildlife away, one trick is to wait at the larger seating areas and stay really quiet and still – after sizeable groups pass a squirrel or two will come out to check for any food left behind – once they spot you they disappear again to await their next opportunity.

The mountain guide we had seemed to know only the basics of the plant life in the park and not much else but was very cheery and keen to help when people in other groups were struggling, - it became apparent that we were fitter than he was so he happily waved us on, at the end of the trek he refused to take a tip but instead let me buy him a meal at the restaurant which was nice.