We are still drying out...

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We are well overdue for an update, but were off the radar for a bit in Borneo. Now we are in Thailand and on to new adventures. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

When we last left off, we were in Kuala Lumpur (or KL as everyone here calls it). Our last full day there we went to see the Batu Caves. These are caves that have a number of Hindu shrines in them. It took quite a while to get there by bus as it was a little ways outside of the city. Once we arrived, we were amazed by a tall golden statue at the entrance way of the cave. It was quite impressive. The caves were interesting as well. We had to climb up over 200 stairs to get into the biggest one. At the top, we were presented with a massive cavern with a number of shrines. It wasn't quite the spectacular sight that I was expecting - it was a little rundown and dirty - but it was still worthwhile to visit.

After the caves, we headed back into KL by bus. On the way it started to pour rain again. When we got off the bus, I opened my umbrella and the top popped off of the shaft!!! Again, you get what you paid for. I can't believe that umbrella only lasted 2 good rains!

The next day, we headed off to the island of Borneo. We landed in Kuching around dinnertime and made our way into the city. Our hostel recommended a seafood food court for dinner. It was quite an experience. There were all of these stalls with raw fish, crabs, and prawns (including king prawns). There were no prices or indications of how the food would be prepared, so we were a bit confused on how to order. Then at the last stall, we finally found a menu so we settled there. It ended up being a pretty expensive dinner for us as travellers because we tried the king prawns, which we decided were not worth the price - not much meat on them compared to the regular ones.

The next morning, we spent some time walking around Kuching. The city centres around a river and there is a very pretty waterfront walkway that we quite enjoyed. Next, we went in search of the bus to take us to the Cat Museum. Kuching means "cat" in Malay and although this is not the origin of the city name, the city has capitalized on it and there are cat themed things all over. Finding the bus turned out to not be an easy task, but finally we managed and eventually made it to the museum. The museum was full of all kinds of kitschy cat things - lots of figurines, posters of cat related movies, cats in advertisements, etc. In the end, although the museum was amusing, we felt it was a bit too much trouble to get there and back to make it worthwhile. After the museum, we went to the Sunday market, which although it was only Saturday afternoon was already open. It was a pretty big market with sections for fruits / vegetables, meats, pets (hamsters, mice, cats, dogs, reptiles, fish, etc.), and crafts. We didn't have a lot of time at the market as we needed to get back to our hotel in order to meet up with the tour group that we had signed up for to help us with our Bornean travels.

When we met up with our group, we were very happy with the people we met as everyone seemed really great. There were 14 of us on it, including 3 couples from Australia, 3 other Australian women, 2 women from the UK, and another Canadian girl.

The next morning, we headed out for our first tour activity, which was visiting the Semenggoh Wildlife Centre to the orangutans that had been rehabilitated there. We arrived at feeding time, so a few of the orangutans came out. They were quite amazing to watch - so agile in the trees!

Next, we headed out towards Bako National Park. We had to take a boat on a river to get part of the way there. Due to it being low tide at the time, we had to walk for quite a bit to actually get to the park because the boats couldn't get closer. The walk ended up being across a mud flat, which made it very interesting. I was so worried that I was going to wipe out in the slimy mud, but fortunately everyone made it unscathed.

After a bit of a rest, we headed out on a walk in the jungle. As soon as we were under the canopy of the forest, the humidity level soared. Within 10 minutes, everyone of us was dripping with sweat. During the walk, we saw some proboscis monkeys, which we had seen at the Singapore Zoo and thought were hilarious. It was great to see them in their natural habit, but they were of course much further away and we couldn't see them as well. We also saw lots of interesting plants including the pitcher plant which has a bug eating flower.

In the evening, we took another walk in the jungle in the dark. Alvin, our guide, encouraged us to try to walk without using our flashlights - "ghost walking" he called it - but we failed miserably as we were all afraid of walking off of the boardwalk that had no railings. Even with our lights on though, it was an experience being in the jungle at night and listening to all the sounds.

The next morning, we got up early to do another walk in the jungle. We saw more proboscis monkeys. This time we viewed them from a secluded cove. They were climbing in trees on a nearby cliff and it was fantastic to see them making amazing leaps from tree to tree.

Afterwards, we headed back in to Kuching where we were given a bit of a city tour and went to the Sarawak Museum. We learned a bit more about the headhunting history of the tribes in the area. The official word is that headhunting stopped a century ago, but people say unofficially that it only stopped somewhere between 10 and 50 years ago (depending on who you talk to). The purpose of the headhunting was to get control of a soul so that you could get the soul to help you do things. The tribes would try to keep the skulls "happy" in order to be able to ask them for favours.

That night we scrambled to re-arrange our bags for the next part of the tour. We were flying to Mulu National Park for the trekking portion of the tour and would be required to carry our gear for over 20 km, so we needed to put enough stuff for 5 days into a small bag and leave the rest for shipping. It was a bit tough, but now we know that we can live out of a day pack for that amount of time.

We arrived in Mulu the next afternoon. We did a 3 km walk out to some nearby caves - Lang's Cave and Deer Cave. The walk was great. Most of it was along a boardwalk through the jungle. Because the walking was easy, we were able to look around and take in the scenery. We saw lots of interesting bugs along the way - centipedes, stick insects - as well as a number of beautiful butterflies. We toured Lang's Cave first and then Deer Cave. Deer Cave has the largest cave entrance in the world and it was massive!!! There were lots of interesting formations and Deer Cave also had a lot of bats in it. One of the main sites to see at Deer Cave is the bats leaving the cave at dusk. Unfortunately, it was around that time it started pour rain and thunder. We still went to the viewing point in hopes that we would see them, but we had no luck. So after waiting a while, we walked back in the dark and the pouring rain to our chalets. By the time we got back, we were completely soaked despite our rain ponchoes and our shoes felt like sponges.

The next day, we headed out to see some more caves - Wind Cave and Clearwater Cave. This time we took a long boat along a river to get there. Along the way, we stopped at a Penan village and had a chance to buy some local crafts. When we got to the caves, again we saw lots of interesting formations. Clearwater Cave also had a good size river in it. As we left Clearwater Cave, it started to pour again! It poured as we ate our lunch (fortunately under a shelter) and let up a bit once we had to leave. Then we took a half hour boat ride to the trailhead for our trek that day. As we started our 8 km walk, the rain stopped, but after only 2 km, it started coming down again! It was not the most enjoyable walk as we splashed through the puddles and discovered leeches. Finally we reached Camp 5, where we were to stay the next 2 nights. The rain continued to come down so we were stuck at the camp under the shelter. Before bed, our guides informed us that if the rain didn't stop, we may not be able to attempt the Pinnacles climb in the morning because the climb is very steep and would be too slippery.

Fortunately, in the morning, the rain had stopped so we put on our soaking wet clothes and shoes from the day before (funny enough, nothing dried overnight) and set out for the Pinnacles viewpoint. The Pinnacles are a bunch of towering jagged limestone formations that can be viewed from the top of a nearby mountain. The trail to the viewpoint is only 2.4 km long, but rises over 1200 m in elevation and typically takes 4 hours to complete one way. Soon after we started, we discovered what we were in for. There was no walking on this trail. We had to haul ourselves over sharp rocks and tree roots, as well as use ropes in more vertical sections to climb. It was very tough and slippery because everything was still soaking wet. Every step forward that I took, I worried about what it would be like coming back down. It also incredibly humid and I don't think I've ever sweat so much in my life!!! Sweat was literally running down my face and dripping off my chin. When we reached the "Mini-Pinnacles", which was basically just a small jagged rock, we were told that we needed to decide if we wanted to continue or head back down. I figured that I would be able to make it to the top, but I was terrified of the climb back down. Plus, we knew that rain was threatening and I didn't want to be going down during pouring rain. In total 10 of the 14 of us decided to head back down while 4 went on. A short time later, one of the four came back down after running into knee trouble. As we started the descent back down, I knew that I made the right decision for me. It was very slippery and the rocks were quite sharp. It was definitely a challenge and my knees were killing me by the time we made it to the bottom. Altogether, it took us about 3 hours to make the return trip to the Mini-Pinnacles (900 metres along the trail, but 600 metres up). It is hard to believe that it could take that long to go such a short distance!

When we returned to camp, we discovered a new menace other than the rain - BEES! We learned that the bees were attracted to sweat and we had plenty of that on our clothes and bodies. There were some clothing items left out at the camp that were being swarmed by the bees! We all rushed to get out of our sweaty clothes and shower before being swarmed ourselves. Greg unfortunately discovered that even dead bees can sting you when he stepped on one. Ouch!

As we cleaned up, it started to rain and we thought of our friends still out on the climb. We all agreed that we were glad we had continued as we had severely reduced our risk of someone getting a major injury. The 3 climbers made it back early afternoon (a great time) with only minor injuries (scrapes, and bruises), but some very tired muscles.

That night, as the rain continued to pound down, we got some surprising news: we might not be able to leave the camp tomorrow as planned. Turns out that the rain had flooded in the trail that we had come in on as well as the trail that we were to leave on. In fact, the caves that we had visited the other day were currently closed due to the flooding. Our guides had not experienced this situation before even in the rainy season (which starts November and peaks in December / January).

In the morning, we were told to pack up while we awaited news from the rangers about whether we could proceed onto the next trail or not. At 9AM, we got the go ahead to hit the 11.3 km Headhunters trail. Once again, we started the day in wet shoes and clothes. There were a number of small creek crossings and I made my shoes even more wet when I slipped off of a rock and into ankle deep water in one of them. In the end it didn't matter whether I had walked through the creek or not because later on in the trail, there were a number of flooded sections that we had no choice but to walk through. We finished the trail around lunchtime and took a longboat to a picnic spot. The ride was quite exciting and the took us through a rapid, which sent a wave over the boat and soaked us.

After lunch, we had a 2 hour longboat ride out to an Iban longhouse, which was where we were to spend the night. The ride was a lot of fun, depite the rain (surprise) that started up again. I've decided that the best way to see the jungle is by boat! We arrived at the longhouse late afternoon. Longhouses are traditionally housing for some of the tribes in Sarawak. They are essentially long, raised, wooden structures with side by side individual family units. At the front of the longhouse is a wide covered hallway that connects all of the units. Before dinner, we had some time to explore the area including the nearby school which is for kids in neighbouring communities as well (they stay overnight there during the week). After dinner, we were given a dance and music performance and had the opportunity to try local rice wine (not bad). The dancing was very slow and hypnotic. After a couple of demonstrations, we all had a chance to dance. There was a hat that the dancer wore and they would pass it off to someone else and then it would be that person's turn. It was quite embarrassing, but most of us took part.

The next day we travelled by boat and van to Limbang, where we had a free afternoon to explore the city. Unfortunately, it was raining again which made it a bit difficult. The following day was another day in transit. We were supposed to take a boat to Labuan Island in the South China Sea and then another to Kota Kinabalu. It was rainy when we headed out and when we hit the South China Sea, the seas got pretty rough. I had had the foresight to take some pills for seasickness, but a lot of others ended up getting sick on the ride. Then when we got to the island, we learned that the other boat had been cancelled due to the rough weather. Our guides made plans for us to take a shorter ferry that was still scheduled to the mainland and then take a bus to Kota Kinabalu. Apparently, this was their back-up plan, but they had never actually had to do it before (lucky us). I think though that the people that had been sick on the way over were probably happy with the shorter boat ride as the one to Kota Kinabalu would have been at least 4 hours long.

All in all, we really enjoyed the tour, although we were tired of the rain and being constantly wet. The highlight for me was seeing the jungle by longboat (even in the rain). We had a great group of people on our tour and were very sad when it was time to part ways.

After the tour, we headed to Thailand. Lots more has happened, but we'll save it for another entry when we get the chance.

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