Jungle Camping

That's mostly what we've been doing since we arrived in Sabah, the eastern state of Borneo, on 10 February. Well, jungle it has certainly been, though the 'camping' has not been under canvas, but in more of the lovely wooden cabins we've enjoyed before (and not mildewed!), from where we've now seen some fantastic wildlife - though not, sadly, the pygmy elephants or pygmy rhinoceruses. The rhinocerus particularly is a very rare sight, and so we weren't at all optimistic about sightings of those. The elephants, however, were only a stone's throw away from the jungle camp - until a few days before we arrived! We did see some fairly fresh dung, by way of proof, but the local villagers reckon that the herd has moved further up-river this week, after some very heavy rainfalls which have seen the Sungai (river) Kinabantangan rise fairly spectacularly, and very speedily, despite it now supposedly nearing the end of the rainy season. (Actually, even though temperatures have remained fairly high - in the high 20s mainly - we've seen more rain and grey cloudy skies since we arrived in Borneo than at any time in the previous 3 months.) Some people we've met since we left the Kinabatangan, who did travel further up-river, DID get a sight of a herd of pygmy elephants, and we're VERY envious!  

Our time in Sabah has been spent in its eastern-most region, firstly and lastly in the town of Sandakan, and in between times, at the Sepilock Forest Edge Reserve several kilometres inland, and then its sister organisation, the Kinabantang Jungle Camp, both run by the same couple, Robert and Annie Chong. The Forest Edge Reserve

  


is set in a beautifully maintained undulating garden landscape, surrounded by jungle forest, and is in walking distance of the world-famous Sepilok orang utan rehabiliation centre, and the rainforest discovery centre, with its tree-top canopy walk, both of which we visited (and did at last manage to see 3 adult orang utans and 2 babies at the rehabilitation centre's feeding station).     

The Jungle Camp sits much further into the dense jungle, a 2-hour bus-ride, and then 45 minute boat-ride down the mighty muddy-brown, crocodile-infested Sungai Kinabantang, Sabah's longest river, at 560km from its source deep in the south-west jungle to the marshy delta on the Sulu Sea.  

The heavens had opened only 15 minutes into our boat-ride to the Jungle Camp - in a very small, uncovered wooden boat with outboard motor - and we arrived in an absolute deluge, more like puttering through a waterfall than merely rain, both of us and our two travelling companions soaked to the skin, and with our backpacks and suitcases also drenched! But the staff were absolutely wonderful - rushing us straight into our 'long-house' style accommodation, providing extra towels, and helping to sort out wet clothing, particularly for one of the two young women we'd shared the boat with, who'd arrived with no change of clothes, having decided that she could cope in the same clothes for the two days she was planning to stay there.

But we have no real complaints, because it was here that we saw a veritable menagerie of wildlife, spotted mainly from the same little wooden boat we'd arrived in, helped by our eagle-eyed guide, Eve and the boatman, Sam. (Oh, but what a time for Andy's sophisticated camera with zoom lens to pack up!! Still, at least he didn't actually cry!! But Canon have a lot to answer for ....)  
 


During several trips along the river - about the most environmentally sensitive way to spot the wildlife, since we don't actually set foot on their territory - we at last had three separate sightings of orang utans in the 'wild' wild: one HUGE, hairy male, swinging lazily through the tree-tops, a large, equally hairy female, busy making a nest for the night (something they do at a different location every night) for herself and her baby, whom we hadn't spotted initially, but who was waiting in amongst the tree-tops until mum was finished, and then suddenly leapt out from hiding and into its ready-made bed, making us all laugh with delight. We've also seen dozens and dozens of long-tailed and pig-tailed macaques crashing through the tree-tops; several groups of the Borneon proboscis monkey, including one dominated by a very large male who mated with three females - who were literally queuing up to take their turns, and making it VERY obvious what they were waiting for! - whilst we looked on from the boat.  

 
We've also had fairly close-up sightings of several more of the oriental pied hornbills, a couple of black hornbills, one bushy-headed hornbill and - my absolute favourite, and the national emblem of Sarawak - three magnificent rhinoceros hornbills with their huge white-and-orange curled beak-top (so, that's four out of the eight types of hornbill to be found in Borneo.  


We've also seen several of two different types of kingfisher, several lesser sea-eagles and crested snake-eagles, some brahminy kytes, bulbuls, purple and white herons, and dozens and dozens of white egrets, who seem to have been 'standing sentry' for us every 50 yards or so along the river, some of them taking off as we approached, and then swooping down gracefully to fly very low over the river surface in front of the boat, like military 'out-riders' clearing the way for our approach.






The jungle camp itself was a lovely place - very low impact, environmentally, but also VERY humid, especially after the rain on our arrival day. Indeed, it proved impossible to dry all of our clothing and shoes, despite hanging them up under cover for the 3 days we were there, and we're now back in Sandakan (where we spent our first two days in Sabah planning these jungle trips), in a VERY posh hotel, with a swimming pool, though crap internet connections, with our damp clothes and shoes draped all over every bit of furniture in our, fortunately, very large bedroom and bathroom.


During our first two 'planning' days in Sandakan, the former capital of S abah before that honour moved to Kota Kinabalu, but a town now with few highlights, we'd found time to visit the old, two-storey wooden stilt villa which had once been the home of Agnes Keith. Agnes was an American author who came to Sandakan in the 1930s with her British husband who'd been appointed Conservator of Forests. Agnes wrote several books about her experiences here, most famously Land Below the Wind, immediately the Japanese invasion during WW2. The house itself was destroyed during the war (actually, so was most of Sandakan, mainly due to the Allies: firstly, their 'scorched earth' policy as the Japanese invasion became inevitable, and then by bombing during 1945 to get the Japanese out) . However, the house was re-built by the Keiths after the war, and is really enchanting. And perhaps Agnes's most poignant book is Three Came Home, which chronicles the gruelling prison conditions of her own and other ex-pat families' time as Japanese POWs in both Sandakan (Sabah) and Kuching (Sarawak) for 3 years. It was from here in Sandakan, too, that thousands of mainly Australian POWs met their deaths on the infamous 'death marches' in 1944-45, when, after their 3 years' occupation, the Japanese became aware that, with the Allies now closing in, they had insufficient staff to guard against a rebellion in the camps. They therefore decided to cut the prisoners' already starvation-level rations to weaken them and cause the disease and death rate to rise, to give them tougher and impossibly gruelling work to do, to execute some on dubious charges, and then to march the remainder 250km through the steaming jungle to Rungau. Of approximately 2400 prisoners who started the marches, in several batches, only 6 Australians, who'd managed to escape, actually survived. In fact, more Australians died here in Sabah than during the building of the infamous Burma Railway. Tragically, it emerged after the war that a rescue attempt had been planned for early 1945, but intelligence at the time suggested that there were no prisoners left at the Sandakan camp.

On a lighter, but related note, there is now a truly delightful English Tea House and Restaurant in the grounds of the Keiths' former home, where we had a VERY English tea on our second day here: Scones with cream and jam, served on a beautiful Doulton bone-china tiered cake-stand, and English Breakfast Tea for Two served from a matching tea-set with its pretty, flower-covered teapot. Absolutely spiffing! In fact, we enjoyed the place so much that we went back there on our return to Sandakan for an evening meal. We found on the desserts menu a 'special promotion' for banoffee pie, together with, in a monthly newsletter of theirs, an explanation of the history of this popular pudding - created in 1972 by Ian Dowding and Nigel Mackenzie of The Hungry Monk Restaurant in Jevington, East Sussex, no less! In fact, we had known this already, and have promised ourselves for the past 12 years that we'd go there for a meal some time, but have still not managed to get there. So, we now have a good reason to splash out, to show owner Nigel Mackenzie (assuming he's still there, of course) that his restaurant is now famous in Borneo!

Now, though, after our brilliant time in the Kinabantangan jungle, we're relaxing in Sandakan's only (and therefore expensive) hotel-with-a-swimming-pool, before flying back to KL on Sunday, to meet up again briefly with Adrian and Michelle: the Bornean couple we first met in the funky Classic Inn from where we began our exploration of Malaysia at the end of December, and with Maya and Hannes, whom we met in Sarawak. After overnighting in their friendly little hotel once again, we'll catch our flight to Heathrow just before midnight on Monday, 20th Feb.

So, apart from a post-script to this blog, this will be our last posting. We hope you've enjoyed being with us on our trip, as we have enjoyed all your comment, on- and off-blog, and look forward to seeing you back in 'Dear Old Blighty'. So, could one of you be a dear, and turn up the thermostat over there for us ....?