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Published: November 15th 2007
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OK, I have to apologise before i start because i am seriously gonna GUSH!!!
WOW wow wow! We have just returned to Kota Kinabalu after 3 days in the Jungle and then 5 days investigating Mabul and Sipadan Islands. We managed to find a really reasonable tour to visit the Kinabatangan river to do a jungle stay. The company even collected us from the backpackers in Sandakan for the 4 hour drive to the lodge for Rm15 (2 quid) each!
We had booked to stay in the dorm at the lodge but there was a cabin available when we arrived and our 5 mins in the ROASTING hot dorm had us running for the cabin and an upgrade! We had looked at a fair few tours to the jungle and they didn't seem to vary in price that much but the place we choose seemed to have more activities included. We arrived at the lodge just after lunch and had an hour to settle in before the afternoon river cruise. We were amazed that as well as seeing loads of monkeys, including our old friends the probiscus (willy noses!) we actually spotted 2 wild Orangutans! The boat trips were
2 hours although they didn't seem to have a problem extending this when there was lots to see.
All food was included on the tour and we were pleasantly surprised that it was really nice! The evening they took us on a night jungle walk, VERY muddy, VERY hot and VERY humid but fun all the same, although the extent of the wild life was a a small frog and a big worm! Talking of wildlife, we were warned that there were leaches in the jungle so to wear long socks and boots and cover up. Luckily none of the leeches appeared to find either mine or Tels blood tasty and so we were spared from being sucked! We did find a tiny leach and i was busy looking at it on the palm of my hand (apparently they can't penetrate there!) and Terry got up close with the camera on macro to take a photo of it, well the camera seemed a better option than my hand and he jumped onto the lens, we laughed at him until the little bugger disappeared between the lens and the casing! Terry spent the next hour with the camera pressed to
his wrist trying to entice it out, but no, he was happy were he was and is still missing in there, presumed dead by now :o(. Oh the camera is still working fine luckily, we did wonder if all our photos would have a little "where's Wally" style leech in but it seems not! We're waiting for someone we're taking a photo of to start screaming as little Martin (named after one of Terry's teachers - Martin Leach) makes a reappearance!
The next day we did an early morning boat trip (6am), a 2 hour walk through the jungle to a lake, an afternoon boat trip and another night walk. On our final morning we had to leave at 8.30 to catch the bus to Semporna on the main road so i declined the morning boat ride for a little bit of a lie-in (7am instead of 5) and to pack. We manged to get to the main road, an hour down a bumpy track, in time to see the bus approaching and waved it down and after a quick pee in a bush jumped on (to find the bus had a loo!)
We had booked into a
place called Scuba Junkies for our first 2 nights and then 4 nights on the island of Mabul with Billabong Scuba. On the first day we went with Scuba junkies to Sibuon island, there is no tourist facilities here and it is only inhabited at times by a few sea gypsies. The island was beautiful, and although it rained for the whole day it didn't stop us snorkeling. Terry has gone from being someone not that keen on the water and swimming to a complete water baby! We were amazed at the marine life, there was so many fish!
Anyway, following our second, very noisy, (our room was right above the bar with a resident awful band) we made an early start for the 45 minute journey to Mabul. We arrived to a little house on stilts were they have about 6 rooms for people to stay. OK, blatant advertising but they deserve it! this place is called Billabong resort, the prices are really reasonable and include 3 excellent and plentiful meals a day, (Lauren is Veggie and they really pulled out the stops with her food not just veg fried rice) The people are really friendly and can't
do enough for you. OK enough of that!The first day we spent walking around the Island which is tiny, and then went snorkeling from the jetty. There were many more fish than we had seen on the other island and the water was much clearer, so we couldn't wait the next morning to get out to Sipadan. The island is a marine park which they have banned people actually staying on in order to preserve it.
OK here comes the gushing!! Well saying that words can't really explain how blown away we were, the pictures are amazing but don't really do it justice, but will give you some idea! I could never have imagined that you could see so many turtles, and they were HUGE i guess over 4 foot long! On the second morning 2 couples we had met on the jungle safari Lauren & Chris and Rosey and Andy (Hi Guys!!) arrived. The four of them have all done PADI diving courses and so the next morning while we went snorkeling around Mabul they went off to dive Sipadan and were as blown away as us. The day before we left all six of us decided we
would go snorkeling at Sipadan and hire an underwater camera between us, as it turns out a GREAT plan! The dive guys were great and despite that we were supposed to go back for lunch at 12.30 they arranged a late lunch and we spent a fantastic 5 hours there! (ouch snorkeling sunburn not only hurts but looks stupid, red back and white front!)
We were absolutely gutted to leave our little home in paradise, especially as the others were all staying another night, but we had a flight booked to bring us back here to Iota Kinabalu.
We have a week left in Borneo before heading to Peninsula Malaysia for 4 weeks. So what to do?......well we are not really sure, i think we'll head to Labuan (a duty free island off the west coast so cheap beer!) and maybe visit the marine park near there if it is not too expensive, or otherwise may head over to Brunei for a few days.
We are seriously thinking of doing a PADI diving course, maybe on the peninsula or flying back to Mabul in a couple of weeks. Its much cheaper here than in Oz and once
certified it will be easy and cheaper to dive in Oz and New Zealand, we'll have to have a finance review, its not something we budgeted on but after this week we are prepared to live on rice for a few weeks!!
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carla
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sorry chaps
hello my lovley water babies!! i didnt look at your blog the last time cos i didnt have the link and felt shit for asking you for it!! ah now i've got the off my chest, jesus christ you look like your an AMAZIN time, turtles and the like!! ha and love the reference from India 'what to do' cant get that out of ya's that place eh?? have you used your jewelry making kit yet claire?? still havet bought one of those calenders tel but i deffo will when im not on the bread line keep all the blogs coming they're great. keep it 'sureal' love you long time. xoxoxoxoxoxo