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Published: February 2nd 2010
The guide who was to drive us to Kinabatangan picked us up from our lodging house at around noon, it was another three hours drive from Sandakan to Kinabatangan River, the second longest river in Malaysia. We shared the car with an Irish couple who were also supposed to stay with Uncle Tan's and who are just as disappointed as we were. Oh well, we did share a different tour together just the same.
The river was flooded indeed. There were fallen trees by the river bank and our guide have told us beforehand that the probability of sightings would be low since the water level is high. During our first 30 minutes, we only got to see several monitor lizards. I was very much more interested with seeing the proboscis monkeys because I've never actually seen a real one in my whole life. After almost an hour of cruising, we finally got to spot a small group with their prominent noses and big bellys. They looked pretty weird and fascinating. There were also several rhinoceros hornbills, lots of long-tailed monkeys, and a mangrove snake. During the best times, elephants would even show up by the river banks they say,
stop over
... a town I forgot the namebut this definitely wasn' that time. Our guide said it wasn't much but the proboscis monkey was good enough for me, besides, the sunset on our way back was pretty nice.
Sandakan continues to be a PI extension. For the day's trip to Kinabatangan, one of the guides who picked us up from the hostel was a Tagalog speaking
(but didn't have any Filipino heritage) member of the ethnic group
Tausug. His tagalog was more like of a combination of Tagalog/Malaysian but it was enough to be understood. Our Kinabatangan river cruise guide on the other hand had a Filipina mother but did't know how to speak Tagalog.
We had to say goodbye to our favorite restaurant in Sandakan, Hawaii. It would always take them atleast 15 minutes to give us our food and it's usually either more or less than what we actually ordered
(communication gap) but we really loved eating there. The day we were set to go back to KK, we had alot more than what we actually wanted and we tried to finish it all in vain. Only that day that we discovered that the waitress who had been tending to us most of
the time was a Filipina from tawi-tawi in Mindanao who can speak perfect tagalog. We could have saved alot of food!
And then the six hours bus ride back to Kota Kinabalu that I've been dreading about. We have been moving alot since we arrived, 3 hours drive there, 2 hours drive back, another 1 hour drive there ... I knew the motion sickness would kick in pretty hard, and boy it did! Tired, sick, and stinky, I was just so happy to get off the bus when we finally arrived after the six hours bus ride through the long and winding road back to KK.
Back at the hostel, the female dorm was all mine, the bad thing about it was that they've taken the AC remote and turned it off and all I have left is a ceiling fan which wasn't enough to ease the heat!
The next day, we we're off again to more or less three hours drive to the Poring Hotsprings and to the Kota Kinabalu National Park. Our day started at 07:00 in the morning. Our first stop was to a certain town two hours away from Kota Kinabalu for a
bit of handicraft shopping
(they are definitely not hesitant to give DISCOUNTS). We arrived at the Poring Hotsprings at around 10:30ish and did the canopy walk. We also went to a waterfalls which was just a few minutes away from the hotsprings tubs, then off to the freshwater pool to start swimming, and then finally to the hotspring cottages to soak on warm water. After having enough of swimming and soaking, we drove again for 30 minutes to Fairy Restaurant to have our very late lunch. Our last stop was the KK National Park where my brother got to see his first squirrel. We also saw lots of climbers descending from the Mountain considering it's a bit expensive nowadays. We didn't get to see much of the mountain because it was hiding behind the clouds so we just lingered to cool down and to chase rodents.
I've not been feeling well since we arrived from Sandakan and as much as I would want to just stay inside my room to rest before our flight later tonight, I couldn't because I don't have AC, making it barely bearable to stay inside. So we walked under the heat to take refuge,
eat ice cream, and enjoy Centre Point Mall's AC.
Getting sick while on vacation is a total bummer! It is during these certain times that I totally miss by pillows and my bed.
BUT
We still had a great time in the very tropical Borneo.
Some maybe useful or unuseful personal opinions/observations: ... it must have been the best time to come over because we got lots of sun, actually too much of it. Accommodation and tours weren't crowded, most of the time it seemed like we were on a private tour/room
... the people are laid-back ... our guides, they were quite nice and very patient
... our
River Junkie guide Terrence is a really nice chap but he smokes, he smokes alot
... there would be lots of festivities on the month of May, as per Terrence
... their malls/supermarkets have elevators going up, none for going down
... HUGE servings of rice in most Restaurants ... small serving in KFC
... touts won't bug you too much
... we've seen the biggest Lanzones, locally called Langsat (picture
here) in Sabah. It is 50%!c(MISSING)heaper
Hanging bridge
... canopy walk in Sandakan VS buying it in KK. We so love it!
... AWAS! means CAUTION! or "all girls are sexy"
(anyone who wants to confirm this?)
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LivingTheDream
Ben
No climbing..
I was also sick whilst I was in KK, funny. And about climbing Mt Kinabalu, it is just too expensive anyway as you pointed out as well....Enjoy the next part of your trip!