I’ve always been very privileged when it comes to traveling, but in the past two years i’ve spend an increasing  amount of time adventuring around the Globe. From the December chills of northern China to the sweltering heat of Tanzania, I’ve made it a point to go out and see more of the world with the people around me that I love.

I’ve gotten lost on the great wall of China, climbed the highest mountain on Borneo, Island hopped the Philippines, mountain biked Andorra and photographed wildlife from the roof of a moving Land Rover in Tanzania. I’m reminiscing all of these things while I’m watching the sun sizzle into the Andaman sea on idyllic Phi Phi island, Thailand.

It would be easy to think that I must have been on a 2 year sabbatical to make time for all of these wonderful journeys. But on the contrary, the past two years, other than being a treasure trove of traveling memories, have been the most productive and rewarding years of my young career. I’ve started 2 companies and learned more about the challenges in my industry that I could ever learn from an educational institution.

I’m not trying to flaunt any success I might have had or in some way try to show off. The important point that I want to make is this: A big part of my productiveness happens because of all the traveling and not despite of it. Traveling fuels my inspiration, it serves as anchor points in a somewhat unroutinely schedule and enables the sort of compartmentalized focus you need when trying to do your very best.

Traveling is like a shimmering oasis of off-time that can feed your productiveness in the weeks leading up to a journey. But rather than ‘switching off’ when you’re away, I often find that my mind is racing in new lanes brought on by a foreign environment and the lurking sense of adventure. While it may not be work in the practical sense it can give you a fresh perspective on current projects or bring about entirely new ideas that you’d never have thought up in the comfort of the known. When I get back home, I’m usually energized and itching to launch into new projects or wrap up old ones. Almost as if holding back work is like impounding water in a dam. Upon my return the floodgates of ideas and executions are opened and comes crushing through todo lists with renewed momentum.

I see my travels impacting my work in 3 stages.

1. Leading up to an adventure I race to complete ongoing projects and tie up loose ends. Energized by the closing deadline i’m sometimes able to squeeze in several weeks of work in a short timespan.

2. While i’m traveling I often find that my thoughts move unencumbered in new directions. Clarity is brought on by new experiences. Distance and unfamiliarity somehow opens new doors and presents direction for current projects or spawns entirely new ideas.

3. When I get back home i’m starved for work and I usually experience a boost of productivity in the following weeks.

At least for me, i’ve felt that each vacation has been an investment, not just in the usual good-for-your-soul sense, but also as a healthy business decision. I’m aware that some of these concepts are reserved for entrepreneurs and people with the luxury of a flexible job/life, but I still think the duality of vacation and work can be viewed as coexisting and enforcing rather than being each others opposites.

Rain was beating on the windshield of a rather modern town car as it wooshed through a rather modern city. It was dark outside. We had arrived at Kota Kinabalu, our entry point into Borneo and we had little idea of the challenges waiting ahead.

It was at the peak of the rain season and we where exhausted after 3 weeks of traveling the Philippines. We both had a bad case of the aircon sniffles and the nagging subtle fever that comes with it. To put it bluntly, we where tired and the uncharming city of Kota Kinabalu (affectionately called KK) set the rainy concrete backdrop in a rather uninspiring scene. 

One of our main goals on the Borneo checklist was to climb the famous Mt. Kinabalu, the highest mountain in south east asia. An occasion I had been looking forward to for months. I had intensified my training back home and had packed and hauled all the necessary gear for the ascent of a lifetime. 

Trying to get back on Schedule

As we desperately tried to beat our colds, the rain kept washing over KK like a grey damp carpet. The city was expensive, and as it zapped our funds, it slowly dimmed my hope of climbing Mt. Kinabalu. As I looked out over the South China Sea, my face painted in concern, it looked like a vaporous struggle between grey and darker grey. That was it! We finally decided to not care about our colds and went straight to the local travel company, booked the necessary permits and accommodations for the the following day; we would be climbing that mountain in the face of bad weather and fever - anything to get out of the city and back on schedule.

As yet another grey day loomed we had settled into our outdoor gear and I had my 12kg camera equipment firmly packed and strapped to my back. We started the ascent around 9 in the morning, just as the weather decided to give us another warm, moisty shower.

The Facts

Mt. Kinabalu is part of the Crocker mountain range that cuts through Sabah in northern Malaysian Borneo. Like an odd kid in a classroom it stands freakishly tall, more than twice the height of it’s otherwise impressive neighbors. It’s often shrouded in clouds, but driving there you get the sense of it’s monumental size right away. With it’s 4095,2m it’s the highest point between Himalaya and Papua New Guinea and the 20th highest mountain in the world. What makes this mountain so unique compared to other mountains in it’s class, is that it requires no mountaineering experience to reach the summit. That makes it very accessible to anyone with the proper physical condition to experience a climb and height that would otherwise be reserved for the more advanced mountaineers. If you’re in Borneo, you do not wanna miss out on this opportunity.

The Climb

The climb consists of a two-day ascend, the first part of the journey takes you up a rough trail that carves it’s way through lush jungle shrouded in moving clouds. Someone explained it like climbing stairs for 5 hours straight, which I thought to be a pretty accurate analogy.

As we made our way up the trail through the various vegetation the rain was relentless. We had a wonderfully solemn guide named Freddie, and the first thing he said to us in a monotonous tone was “You probably won’t reach the summit.” He explained that no-one had been able to go there the past two days because of the weather. But even this sombre warning couldn’t ruin my mood. We had finally gotten out of the city and we where making our way up the mountain in one of the most extraordinary terrains I had ever traveled, I was absolutely ecstatic. My fever pounded, I couldn’t tell if it was rain or sweat running down my body, but I was the happiest guy in the world. 

We reached Laban Rata, the dormitory styled building where we would spend the night before making the early morning push for the summit, that is, if we where allowed.

We went to bed around 17pm awaiting the weather verdict around 2am where our alarm clocks would go off. I think I got roughly an hour of solid sleep that night, listening to the rain pounding on the tin roof and battling the fever, crossing my fingers. If there was just the slight hint of bad weather we would be ordered down the mountain without ever reaching the summit, a prospect that just seemed too unfair to grasp. With only enough electricity to run the lights, Laban Rata slipped into the night with 80 people cold in their beds, hoping for the best,

Where’s the Stars?

2am came suddenly. People where making noises in the hall and I got up, ran to the toilet and stuck my hand out the window; no rain. I made my way through people getting in their gear, got downstairs to find that the warning sign was nowhere to be seen. I found Freddie and asked “So that’s it, no rain, no warning sign, does that mean we can make a try for the summit?”. Without looking at me he stared into the pitch black night sky and slipped out a “Where’s the stars?” We both gazed for a minute, my heart beating a soundtrack from a suspense movie. Finally a cloud broke and a vivid starry patch shun through. He looked at me and whispered “We go now”.

At 2.30am we had our full gear on, headlamps fixed and where making our way further up the mountain. Laban Rata, like a dimly lit shed disappeared in the distance. The first hour was a rather rough trail interrupted by big boulders and wet wooden stairs.

At around 3.30am the trail stopped. It was replaced with a sheer rock face and a rope. Knuckles white, we held on tightly as we made our way up some rather difficult patches. Coordinating rope and making sure that you had good foothold while keeping your lamp fixed on the next move was challenging and a lot of fun. At around 4am we reached the last support station at 3800m above sea level. Here they did a man count to make sure that no one was lost.

A huge granite plane with more rope led us up the next part of the climb. I was bubbling with adrenaline, my fever was just a faint sting that I payed little attention to. I sped up and got a few hundred meters higher than the group I was following. Here I put down my LowePro bag and took out my 5Dmk2. Lights where flickering in the distant, I could see KK off to the west. The entire scene was lit by the most beautiful and clear night sky that I had ever witnessed. As I crotched down, shimmering from the sweat rapidly cooling my body I managed to take a few long exposure shots of this magnificent view.

The last push towards the top was a challenging climb on boulders the size of a bus. At around 5:45am we made it to Low’s Peak, the summit of Mt. Kinabalu, 4095,2m above sea level. Just as we got up there the sun came up over Borneo, burning bright yellow and red - piercing the cool blue night sky. It was a view that I can’t justify with words. It was simply, breathtaking.The air was thin up here, I could feel altitude sickness giving me a solid headache and every move I made exhausted me tenfold of what it would have done on the ground. None of these things mattered though, it was part of the experience. We had finally kickstarted our Borneo adventure in style. We had been incredibly lucky with the weather, it was one of the calmest clearest mornings in weeks. The descend was a fairly painful experience with around 8 hours of climbing downhill, but I really urge anyone who come to borneo to not miss out on climbing the mountain. It was an amazing experience, i’ve uploaded a few shots to give you a glimpse of what my camera saw.

We hit 3 islands in less than a week, to say we where on the road would be an understatement. We where on the road, across the sea, climbing mountains and braving any available means of transportation. The only time i got a good look at my bag was when it was strewn in the aisle of a humid bus next to a cage of chickens or in the rows of a freezing ferry next to sleeping children.

We left behind the long slender mountainous island of Cebu and crossed the narrow calm passage at Lito-an over to the Island of Negros. With it’s volcanic dark soil the beaches looked like crunched oreo, washed wet by the foamy sea.

With just a single night in Dumagette, we saw the local market, ate dinner at the popular Rizal Avenue and even made our way out to the bars on the outskirts of the city. I can see why people come here, compared to Cebu the size of the city just makes it very manageable, and because of it’s heritage and university it seems that the locals are ‘used’ to foreigners, which means you can walk the streets without anyone shouting ‘Hey Joe!’ after you.

Late checkins and early checkouts had become the rule rather than the exception. Our alarms went off at the same time at around 6:00 am as the sun dawned on a new hotel room. We gulped down the usual Filipino breakfast. The streets where waking up and we caught a tricycle to the harbor and jumped on a ferry bound for Tagbilaran, Bohol.

Bohol

Arriving in Bohol we had no reservations, just a vague idea of where we wanted to go. After some haggling with the local tricycles we bartered a ride to the island of Panglao, connected to Bohol by a shallow bridge.

The Republic of Bohol, as the Boholians affectionately calls it because of a quick spat of independence in the past, was almost circular in shape. A vacation destination for locals and foreigners alike it sported a more laid back vibe than our previous stopovers. 

We arrived at the hotel and restaurant known as the ‘Bohol Bee Farm’, an epic organic operation situated on a quiet stretch of coast on Panglao. A sprawling herbal garden and, you guessed it, an actual bee farm produces the main ingredients for the zen-like restaurant perched on the cliff overlooking the water. Hidden between pots with lettuce, rows of vegetables and hanging flowers where little villas or ‘beehives’ as they called them. We stayed in the ‘Carrot’ room.

The Chocolate Hills

We rented a motorbike and etched our way through the winding roads of the mountainous inner island. Zooming past rice paddies and waving locals yelling the occasional ‘Hey Joe!’ we made our way to the big attraction on Bohol; The Chocolate Hills. Parking the bike and walking the last hundred steps up to the observation post we had unabridged view of the hundreds of 100-150 meter hills or lumps dotting the plains below. This bizarre geological phenomenon was fairly hyped. Someone far up the ministry of tourism must have a strong affection for hills as these lumps appear on billboards, tv commercials and flyers all around the Phillipines. The truth is, unless you see them in perfect weather conditions and the right time of year when the grassy hills turn to a brownish hue (thus the name), they really aren’t that big of a deal. I found the motorbike trip more enjoyable than sharing the observation deck with a hundred people making funny poses in front of a, albeit unusual, but otherwise tame geological occurrence.

The time was running out on our Visayas adventure and as we chucked down the last of the flowery organic green salad (yes hippies, we ate flowers) we started preparing ourselves for the next leg of our trip; Borneo and the many challenges waiting there.