SkimChix - island life

We arrived at Kidapawan at one o'clock in the afternoon. We had a briefing regarding our climb at the Tourism office of Kidapawan. We were reminded about the do's and don'ts in climbing and an overview of the chosen trail. We were advised to spend the rest of the day at Kidapawan instead of pushing for an emergency camp in the trail.

But our feet are itching to start the climb, so we did, and arrived at Lake agro at three o'clock in the afternoon, our jump off point . Fortunately, we met some kids who volunteered to act as our porters. And since, it was my plan to have the least load during the climb, we hired them to assist us, actually to carry my load. I was there to enjoy the climb and not to punish myself of my load.

We started trekking the Marble River, which includes passing over a fallen tree branch that connected the ends of the river. It was a heart thumbing experience since it was for more than 7 meters long. I wasn't sure if I can cross it without falling underneath the rocky river. But thank God I reached the end safely. So far that was the most challenging part of the trek, the rest seems very easy. Even crossing the river with strong currents didn't scare me.

Then we reach the most appropriate spot to spend the night, we set up our tents and started cooking our dinner. After our dinner rain started pouring so we decided to call it a night. I had a hard time sleeping with the water flowing on our side and my sleeping bag was getting wet. And the noise from the cascading river was making it more difficult to sleep.

So our first cold night to quest Mt. Apo ended.