Ulu Temburong Park, Brunei; The Borneo Rainforest from the Tree Tops... And a Foot Massage

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We left the hotel early this morning and headed for the docks. We had a spot on a 7:30 am water taxi to Bangar (another city in Brunei) with our name on it. From there we would take a car to the edge of Ulu Temburong National Park and finally a motorized canoe (or longboat) up river, deep into the park. It was all quite the adventure, and very fun! The initial water taxi ride was in a fairly large power boat, and there were about 16 people onboard.

When you leave Bandar, you pass by the fishing village and then speed through some very small waterways in the Mangrove forests. At times it seems like there was only about 10 feet between each side of the boat and the trees, and we were cruising along at about 25 knots. To top it all off, this portion of the journey is not even in Brunei; it's actually in Malaysia. After taking a random path (at least what seemed like a random path) through the various waterways (aka ditches!) in the forest the water opened back up into a large bay. We crossed it (at which point we were back in Brunei) and then went back into little waterways before entering a river that took us up to Bangar. These drivers know all the shortcuts! All in all, the first leg of our journey took about 45 minutes.

The second leg of the trip, driving into the park, was uneventful but took about 20-30 minutes. At the park we were at the Borneo Guide Eco Lodge (Borneo Guide was the company that we booked with). It was a very simple little lodge - open sided eating area and tents for those who spend the night, but with running water and electricity at the lodge. It was a fine place for a day visit to the park, but we aren't so sure you'd want to spend the night there. Even in the daytime the bugs can be bad, the evening is probably crazy. And, with only a tent to hide out from the bugs and mid-30 temperatures in, you might find yourself wishing there was somewhere to play a game of cards! But, like I said, it was a great spot for a day visit. At first, we thought everyone that had spent the night must have been out on an adventure in the jungle because it was really quiet. Not another traveller around. But then we asked and they said that they didn't have anyone spend the night the night before and that today they only had one visitor spending the night. So if you do decide to stay here, it might not matter that there is no where to hide out with a group of people from the bugs - because there is no one else to hide out with! And this is supposed to be the busy season for this lodge!

After the lodge, we hopped into a motorized canoe for the rest if our journey. A motorized canoe is basically a canoe with an outboard engine strapped to the back. Basically, this means the craft is VERY tippy, but able to travel upstream even in low water levels. (The prop is always cavitating, so it sounds a little funny, but other than that it is what you would expect!) Going upstream is a lot of fun, but not for the faint of heart. If you don't like boats, you won't like this, but if you don't mind them, then you will love it! Hitting the rapids is especially fun, but you have to hold steady. The driver seems to tilt the canoe from one side to the other a little bit to help control it. If you are shifting your weight back and forth you'll throw him off and everyone may end up swimming... with the crocodiles! On the way up the river we didn't see any interesting wildlife, I guess the boat engine scares them off.

After checking into the park at the registry lodge we crossed the river and hiked up the mountain to the Temburong Towers (a Canopy walk above the trees). Apparently the hike up involves a thousand steps, but it wasn't too bad. They were all very uniform in size because the trail was all along a very nice boardwalk. We took a little comfort in knowing that we probably wouldn't come across any pythons or vipers on the boardwalk, but then our guide told us that he had been bitten three months before by a snake that was sitting in the handrail. So we kept our eyes peeled! Along the way we passed a suspension bridge that crossed the river. It wasn't in the best of shape. The bridge had been hit by a tree a few years back and was now overgrown with jungle. It looked pretty cool but, you wouldn't want to walk across! A little later we came across a restroom that had met a similar fate. Having been crushed by a massive tree, the toilet was out of service.

The so called 'Tower' at the top of the mountain is actually a series of six towers of aluminum scaffolding connected by a series of bridges, or essentially a very sturdy canopy walk. The highest of these is the first, at 42 metres (that's 21 levels of scaffolding stacked on each other for anyone that cares). It's very high. If you dislike the glass floor at the CN Tower, you probably won't be happy at the top of these towers. As you ascend the ladder, you can almost see straight to the bottom. We wouldn't have wanted to slip down that! Of course, these aluminum structures aren't anywhere as tall as the CN tower but, they do have the added effect of being on the top of a mountain and swinging back and forth with your movement, and squeak. Then there is the fact that you can see down all the way through the rungs of the ladders. Finally, it is wise to try to not let your mind drift to the crushed washroom or the crumbling suspension bridge when you are high above the tree tops. Those sorts of thoughts will not help your confidence! There could only be two people on a given tower at once, so we made sure to keep our distance since there were a few other people there too. We were feeling a little queasy about the climb, but then we saw a family do it with two kids under the age of 10, so we figured we should be alright. Unfortunately it was such a hot and muggy day that we were very worried about keeping our sunglasses on our face that was slippery from sweat as we climbed up and down. That's too far a drop for the glasses to survive! We did manage to get all the way to the top, but honestly our knees were knocking enough to make us not want to linger around for too long up there! It may not seem like much of an extreme sport, but I guarantee a lot of you out there wouldn't have climbed up!

After climbing down the 21 levels of scaffolding and being safe and sound back on the jungle floor (phew!), we hiked back to the canoe and journeyed to a small river mouth about ten minutes away. We walked up the river (Elysia had to take her hiking boots off and switch to flip flops because we had to hike in the water) to a small waterfall. There had t been too much rain over the last couple days so the waterfall was pretty small, but it was pretty nonetheless and we waded into the pool of water at its base until we were about knee deep. As it turns out, this isn't just any pool of water. The water is full of fish. And not just any fish. These are the sort of fish that they use in those foot spas where you can pay money to let little fish gnaw on your feet and take off all the dead skin. So as soon as you stand still in this little pool of water, you start to feel nibbling on your toes, feet, ankles and legs. In addition to dead skin, they apparently enjoy chewing on mosquito bites. Since there are no shortages of Mosquitos on Borneo, Mike had a lot of mosquito bites to share with the fish! When the fish first started to bit Elysia she was really startled even though we knew the fish were there before we stepped in the water. She let out a little scream and had to get out of the water (she hates the feeling of fish nibbling on skin- can you blame her?). It's a really strange feeling and you can't really know what to expect until you have done it! One difference between these fish and those at the spas is that these fish are pretty big. We saw one that was about 6 inches long!

After a short spell with the fish, we headed back out to the canoe. Unfortunately, when we got back to where Elysia had stashed her shoes we realized that we had left our backpack and DSLR camera at the waterfall! Stupid tourists! So back to the waterfall we went to fetch them.


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Our trip back to Bandar Seri Begawan was uneventful and just as enjoyable as our trip up. When we reached the lodge after our canoe trip downstream, we had a quick lunch and then headed for the water taxi in Bangar back to BSB. We had read that it can take up to three days to get a permit for the park if you don't hire a guide so we decided to hire one. After all, today was the only possible day we could go to the park. Hiring the guide actually made things pretty easy, but we don't think he added much to our trip. We used a company called BorneoGuide.com and think our guide was just a little full of himself. After he told us that his mother was one of the Sultan's cooks and that his uncle was the Sultan's butler, he told us that he was actually part of the royals. Seems a bit odd that the Sultan would hire nobility as servants. Apparently though, being noble has its perks. For his 16th birthday, our guide was given a Mercedes from the Sultan, and he was given another car a few years later. Or so he said. Makes you wonder why he was guiding tourists through the jungle!

Shortly after getting back to the hotel, we met up with Leanne and Jeff, two Canadian teachers who have been working in Brunei for the past three years. Leanne used to work with Mike's mom in BC, so we arranged to meet with them before we got to Brunei. BSB is a very car oriented city. Although we were able to walk around and see a lot of sites, not having a car limited our site seeing a bit. Leanne and Jeff do have a car though, so they took us to some of the more distant attractions. First we drove past the Sultan's monstrous palace. It's the largest residential palace in the world and absolutely dwarfs Buckingham Palace in London. There is a dining hall in the palace that seats 4,000 (yes that's four with three zeroes). Imagine cooking dinner for that bunch! There are 257 bathrooms in the place, which means you could use a different bathroom everyday, and if you started on January 1st you wouldn't repeat bathrooms until September 16th or September 15th on a leap year. In addition to all that there are almost 1,800 rooms in the palace. You could have quite a good game of hide and go seek!

We then drove past a bunch of the extremely elaborate government buildings. We saw the Parliament, which is very modern and one of the most beautiful legislatures we have seen, as well as the Prime Minister's Office, which I am sure would make Stephen Harper a tad jealous. It would definitely big enough to hide Mike Duffy in, away from the media. The funny thing about these two buildings? There is no Prime Minister and there is no Parliament. So these very elaborate and beautiful buildings are empty. (Okay thats not quite true, there is a Prime Minister, it's just that the Sultan is the Prime Minister. And, there is a parliamentary body, its just that it is a council to the Sultan and not what we democratic types would think of as a Parliament.) Brunei is an Absolute Islamic Constitutional Monarchy, and the Sultan is, well, the Absolute Monarch. So what he says is law. These buildings give the dictatorship the feeling of a democracy, I guess! Something to appease the plebs! But we do hear that he is very good to his people and is really well respected, so that is a good thing.

We then drove last a few other palaces, which are for some of the princes and princesses. You cant honestly expect the Sultan to share some of his 257 bathrooms with his family, could you? Of course, we couldn't stop at any of these buildings as you would instantly be swarmed by security, but we got a decent look as we drove by. Our second to last stop was the Jame'asr Hassanil Bolkiah Mosque, which is the largest mosque in Brunei. Again, we weren't allowed inside because its Ramadan and non-Muslims aren't allowed in during Ramadan, but we walked around the grounds. It's very impressive! The mosque was built two commemorate the Sultan's 25th year on the throne as a gift from him to the People.

Our final stop on our tour by Leanne and Jeff was a little food market where we bought dinner. All sorts of hawkers were out selling everything from sugar came juice to chicken satay to fried rice or noodles. We a whole array of satay, noodles and other dishes and we brought them back to our hotel to gorge on. Mmmm, delicious. Thanks Jeff and Leanne for showing us around!

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