Beaming in Borneo

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Borneo Malaysia

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Mt. Kota Kinabalu
September 23rd- September 25th


So after what was probably the bumpiest flight I've ever been on I have arrived safe and sound in Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia. The flight was up and down most of the way and I also got fumigated as they sprayed the inside of the plane just before we landed!

To get to my hostel I jumped into a mini bus and ended up being the only passenger. I began talking with the driver who ended up being my age and was nicknamed "boy". After a few minutes of talking he offered to give me a tour of the city. I of course didn't turn this down and along the way we even picked up a few of his friends and talked about Malaysia and traveling the rest of the way. They even taught me a few phrases in Malay before dropping me off right at my hostel and not even charging me for the ride. I got their numbers and plan on giving them a call when I get back into Kota Kinabalu (KK).

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Today started pretty early as needed to be at the bus around 7 in order to get to the mountain in time and after a 2 hour bus ride, most with Mt. Kinabalu peering down off in the distance, I arrived at the park HQ. After paying the entrance fees, meeting my guide, and picking up a packed lunch that is included in my mountain accommodation I set off up the mountain. Now instead of taking the bus from the HQ to the starting gate I decided to walk it again, like Mt. Fuji. Don't worry this walk was only 4 km not nearly as long as the 30 km hike I did before starting Fuji! I soon arrived at the gate,bought a snazzy new hat that matches my super socks and began my climb.

The hike was up hill pretty much the whole way and was actually pretty steep the entire way. It's also a bit more like walking on a dry river bed then a trail as more often then not I seemed to be guiding myself over rocks. Along the walk, Morris, my guide, pointed out a few cool looking birds and a plant that is pretty huge that eats insects. I think it was called a bell plant. It was a lot bigger than I thought it would be! With all the hiking I've done over the past few weeks this hike doesn't seem to be as hard as Fuji was. Mind you hiking 30 kms before hand and climbing over night might be playing a hand in that, Along the way I passed a group of hikers and the one women recognized em as their bus had drove by me on the road to the mountain. She threw me a congrats as I passed her which I thought was funny. At around the 4km mark of the 6 km I'll be doing today I really started to slow down. I think this was mostly out of hunger as the 4 pieces of toast I had at 6:30 am probably aren't holding up. Luckily I was almost at the lunch stop and when there I dove straight into my packed lunch. I figured this lunch would be pretty basic but it actually turned out to be quite good. It had a boiled egg, 2 spring rolls, 3 thin sandwiches, a big piece of friend chicken, a bottle f water, and a sports drink. Throw in a couple piece of chocolate from my stash and I was good to go again! Over lunch I began talking with the congrats women as her group reached the lunch stop just as I was wrapping up and it turned out a guy in her group was a drama teacher. I had hope to find him at the accommodations and maybe talk to him but I never ended up finding him.

So I began the final 2 km of todays hike towards Laban Rata where I will be spending the night. Kinabalu is 4100 m tall and is doable in one day but you risk getting hit with altitude sickness so the general route of action is to do it over 2 days. Passing through and over the clouds, seeing the plants change along the way, and fighting through dropping temperatures we finally reached Laban Rata. The climb took me only 3 hours and 15 minutes which Morris said was really good as it generally takes people between 5-6 hours. Not only does this give me more time to rest today but it also allows me to sleep in an extra hour tomorrow since we can climb at a pretty god pace. So tomorrow starts off at 3:15 for me instead of the normal 2 am.

After a much needed (HOT!) shower it was time for dinner. As you all know I'm a buffet fan on a normal day but when you throw a mountain in between me and a buffet that buffet is in serious trouble. While eating I met a bunch of other solo travelers, some of which are headed the same direction as me. Dave, a German guy, is actually trying to do the same stuff as me so we're going buddy up for the rest of Borneo as long as he can get into my jungle trek. Another guy si trying to do the same trek but just a few days later so we may cross paths again. After talking with all of them for a while and watching a super awesome sunset from the balcony of the cafeteria I trekked the final 200m to my accommodation for the night. After talking with some other hikers for a bit (most of them being much older than me) and having a journal session with one of the older ladies I headed for bed at about 7pm hoping to get as much sleep in before 3am as I could.

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Up at 3am and out by 3:15. I was the last to leave the accommodation and at the start it was a pretty solid line of people. Being just the two of us Morris and I were able to pass big groups of people pretty easily and we made a big jump when everyone seemed to decide to take a rest at the final check point before reaching the top. We pushed on at a solid pace as the climb became a bit more challenging as we began to pull ourselves over a pretty flat and steep rock face towards the summit. At one point I was told not to fall and that if I did to fall to the left because if I fell to the right I would probably die! Morris also eventually suggested taking a rest and pulling up a bit so that we were at the top to early, therefore staying warm for a bit longer. After about an hour and a half of trekking under the clearest night sky I have ever seen we reached the peak. I was actually the first person there this morning and it was awesome to take in the top, even in the dark, with no one else around but Morris.

After getting hit with a cold wind and jimmying a wind breaker out of my poncho I found a nice cove in the rocks to nestle into to block the wind and wait fr the sunrise. It was only after the sun had come up that I realized that I was sitting on the edge of a pretty huge cliff! Compared to Fuji the sunrise wasn't as nice as it was a lot quicker and hidden a bit by a cloud of in the distance but the view from the top was much better as it was a much cleared day. It was definitely amazing to look around and see all these other mountains with the sun rising off in the distance. Also cool to be able to say did so from the highest point in South East Asia! The way down was a bit difficult as the mountain was quite steep but I eventually reached Laban Rata for a nice breakfast buffet and conversation with the solo group before heading off down the rest of the mountain. This part really sucked and left my legs sore for days. But what goes up must come down!

After having another buffet for lunch (again all part of the accommodation) I headed down to the bus stop to catch a bus heading for Sepilok (sep-E-lock). After waving 3 buses down that didn't pull over Dave and I headed back up to the park HQ to see what was going on and it turns out that all the buses are booked until the 19th because of Ramadan which is a month long religious "festival" for Muslims with the ending of it involving headed to your home town/family. David and I decided to head to the next town over and try and catch a bus from there as the rest of the group was heading into that town too and we could all split a taxi. After being dropped off at the bus station we met a German couple trying to head the same way. After a few more buses just drove by all 4 of us where beginning to worry. Eventually a man came up with his mini van and offered to drive us for a pretty expensive fee. We told him we rather take a bus and he got out of his car and began flagging the buses down and trying to see if there was anyway for us to ride on them. It was really cool of him to help us. One bus said that there was standing room only and after we said that was OK it just drove off! Another bus pulled up with 2 seats but since the couple was there first dave and I let them have the seats. Luckily only a few seconds afterward a random minibus (which was more of a SUV) pulled up and had 2 seats left. We piled into the back amonst the tough looking men who where listening to Britney Spears and Celine Dion. After a white knuckle ride involving speeding and many games of chicken, passing huts with satellite dishes and small rest stops that looked pretty sketchy, we eventually arrived at Sepilok Jungle Resort.

Needing to calm our nerves a bit we had a few beers over a cup of noodles each and talked for the rest of the night. Its funny how travelers seem to group up, look out for each other and help each other without really knowing much about the other person. Turns out that he actually studied in Ireland too, although at a different school down south, and in fact was the for the semester right after me.

Some things I noticed today was that Malay seems to have a lot of works that are pretty close to English. For example bus is bas and police is polis (I think). This probably comes from it being a common wealth country but it's definitely pretty cool, especially since their have the same alphabet so I am able to read Malay too. Also the people here are super friendly too. The mini bus driver could have easily said alright and drove off but instead he stuck around an tried to help us get a ride with his competition which was really a sweet thing to do considering he didn't know us from a whole in the ground.

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Sepolik and Kinabatangan
September 26th- September 28th


Today is the beginning of the jungle section of my Borneo trip as I head off along the Kinabatangan river. Dave was trying to get into the same trek but unfortunately it was all booked up but he luckily found a similar tour and was going to do that. Before we split up though we checked out the Sepilok Orang Utan rehab centre. Although not nearly as good as I thought it was still cool to see some orangs in case I didn't see any on my jungle trek. One was pretty cute and did a cartwheel down the rope to the feeding station and one came right up near the people to get to a tree where she decided to build nest after nest. Really cool to see something like that.

After saying goodbye to David I eventually piled into a van and headed off towards Uncle Tans office to start my trip into the Jungle. In the van I met an older guy who reminded me of Santa who was here witha buddy of his from Hawaii where he is a marine Biologist which is quite amazing. He and his freind ended up being quite the characters on our trip. After another buffet lunch (I like it in Borneo) and about an hour in a van we packed up all our bags and some supplies for the camp onto some boats and headed off down the river. Within minutes we had already seen a huge monitor lizard and a few families of long tailed macaques.

When we reached camp I got the sense that I was going to see a lot of animals as at the camp already was a family of bearded pigs and a group of macaques playing off by the edge of camp. After throwing my bags into my hut/cage I went out to meet some more of the people who also doing the trek. Oh we have to sleep in a hut like cage because if we don't the monkeys will break in and steal our things! One pf the first people I talked to was an older women who is a grade 4 teacher from Australia. Her and her sister are traveling together and have traveled most of the world. IT was really cool talking to her and hearing her stories from everywhere and we talked about teaching and war and everything. She was definitely pretty cool. I grouped up with her and her sister and 2 German friends who are med students and where here in Borneo on a placement. The 5 of us kind of stuck together most of the trek which was really cool.

Just before dinner it was time for a first big taste of wildlife as we headed off for a night time boat ride. Our guides have amazing eyes and with nothing but their eys and a flashlight there were able to see not only bigger animals but small lizards and stuff too from super far away. They'd definitely do good in a wheres waldo competition. On this ride we saw lizards, owls, proboscis monkeys (which are the monkeys with the huge noses), king fishers (which are super colorful birds that are blind at night so you can get pretty close to them), a Malay civet stalking a group of macaques, crocodiles and a few flying foxes. For the first trip we got to see quite a bit! Hopefully this is a sign of things to come!

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Today started at 6am as we where heading off at 6:30 for a morning boat ride. Before we left a huge monitor lizard came walking through camp. I jumped down to get a good picture of it and it walked right beside me. I could have touched it if I wanted to, but valuing my health I decided against it. On this trip we saw more of the same from before, which is still super cool as it is amazing to see so many different animals in their natural environment. We did see some horn bills (the Guinness bird) which was also pretty cool. They're a lot bigger than I thought they were. Arriving back at camp to a nice breakfast buffet (did I mention I like Borneo?), which we had to constantly defend from a group of monkeys, it was quickly time for a trek through the jungle. On this trek we didn't see many animals and mostly just learned about the different plants and bugs. We did hear an Orang though and the other group was able to see its arm when they passed through. We also saw many tracks from the pygmy elephant. The pass through here every April and August so many traces of them are still kicking around.

The afternoon involved me taking a nap in a hammock and spending some more time talking to some of the other trekkers before heading off with Martin, one of the German med students to see if we could find the Orang. After looking around for about an hour we headed back to camp to get ready for our evening boat ride. This was probably my favorite part of the trip as we saw tons of all the animals. The got to see the proboscis monkey really close to and it is amazing to see their huge nose from a close distance. We literally saw probably close to 100 monkeys on this tour down the river as many of the animals where getting ready for the night. We also saw a new monkey called the silver leaf which has a pretty sweet hair style. We also got pretty close to a baby crocodile on the way back. Whenever we get close to them the dart into the water and for being such a small legged creature they sure can move! We also saw a really cool sunset that made the sky look like a painting.

Before dinner we all just sat on the porch in the dark (the generator was temporarily out of gas) and talked while we watched a thunderstorm come in from the distance. TI rained every night like clockwork from around 8ish till 9ish so we were well prepared fr it. After dinner some of us headed off for the night trek as the the power went off again. This trek was a lot cooler than I thought and we saw some pretty cool things. We saw a huge scorpion fighting a huge centipede. We also saw many King Fishers and again because they are completely blind at night we were able to get quite close to them. It's weird how still they are at a night. They almost look fake. On the way back to camp we saw a Malay Civet up close and man do they look funny. The look like a cross between a raccoon, a cat, and a leopard. Utterly bizarre.

When we arrived back at camp we found out we missed a bti of drama as a generator had blown up and burnt down the entire (small) building that houses the 2 generators. Everyone, including the staff, thought that one of the staff members was in the hut at the time so there was a pretty big level of panic when it all happened but luckily no one was hurt. WHile having some tea before bed some of us decided to get up with the sun and go one one last hike t see if we can find this Orang. Apparently he/she has been around camp for a while and the group that left today said that it came right through camp earlier on the day we arrived and even went through someones purse. I was going to do everything possible to try and see this Orang even if it meant getting up at 5am!

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So after hiking for about 2 hours, most of which we spent somewhat lost, we arrived back at camp empty handed. It seems as thought I wont be able to see an Orang in the wild which sucks but this jungle trek was still completely worth it. It was amazing to see so many different animals where they should be and I also got to meet a lot of really cool people. At about 10 am we headed to the boat to take us back and along the way we saw the biggest croc we had seen. The guide said it was over 2m long. It was huge. Definitely not swimming water!

We eventually arrived back at the ops base in Sepilok and around 2 many of us headed to the bus to take us back to KK. I walked down with Martin and Ines, the 2 German med students, and a couple from New Zealand who had down the tour one day ahead of us. The guy actually taught in Korea about 6 years ago so it was cool to hear the differences from them to now. While waiting for the bus David pulled up at the bus stop but he was booked onto another bus. So the 5 of took the long ride back into KK together and when I got to my hostel and into my room I saw Josey one of the people from the solo group I met climbing the mountain. Turns out she is even one of the other 9 people in my room. (Philippines spoiled me as I always had a single bedroom). I saw a lot of familiar faces in the hostel of people I had seen over my trip here in Borneo so far. After having my first shower in about 3 days (I really stunk and was pretty covered in mud) and just before I was about to head over to the med students and New Zealanders hostel David came walking into my hostel and he joined us.

We all headed t the Filipino market and bought a bunch of BBQed meat to share amongst us. We had tuna, chicken, snapper, shrimp and sting ray (which was super good)! It was such a awesome and huge meal and all for about 2 bucks each! Can't go wrong! Afterward we headed back to their hostel to watch a movie over a few drinks before heading to bed.

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Kota Kinabalu
September 29th & 30th


Today was a pre-planned personal day which not a lot going on. I took the morning to sleep in and type up my blog as well as reorganizing my bag as I had left most of my stuff here and only brought along some of my stuff in my small bag. The afternoon saw me meet up with the Med students and head over to Sapi, one of the islands near Kinabalu. We just hung around the beach relaxing for a bit before heading back to the mainland so I could head to the airport.

Once arriving at the airport things took a bit of a twist as my flight was canceled and moved to tomorrow. Which sucks a lot because if I would have known this I could have gone down and done some scuba diving in Sipidan which is supposed to be beautiful instead of coming right back up to Kinabalu. It also cuts a day off of Bandung down in Indonesia as I have had to book a train from Bandung because of the holiday. But not a whole lot I can do so time to just role with the punches! I headed back into town and booked in at the other big hostel here as most of my my friends where staying here and after cooling off with a shower I caught a movie with the New Zealanders in the common room before heading to bed and calling it a day.

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After sleeping in a bit I headed out to explore the city and walk the endless a mounts of markets they have here in Kinabalu. I think there are a lot more markets right now because of Ramadan but there seems to be a market around every corner. I also finished up this blog and put some photos online before heading to the airport for Indonesia. Nice relaxing day before I begin to truck it across Java.

I saw some cool things today and notices some other things. While walking I saw a line of men with old fashion sewing machines right on the sidewalk. It was weird to see especially considering they were men in a country where women are still oppressed. I have also been hearing Jason Mraz pretty much ever half hour which is also quite weird. I also saw a corn in a cup stall which made me laugh. Also something I've noticed is that in Malaysia when you shake hands with someone they seem to touch their chest/heart afterward which I think is pretty awesome. Another thing I think is cool is that I can get a lot of food for lunch for about a buck fifty.

Borneo was really the first country on my trip that gave me a good opportunity to meet some other travelers and it was really cool to start to buddy up and travel with some of them. I have already met so many amazing and awesome people, both local and foreign and this is all just the beginning. Tonight it is on to Indonesia where I'll get to see some Muslim temples, the city my Opa lived in when we was fighting in the war, a few volcanoes and possibly learn how to surf (and if not bungee jump!). The adventure continues!!!


Philippine photos are now online too!

**** To see my pictures from Borneo Malaysia click here ****

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