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Published: July 17th 2008
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Jungle Trip
Pygmy elephant at house next door I've had a fear/obsession/paranoia with leeches ever since I witnessed a traveller in Laos 2 years ago with blood streaming down his legs still an hour after having hiked in a leech area. Disgusting! I'd read that we'd be in leech territory in the jungles of Borneo so I made sure to bring tennis shoes, long socks and pants and even briefly considered buying leech-proof socks. And finally the time had arrived for our jungle trip...
We took a bus from the national park to Sandakan and booked a jungle trip from our hostel near the Sepilok Orangutan Rehab Center-one of 4 in the world. The bus ride was spectacular-I saw 3 movies-one of which was the new Angelina Jolie movie Wanted that's in theaters in the States right now. Luckily, dialogue wasn't key to understanding the movie since the volume was kind of low.
The jungle tour reminded me a bit of a trip I took to Los Llanos in Venezuela since it was set along a major river and we went for "cruises" in the mornings and afternoons to see wildlife. I skipped the mornings since I had been feeling a little sick and felt like I
Jungle trip
Sunset on the river had amoebas in my stomach-funny how quickly I can recognize that familiar feeling from Peace Corps. We saw Macaque monkeys and a few Probiscus monkeys, which are hilarious looking in up-close pictures since they have gigantic noses and flat-tops. Also, some different kind of Hornbill birds and crocodile trails in the mud but no crocs. We also lucked out with the pygmy elephants since they were in the area and had even come through our camp the night before we had arrived. All of the animals except for the elephants were too small and far away to really get good pics though. Our guide was great and we staked out a spot along the river in our boat one afternoon alongside a big plant they like to eat and sure enough 4 of them came along and we had a great view. The day before we had parked the boat to get a close up of one hanging out by a local's house just down from our lodge. We followed it a bit to get some good pics and at some point the elephant got annoyed and charged us as we backpedaled clumsily down the bank into the safety of
Jungle Trip
Can you see the monkeys? our boat. Poor Wendy got shoved out of the way by a panicked Aussie dad, his wife and kids already on the boat. The guides said it's no problem-they just pull on the tail.
The last night of our trip, I went on a jungle walk. The night walks are guided by locals and it gives them a chance to make some money and show us their territory. We had done a hike during the day and no one had been sucked by leeches though Wendy pulled one off her clothing later. We wore our headlamps-though the bugs kept racing towards my eyes so I eventually took it off and used it like a flashlight. I was cracking up with an older Aussie couple at the end of our "parade through the dark" since we had no idea what we were looking for and didn't seem to be much out there worth seeing especially will a group of 10 tourists crashing-though trying to creep-through the jungle. At one point, I brushed my hand against my neck and felt something odd there. A bug? I nervously grabbed it and shined my headlamp on it. A leech!! Uggggghh! Luckily I had
gotten it before it got me. From that point on I kept doing leech checks. The Aussie husband laughed since these leeches were tiny compared to what he was used to back home. The one I pulled off was about 2.5 inches long. It would have been bigger, of course, if I had caught it later.
Finally our guide informed us he was on the trail of a mouse deer. We spent about 15 minutes creeping back and forth and finally we caught a glimpse! It looked like a rabbit. After that we regrouped and had an intense Q and A about the exciting mouse deer sighting. Then we went back.
The morning after, the Aussie wife pulled me aside and confided that that night back in her room when she had changed out of her clothes a leech fell off of her bottom after it had attacked her! She thought that I would have wanted to know.
After the jungle trip, we went to an afternoon feeding of the orangutans near our hostel. A young one was already there early-ready to eat. Then a dad and later a pregnant mom came swinging in. As soon as
Jungle trip
Little critters the pregnant mom arrived, the young one was really on edge and it climbed up the side of where we were watching from into the crowd right by us and had to be led off, held by the hand like a bad kid, by a park worker. We talked to the park person later and he said that the pregnant orangutans can get really violent and take it out on the little orangutans.
My stomach had still been feeling off for the past 5 days and I had had no appetite-so unlike me-and felt tired. Finally a trip to the bathroom in Sandakan led to a gross but welcome surprise. There was my worm hanging out in the toilet bowl! My appetite was back after that.
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