Boreno Day 4

Day 4 we were still at the Kinabatangan River.  We had and early rise at 6am for another river boat ride.  I think the only big species we had not seen after the first boat ride the night before was the orang-utan.  And finally we saw one.  The highlight however was the little mangrove snake (not coral as I had identified earlier).  Jarrah unfortunately had woken up with a little fever but still came out on the boat ride and slept through most of it.

 

The next activity after breakfast was a hike.  Ben and I went on the “long” hike to the oxbow lake.  It was about a 3 hour trip through lots of mud puddles so again we had to wear gum boots.  This time, Ben found a size that fit him so he didn’t have to go barefoot.  We were still underdressed in our shorts however somehow were lucky enough not to get a leech on us – the guy in front who was all rigged out, managed to get five or so on him in one shot!  So the lesson was that in a hike with leeches, always say at the back. 

 

Aunty Jill, Uncle Vijay and Dad had a short hike with Max who showed them lots of things on a shorter walk.  Dad found lots of greens that he used to collect from his jungle home.

 

Went on another boat trip in the afternoon, much more relaxed since we had seen everything already!!  But we did get a good glimpse of orang-utans and the funny probiscus.

 

No one wanted to go on the night hike, so we all retired – very tired.

 

 

Borneo Day 3

Once we all got together, there was no rest scheduled into the itinerary.  Today we had to wake up at a crazy 5 am to get us all our the door and in a taxi and to the airport.  We managed all that somehow and made it onto the plane without any problems with about 18 pieces of carry on and 6 heavy suitcases.

We flew over the mountain all the way to the east coast of Sabah.  I actually didn't look out the window at the right time to see the mountain but it was apparently pretty impressive.  Arriving in Sandakan town we had a couple of hours to wait for our transfer to the Kinabatangan River.  We roamed around town looking for a suitable (read cheap) Indian style restaurant to fill up Ben's stomach and everyone else's.  Uncle Vijay and Aunty Jill were most impressed by the freshly-made-in-front-of-you parathas for 1 ringgit (30 cents).

Finally we got on the bus and rode the 2 hours to the river.  Through lots and lots of oil palm plantation.  In fact the wildlife reserve is bordered by palm oil plantation.  The reserve is a narrow strip of secondary forest - a corridor.  Very sad.  But what it means is that in this small area is a large concentration of lots of animals.

We stayed at the Kinabatangan Nature Lodge.  We had aircon rooms and our own bathrooms!  Nice.  At 4 pm was our first boat trip on the river.  We had a local guide Max (whose real name was Raziman but he started using his nicname Max when people started calling him Craziman).  Because there were so many of us, we had a boat to ourselves.

Spotted over the 4 boat trips (one every evening and another in the early morning):
Pygmy elephants
Proboscis monkeys
Orangutans
Macaque monkeys
Silver langurs
Saltwater Crocodile
Rhinoceros Hornbill
Black Hornbill
Pied Hornbill
Wrinkled Hornbill
Wreathed Hornbill (maybe)
Kingfishers (not sure the type!)
Broadbills
Cattle Egrets (yay!)
Coral Snake (Aunty Jilli's favourite - especially when we parked the boat under the tree it was sitting in)
Some kind of stork that I can't remember - the biggest in Malaysia

Oh, I'm sure I have forgotten something or someone.  Max was incredible at spotting things.  This snake was sitting quietly in a very leafy tree.  When he spotted the snake, we were way off and no one could work out how he saw it - to the point of accusing him of putting a rubber snake in the tree!  It started moving so we took back the accusations!

That night, Ben and I (we had many offers of babysitters) went out for the night hike.  The others weren't too keen on the idea of mud, mossies, leeches.. !  I located a pair of gumboots in my size.  Ben didn't bother.  His feet are big and it looked like all the big boots were taken.  So he went bare footed.  I had shorts on!  We both had shorts on in fact.  All the others going out had long pants.  Long sleeves.  Leech socks.  We looked quite underdressed!  Despite that, I didn't get any leeches on me and not any noticeable mossie bites.  I saw a leech on Ben's calf trying to fix himself on, which I quickly flicked off.  The only really interesting thing we saw however was a poor little kingfisher trying to sleep while 15 people were shining flashlights in his face!  We also walked over fireants which Ben also found particularly interesting in his bare feet.

We decided not to go out the next night and naturally they saw something interesting - a Western Tarsier (a small very cute looking mammal).

It was a good day though.  Very pleased we saw the elephants!  there were about 20 of them.  Babies and mummies and daddies and youths.  They were eating grass and drinking by the river.  Quite used to being looked at by humans.