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Published: September 18th 2017
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We arrived by boat in a small island called Labuan. I loved Malaysian food when I was in Kuala Lumpur a few months ago so I was excited for that again. Labuan, they say, is where people from Brunie come to chill from the strict rules of their country. It’s only a two hour boat ride away. They had alcohol, bars, clubs, hookers, the works. They had some sites for tourists which we planned to see, but then it rained. I wasn’t too disappointed though because we got a pretty good deal in Agoda for our accommodation. We got an $80 hotel room with free buffet breakfast for two for only $30! I rarely get to sleep in proper hotels. That only happens when I’m travelling with family. Otherwise it’s the usual backpacker hostel. The room was really nice and the breakfast even better! You can’t get deals like that in the Philippines. I was extremely happy with it that I didn’t mind just staying inside the hotel that day.
The next day we took another ferry to Kota Kinabalu. It was a four hour ride. I thought we'd have time to visit at least two islands
when we got there at 11AM. But the last trip going back to KK from the islands was at 4PM so we had to pick just one island and we picked Sapi. It was a very short 10-15 minute boat ride and we were there. The turquoise water was gorgeous, but we were not prepared for the crowds. There were way too many people. It would have been lovely had there been 80% less people there. I haven't seen crowds like that in any beach in the Philippines. Then again I haven't been to the most touristy ones. We went snorkeling and there were plenty of colorful fishes. I accidentally stepped on a coral then a fish attacked me. I actually had scars the next day. Won't blame the fish. Stupid human stepped on it's home and deserved some level of violence.
The next day we picked up our rental car and drove to Sandakan. We first stopped by to see Mount Kota Kinabalu which is THE place that people go to Malaysian Borneo for. We drove to the starting point of the three day hike. It costs about $300 USD to hike and I was just not willing
to spend that much just to go hiking. It was foggy at that point so we didn’t really see anything. The weather there reminded me of spring in Vancouver. It was pleasantly cool. We took the short hikes as there were several trails available from 500 to 7,000 meters. We hiked the one that took us 45 minutes to finish.
After that we continued driving towards Sandakan. I heard they have elephants there and I wanted to see elephants in the wild. The traffic was absolutely horrendous! There was only one lane on each side so we spent extra three hours in traffic.
The town of Sandakan looked very old. It used to be a bigger city than Kota Kinabalu but now it’s like a forgotten city. I read somewhere that it used to THE ultimate destination in Malaysian Borneo but it has now been eclipsed by Kota Kinabalu even though it has much more to offer than KK.
I enjoyed the Urangutan reserve and Sun Bear conservation center. They were right next to each other. They were beautiful creatures! But I think I enjoyed being in the forest more. It was nice to walk in a
forest without having to step on land. The walkway was high up in the trees in the sun bear conservation centre because bear are cute AF but they can maul you to death at the same time.
The highlight of this trip for me though was Kinabatangan river. I felt like I was in the Amazon river, though I’ve never been there. It was so incredible seeing so many species of birds, and many other animals. There were a few species of monkeys, crocodiles, lizards, etc. Sadly they elephants didn’t show. But it was still worth it! My heart was full because I’ve never seen so many animals in the wild. I can only imagine what a trip down the Amazon river would be like. Now I wanna go!
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