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Published: October 30th 2010
We were sad to say goodbye to the Mayfair Hotel in Sandakan to embark on our excursion down the Sungai Kinabatangan. We'd grown fond of the owner, Mr Lum (better described as Mr Glum, he was the gruffest, most serious man ever...but lovable nonetheless) and we loved the giant TV in the room and huge selection of DVDs. However, we knew we'd be back so we waved farewell to Mr Lum (under his scowl you could tell he'd miss us too) and headed off over the road to find our lift to the river.
We bundled into a car with another English couple and off we set. Once we arrived at the sweltering Kinabatangan we checked into our stifling wooden chalet and then headed down the river by boat to see what we could find...and we weren't disappointed. We were lucky enough to see long tailed macaques, the VERY odd-looking probiscis monkeys (who make the strangest sounds), and a herd of about 10 pygmy elephants who came right down to the river for a drink, some food, and some of them even for a dip.
After dinner at the chalets we climbed back into the boat for a night
cruise where we saw baby crocodiles, a nest of swiftlets, numerous types of kingfisher who had night-blindness so you could get right up close enough to touch them without them knowing about it...and also a buffy fish owl, absolutely beautiful with huge yellow staring eyes. The next couple of days followed the same pattern of a cruise at 6am, 4pm and 8pm to see the different types of wildlife at different hours of the day so as well as the nellys and monkeys we saw eagles, hornbills, a couple of storm storks, giant lizards, numerous colourful little birds and on our last day a gibbon who was sat in a tree outside our chalet.
We befriended an old Canadian couple who were kind enough to share their gin with us so the time between the cruises was well spent. At one point as we were sitting having a chat there was a huge crash as a tree right next to our chalet suddenly, for no apparent reason, fell down. Luckily it fell in a different direction from our room or it'd have been crushed! I also had a bit of a nightmare as I was having a shower and
the water suddenly turned into mud...when I tried to turn the tap off I pulled it off the wall and mud sprayed EVERYWHERE as I tried to get the tap back on, it was like something out of a comedy sketch. Rob managed to sleep through that mini-drama and was surprised to see me emerge from the bathroom covered in mud.
After a couple of eventful days by the river we returned to Mr Lum who welcomed us with a smile and open arms...ok, he did none of those things, but he acknowledged us at least. We then booked our bus ticket back to Kinabalu to attempt the big challenge...Mount Kinabalu...
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Mummy Bailey
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You got some great pics ...
Looks fantastic, and glad you kept your arms and legs inside the boat... and I know you would never smile at a crocodile... x