Blogs from Sabah, Malaysia, Asia - page 121

Rain, Rain go away..... Kate: We left Kinabalu Park early on a very wet morning, by waving manically at passing long distance buses until one stopped and let us aboard. If we had thought it was raining alot at the National Park, we were about to be proved very wrong. As we wound round the roads towards Sandakan and the Sepilok Orangutan Sanctuary, the rain got heavier and heavier. As the bus dropped us off at the junction for Sepilok (about 1/2 hour before Sandakan city) the rain was torrential. By the time we had got the bags and run across the road to shelter underneath the corregated iron roof of a fruit stall we were wet through. Luckily there happened to be a guy in a pickup who did free transfers to the nearby Sepilok ... read more

Fri 12th A 8.45 Bus journey to Batu Puteh Village which is on the Kinabatangan river and on the edgeof the jungle. However suprise suprise because of the rain it is to wet and muddy to camp in the jungle so we have 2 nights staying with a local family. First we went of a boat ride up the river and saw lots of long tail monkeys and an Orangutan making its nest for the night which was very cool but very high up in the trees to see clearly. We eat dinner in a large open room by the river owned by Mescot the charity that run the homestays. Chris, Kaz and I are sting in our guide Jims house. It is big and spacious and they have 2 cats that look like Tonga. The ... read more

Wed 10th After we had all made it down the mountain we headed of to Poring hot springs for what was suppost to be a relkaxing couple of days in the hot water. HOWEVER... When we arrived to flooding had blocked the water pipes and so the whole village had no running water so no showers. Not a problem I thought lets all go to the hot springs to wash. Of we go across the road- half an hour before closing to find that most of them are shut for referbishment and those that are leftlook green and like you'd be dirtier after you got out. The only clean one was a ciold swimming pool that a few of us dive into and got straight out of - it was better than nothing. That evening dinner ... read more

Sleepless in Malaysia Kris: We left Singapore by bus on the 2nd of January and planned to head straight for Kuala Lumpur. This plan was scuppered however by there not being a bus until the evening when we got to the station. With this development we decided we'd head for Mallaca, stay the night and go to Kuala Lumpur (or KL if you're cool) the next day to catch our flight to Borneo. So, we had one night in Mallaca and one in KL (see? I'm cool). Can't really report much on them as we weren't in either place long enough to do more than a quick wander. All that was notable was the complete lack of sleep we had in either city. Both places we stayed had paper thin walls and we could hear everything ... read more

Arriving by taxi in the dark at what looked like an industrial estate, we felt uneasy about the jungle tour we had booked with 'Uncle Tan's'. However, we spent the evening relaxing as the rain poured continuously, and hoped for better weather in the morning. Morning came, and off we went to Sepilok Orangutan sanctuary, having bought huge black macs to keep off the unrelenting monsoon downpours. Our memories of the Orangutan sanctuary are sadly disappointing: Standing in the pouring rain among crowds of other daft tourists, looking into the trees for a small black dot in the far distance (an Orangutan). David had the immeasurable joy of seeing a moving arm; the only things Louise saw were the raindrops cascading over her glasses. Arriving back at base, dripping-wet and quite worried about our impending jungle ... read more