Malaysia Borneo

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Saturday 20th June

Flight to Kota Kinabalu, got charged for being over weight then for being 2 days over visa!! Got to KK late so no buses to catch into City! Two girls saw my plight of trying to sort a taxi and took me under their wing! Found some accommodation and went for a beer at a local bar with a live band, randomely saw Andres and his friend in the same place! Theres just no escape from people out here! Hehe

Next morning went to ferry terminal to go and visit some islands off the coast of KK, Andres was poorly so couldn’t make it, made friends with 3 guys waiting in the queue for the ferry tickets, Danish and 2 aussies, ended up spending about 3 weeks ish with them in the end! Islands really beautiful except I went snorkeling, managed to fulfill another Abi-ism and fell in the sea on some rocks, convinced I broke my toe especially as it became more and more blue,purple,black….nice! So spent the rest of the afternoon hobbling around! Went to food markets that night to end our little island toe breaking adventure, planned to re-meet Nic (arrogant American we ‘found’ on the island) and Nicolaj the Danish next day to ‘bus’ it to Mount Kinabalu.

Early start, got ourselves on tiny mini van thing, long journey to get to destination - I fell asleep as is usual on my little car, boat, bus, train journeys - I just can’t control myself its like I suddenly get that illness where people just drop to sleep in a flash! We climbed higher and higher in the cramped mini van, finally felt like we were actually in the ‘real’ Borneo, miles and miles of lush green scenary, mountains everywhere! Our accommodation at Mount Kinabalu looked out over a valley then onto mountains surrounding us, the sun set here and was amazing! Somehow Jared (Aussie 1) and Jamie (Aussie 2) separately made their way to Mount.K and managed to find us, so next day we all set out at 6.30 AM on a mission walk around Mount K, walked for 7hours in the end and it was brilliant! Trudging through rainforests and hill sides and things the scenary was just out of this world!

We all parted company next day except for Nicolaj and I who got yet another bus to Sandakan, got to be up there with the top ten worst bus journeys ever. Bus full of locals, struggled to find seats, I almost sat on a seat next to a woman with a young baby until I realized the baby and the seat next to his mother were covered in sick - including its mother!!! Had a lucky escape although I ended up sat opposite her and had the wonderful joy of watching - and smelling the baby puking for the next 4 hours! Included in this wonderful sight were about ten million other kids up and down the bus also showing us this mornings breakfast! Then I went to put my seat back, it was broken so ended up flying backwards, into the young lad sat behind me who had hung a plastic bag full of blackcurrent juice on the back, therefore, covering him, his legs, his brother, the seats and the floor in black current liquid! To top this off (are you beginning to see a picture forming here) there was another young boy who obviously needed ‘the loo’ and so his clever, kind and thoughtful father (man of the moment, deserves a medal for thinking fast on his feet in his sons moment of need) decided to use a plastic bag to let him ‘wee’ within, to add insult to injury, he then did this for all of his kids all crammed onto one set of two chairs and all encountering the same problem! Oh the joy!

So after a pretty traumatic bus journey we made it! Yeyy and now had a new recruit in tow, Chris from Kent although Nicolaj and my good self both forgot his name so for the first 3 days unknown to him, he was named ‘Kent Guy’ hehe. Sandakan quiet, boring and everywhere shut at 6pm, well not quite but not far off. Next day we all trotted on down to the Orangutan centre, was brilliant they are so weird and human like! Fact of the day, did you know 98% of our genes are identical to monkeys and we are 3rd closest to Orangutans after chimpanzees and gorillas! Wow, that explains a lot hey!

Anyhow, next adventure was embarking on a jungle trek! 3 days living next to a river in the midst of the jungle! Took river cruises each day and forest treks at night was really cool. Saw about 1,000,000 monkeys, of the long and pig tailed maskaratt variety (or something like that, the type who pull off your windscreen wipers at Knowsley Safari Park), saw an alligator’s head bopping up from the water and saw Pigmi Elephants - tiny elephants, we thought were babies frolicking by the river bed until we learnt they were actually adults and were this size their whole life!

Went from our depths of the jungle destination, straight to Semporna, south along the coast. This is a stopping off point for us backpackers, to then go onto the islands nearby to snorkel and dive. We went to Mabul, next to Sipidan - one of the best dive sights in the world. Went diving two days, saw soooo many weird and wonderful fish and lots of turtles, one swam gracefully right past me as we were meandering deep in the depths of the deep blue sea! WOW! Mabul island really beautiful, clear blue sea and long white sandy beaches it was paradise!

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