Braving Borneo

Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei:  Palm Garden Hotel

First and foremost, this hotel is kind of out on it’s own.  It’s not in the city center, it’s not next to the Gadong market (although the walk is only about 10-15 minutes and they’ll drive you there for $5 Brunei).  I was a bit disappointed as we drove up, I checked in and went up to my room.  It is pretty basic, and seems a little run down.  That said, I was just at Le Meridien in Paris a couple night before, so maybe it was just shock of the change.  The staff was very friendly and helpful, I paid $88 brunei including breakfast (about 45€), there is air conditioning, a small pool, and a very nice fitness club on site.  Major drawback for me was the very hard bed.  Overall in summary: decent value for money, location a bit of a challenge, bed not comfortable for “soft mattress” lovers, but otherwise okay.

Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia:

Eden 54

I liked this hotel.  The lady at check in was very friendly and helpful, offering luggage storage if I needed, pointing me towards a restaurant for dinner and supermarket to buy a few snacks.  My room was a bit small but very nicely decorated with dark wood floors, nice colors and furnishings, bed was a bit on the hard side but not too bad.  Free Wifi available in the rooms, I think I paid about 35€. Location is good, in a bustling part of the city with shopping and restaurants right outside, waterfront not too far away.  I would stay there again.

Palace Hotel

This was my favorite hotel.  I had a beautiful, spacious room with wood floors,modern and comfortable furnishings and decorating, a nice bathroom and two relatively comfortable super-twin sized beds.   The entire hotel is very stylish and inviting, with a lovely pool area, nice fitness room, and on-site spa.  My massage therapist was great, and a 60 minute aromatherapy massage only cost about 18€.  Free Wifi in the lobby, air conditioning in the rooms, price including breakfast &tax was about 45€.  The only drawback is location, as the Palace hotel sits on the outskirts of town and really too inconvenient to walk.  A taxi costs 15 MYR (about 4.5€) into town. Still a nice place to stay and I would definitely go here again, especially if you’re looking for relaxation and not intent on the bustling city life.

Hotel Sixty3

Modern, comfortable hotel in a good location.  Since I was miserably sick, I got the most out of the comfortable bed: wasn’t really able to enjoy anything else!   It is farther from the airport than the Palace Hotel, so unless you want proximity to town, I personally preferred the Palace (with on-site spa, pool, etc).  But this one is also nice, similar cost and directly in town with shopping / restaurants just outside.

Very nice room for my last night in Malaysia

Mt. Kinabalu, Pendant Hut:

Small hut with dorm rooms.  Bed comfortable enough, sleeping bag, inner sleeping bed and pillow provided (so you don’t have to carry them up the mountain!).  Bring a small towel.  Very friendly staff, tea and coffee available all day.  Not heated, sitting around requires warm clothes.  Breakfast served at the hut (basic food), dinner served a few meters down the hill at Laban Rata (nice buffet).

Nature Lodge Kinabatangan

Good cost/benefit ratio.  Basic accommodation surrounded by jungle, my 1 night package included a bed in a 5-bed dorm room, dinner and breakfast, 2 river safaris and one night jungle walk for 370 MYR (about 100€).  The dorms are built in raised huts, limiting the number of non-human visitors inside, although I did have a friendly gecko perched on the wall next to my bed.  We had shared bathrooms and the showers looked a little scary but were fine.  Overall very natural, I would stay there again despite a not-so-comfortable bed (I could feel the lattice through the mattress).  Our jungle guide was great – very knowledgeable, superb English, entertaining stories and examples about the animals.  There are probably nicer places to stay, but this was good and budget-friendly.

Semporna, Scuba Junkie Dive Lodge

First, please note that a number of establishments run under the Scuba Junkie name: the dive lodge (backpackers lodge) in Semporna, a Bar / restaurant next to the lodge, the dive shop, and the Mabul Beach resort out on mabul island.  It’s important to keep them apart in your thinking, because I rate them quite differently.  I was not impressed with the Lodge in Semporna.  Very dark, dank, musty dorm room, toilets and showers in integrated cabins (3 of them on our floor, not sure if there were more elsewhere) meaning wet toilets all the time, check in staff didn’t seem very helpful or knowledgeable.  The plus: ease (across the street from dive shop), free Wifi, and cheap.  If you dive with Scuba Junkie, a dorm bed including breakfast only costs 25MYR (about 7€).  I can’t say I would stay there again, mainly because of the dark, dank room.  Felt a bit like sleeping in a dungeon.  But maybe there are some better rooms.

Mabul Beach Resort

Love it.   For a few days, maybe up to a week.  Right off the beach sits a collection of little beach huts, main  building with restaurant and bar, and a large building housing some dorm rooms.  The resort jetty is also right there at the beach, with the dive shop at the end of the jetty right next to where you board the dive boats.  My first night, I was in a 10-bed dorm room which was a bit hot and the air felt stale during the night (too many people breathing the same air).  The room itself was nice, all wood floored and paneled, nice looking and relatively comfortable beds, toilets and showers  en suite (4 of them, same strange integrated idea as at the lodge, albeit a bit bigger so water doesn’t get everywhere quite as much).   On my second night, I moved to one of the individual huts and it is great.  One double and one twin bed, ensuite bathroom that is quite roomy, nice porch with table and chairs out front.  All wood paneled and floored, ceiling and standing fan and some huts have airconditioning (you pay more). All rooming options here include 3 meals a day and a small snack at the end of the dive day, around 16:00.  Water, tea and coffee available in the restaurant, pretty much whenever you want it in my experience.  The food is good albeit somewhat monotonous – hence my note that a few days and up to a week is great.  I paid 95 MYR (about 25 €) for the dorm bed and all meals, and 170 MYR (45€) for the beach hut (single supplement, normal price is 115 MYR pp double occupancy).  The huts with air conditioning run about 60 MYR more per day.

The staff is great, especially the guys in the dive shop and the dive staff.  Although also reception and dining room staff are friendly and helpful.   I can definitely recommend this as a good, laid-back place to visit.  Very down to earth, mix of western and asian travelers (mainly western), both long-term travelers/backpackers and regular vacationers.  A bunch of like minded people intent on diving – early to bed, early to rise, conversation centers around diving and travel.  Nice experience overall!

Today was my allotted day to dive Sipadan.  It’s a big deal.  Only 120 people per day are allowed to dive the island, and you have to get permits early.  So most of the backpackers I’ve met who just kind of turn up have virtually no chance of going to Sipadan, unless someone cancels and a space frees up.   What makes Sipadan so special?  A lot of it has to do with topography.  Most of the islands around here sit on the continental plate, so that the maximum depth is only about 70m.  Then shortly beyond Mabul, the plate drops off into about 600m depth.  And out beyond that is Sipadan, standing alone and surrounded by these deeps waters.  So there are lots of interesting currents, bringing lots of interesting marine life, and (for me most importantly) also bringing lots of big fish.  In addition, it is a beautiful island – a small piece of paradise out in the Celebes sea.

The history of Sipadan is not all pretty.  Ownership of the island has been fought over between Indonesia and Malaysia for a long time, with finally the International Court of Justice awarding it conclusively to Malaysia.  There used to be resorts on the island, until a number of years ago, when a group of tourists and staff (21 people in total) was kidnapped by a Filipino Islamic terror group and held captive for a few months.  After that incident, Malaysia decided it is too difficult to guarantee safety and that it is more appropriate to preserver the natural state of Sipadan, thereby instructing the dismantling of all resorts, and turning it into a protected wildlife sanctuary.

And today was my day to go visit and more importantly, to dive the mysterious Sipadan.  First the good news: we were not abducted by pirates.  The bad news, I woke up this morning congested and generally not feeling very well – repercussions of my very cold day yesterday.  For those of you who are not divers: this is a serious dilemma. The standard rule is: congestion = no diving.  If your nose and/or sinuses are stuffy, you can’t equalize the pressure in your ears and you risk serious damage.  But on my Sipadan day?  Like I’m going to cancel that?

In comes loads of Sudafed, nose spray, ear drops and wearing a hat whenever I’m not in the water.  Luckily I was in a group with a divemaster who already knows me, so I had his trust and could start descending before the group, giving me enough time for a really slow descent, with frequent stops to deal with ear problems before getting to depth.  By dive #4 today, it was painful, but just manageable – so I got my complete day although with potentially a bit less enjoyment that otherwise (especially on the last dive).

But what dives they were!  We saw two different kinds of sharks – and lots of them.  Turtles on every dive.  Twice we went into huge schools of jacks that were so big and with so many fish, we all lost each other for awhile.  This was fun – remember Finding Nemo and the jacks all swimming together and making arrows and such to show the way?  In the middle of this group, I would swim along with them as they all got aligned on the direction of travel, then I’d turn and go in the opposite direction.  The poor confused fish would be coming right at me, almost straight into my mask and you could almost see their surprise and a “whoa – where’d you come from?” look on their face and they veered around me, got confused and swam around in all directions until they could get aligned again on which way to go.

And Barracudas.  A huge school of Chevron barracuda, swirling around us like a tornado.  Later on, we also saw great barracuda hovering around by themselves around a cave entry – and they were HUGE.  I have never before seen such enormous barracuda.  The walls we dove were fascinating, dropping off into just black sea, with growth patterns from the currents and every imaginable sort of fish in all colors and patterns, not to mention to corals and other animals.  We also did a blue dive, heading straight out into the ocean and into nothingness, in the hopes of running into a hammerhead or manta.  Didn’t happen, but it was a cool feeling to be in zero gravity with just nothingness all around.

So, it was a great day.  I can’t hear anything now, but have repeated by Sudafed, nose spray, ear drops regimen and hope it will be better tomorrow.  Thankfully no diving tomorrow, but I do have a flight in the evening and really hope that doesn’t become a painful endeavor.   In any case – this is one happy diver, sick or not.

It’s been a tough couple of days.  Well, tough is relative –it’s not like I have stressful tele-conferences all day or million dollar decisions to make.  Maybe it’s more appropriate to say it’s been an exhausting couple of days.  But I am SOOO HAPPY!!!!  Last year, I decided I was born to heli-ski.  But maybe I was born to live at a dive resort.

Yesterday the boat left Semporna at 8:00.

By 9:00 I was at Mabul island, had all my kit put together and was already boarding the next boat to start the dive day.

the sign greeting you at the dock as you arrive

First dive, I was a bit disappointed with visibility.  I was expecting more like

dive shop at the end of the pier

Malta, Belize, or Cozumel visibility.  But it’s not that kind of diving here.  Referred to as “muck diving” (named because you’re basically diving over a bunch of muck – sand, disposed tires, dirt, etc), it is not world class visibility but it is most definitely world class in terms of variety of marine life.  And to a certain extent, the more challenging conditions force you to get up close and pay attention – meaning you start to see teeny tiny nudibranchs, juvenile fish, sea slugs, pipe fish, seahorses, and the like.  Plus we’ve seen a multitude of more “traditional” sea life including various eels, green turtles, lots of fish, and so on.

Yesterday culminated in my first dive during a monsoon storm. We watched the wind and rain for a good 20 minutes before deciding to just go for it.  So we back-rolled off the boat, right at the jetty, with the plan to dive out towards sea and get picked up there.  Apparently the different dive masters were not all aligned with the plan, because after 2 of us were in, divemaster #2 told the boat captain to drive out.  Which he proceeded to try, getting washed back towards the jetty, blown around and basically almost running over us 3 times.  We kept swimming back and forth to get out of the way, almost washing into the jetty in the process.  I wanted to just descend, but one of our divers was still on the boat so we couldn’t do that either.  Chaos.  Finally sorted out, we had a good dive, making it three for the day.

For those of you also seeing my FB posts, the night was not extremely restful.  My room reservation got screwed up, and I ended up in a 10 bed dorm last night.  Which was good to meet people – and there are some really nice and interesting fellow travelers here – but not so good for sleeping.  One person came inside at about 3:00am, after apparently finishing a bottle of gin on the porch (at least there was an empty one there this morning).  Someone was snoring a bit.  My pillow was lumpy and the air a bit stale.  And then there was the mentally unstable rooster, who started crowing at 3:45am instead of waiting until sunrise.  Either mentally unstable or confused – did someone not accurately explain his role and responsibilities?!  He was of course joined 2 hours later by all his buddies, so by 5:45 the single crowing turned into a cacophony of sound.  And as you can see, I was awake for all of it.

No matter: breakfast at 7:30 as there’s diving to be done!  We boarded the boat, all geared up, at 9:00 and headed out to MantaPoint.  Which we were pretty excited about, until we learned 20 minutes later during the dive briefing that the dive site has a serious misnomer: no one has seen Mantas there for years.  Already cold, we rolled into the water and…got colder.  Really – I can’t remember much of anything about that dive besides how miserable I was.  Shivering and getting stomach cramps (not only altitude makes me have to pee, so does extreme cold), I kept checking my dive computer to see when would be an acceptable time for me to bail out.  And then it was a long cold 20 minute drive (umm,  it is a drive with a  boat?) back to Mabul island.  Ran for hot tea and dry clothes, tried to warm up, then back out to the jetty for dive #2.  Do I really want to do this?  I ventured into the dive shop and my favorite dive shop guy was there (what luck!).  I asked if he might have an extra shirt floating around for me.  He found an XL and I agreed better than nothing.  Then he cocked his head, thought, and said “wait a minute.”  He wandered into the back and returned with a wonderful, thick, cozy feeling long sleeve, hooded dive shirt. Size XS.  Eureka!  It apparently is someone’s private gear (luck y for me Malaysian guys are small), and the dive shop guy said it was his good friends’ and I could use it.  He saved me!!!  I was able to enjoy myself again and had a great second dive, out at Seaventures (an oil rig turned dive resort of sorts, with lots of scrap gear underneath attracting loads of sea life).  Giant grouper, crocodile fish, frogfish, mantis shrimp, sweetlips, puffer fish, scorpion fish, the list goes on and on.

Only to be topped by dive #3 after lunch – we dropped in at stingray city and caught an amazing current.  So we did a fast-moving drift dive, floating for miles past a wall that dropped into nothingness.  And on the way, saw over 20 green turtles (the biggest one almost the size of a smart car!), the biggest great moray I’ve ever seen, ribbon tail ray, blue spotted ray, pipefish, … again, an endless list of exciting marine life.  The drift we caught was so good, we actually did 3 dive sites in our 58 minutes – what fun!!

Of course by the end I was again freezing cold despite my extra shirt, and was absolutely beat. But good news: I got to move into the my new (private) room today!  Hot shower, hot tea, and dove into bed for a power nap before dinner.  I love my room!  It is a cute little beach hut, with bedroom, bathroom, porch out front and finally space to myself.  At dinner I drank hot water instead of cold and between the 29 degree air temp outside and hot food and drinks inside, I’m finally warm again.  Heading to bed early as tomorrow is my Sipadan day.  Sipadan is one of the worlds’ premier dive sites, and we are heading out at 6:15 for a 4-dive day.  I sure hope we get some sun tomorrow so I can make it through without hypothermia!  I know, seems strange to have 21-22 degree water and 29-30 degree air, and still freeze.  But such is the sport of diving.

The Scuba Junkie resort bar - a cozy place to hang out

Downside to the wet season (besides being so cold) is that everything is soggy and turning moldy.  You can hang things up to dry, but they don’t.  Days later they are still damp – not so great for someone allergic to mildew. But one of those things that is, quite simply, out of my control.  And one thing that makes going home start to sound good even though I’m loving my time here.  Seeing my loved ones again, and clean, fresh clothes.  Ahhhh.  Sweet dreams of home tonight!

And here, some images of the neighborhood…

the local village as seen from our pier

watching the "traffic" on the beach

A typical village home

My transfer was supposed to pick me up in front of the S.O.R.C between 12:30 and 12:40.  After watching a few minivans come and go (without me), I started to get nervous.  At 12:45 I tried to call the contact number I had – no answer.  I waited in the baking sun, and sweated, and waited a bit more.  Finally around the corner came a bus!  And they had my name on their list!  What a relief.

It took us about 2 hours to get to the part of the Kinabatangan River where the Nature Lodge is located.  Most of that time we drove my palm plantations, where they harvest the fruit and make palm oil (for cooking, cosmetics, etc).  These palm plantations, while doing a lot to help the Malaysian economy, are the primary reason Orang-utans are endangered.  Massive deforestation has happened to make way for the palm trees, leaving many small pockets of rainforest that are not big enough to support Orang-utans.  And as Orang-utans’ primary mode of transportation is swinging – and they cover large distances to find enough food – the plantations as well as rivers and such provide unhelpful borders.

Palm plantation

Jungle - this is what Borneo is supposed to look like!

Once into the rainforest, we unloaded the bus, loaded a boat, and motored over to the lodge.  Which is beautiful.  Trying to keep costs down, I booked a far-from-luxury but very integrated into nature lodge, and it was a good choice.  A few drawbacks (will document in my reviews section once I get to it), but overall had a good experience.  Our jungle guide, Mohammed, was great!  He really made an effort to tell us about the different wildlife we were seeing – their living, eating, reproducing habits and how they interact with each other.

We checked in and within 20 minutes were back out on the river for our afternoon river safari.

Heading out on safari

Cruising down the river. lined with jungle

A happy safari customer!

Having taken millions of photos (okay – 458 to be accurate), I’ll do my best to sort out just a few to provide an overview. Here is at least a partial sighting list:

Orang-utan (albeit way off in the distance)

green viper

macaque monkeys (loads of them!)

silver leaf monkeys (very rare and no photo – he took off quickly when he heard us approach)

hornbills

egrets

and the crowning sight of the evening – a tree filled with proboscis monkeys, including the dominant male.

A word about proboscis – they are only in Borneo.  The male has a very strange and big nose.  They are very shy monkeys, so sightings are quite exciting (I’m wondering if the nose thing contributes to being shy?  Certainly was a factor in my childhood shyness).  There are two kinds of groups in which proboscis live: a harem (dominant male with lots of wives)  or in a bachelor group (all the guys that don’t end up with a harem).  Listening to our tree full of proboscis screeching around, Mohammed’s words of wisdom: “that’s what happens with lots of wives…lots of family discussions.”

Dominant male Proboscis monkey

Back at the lodge, we had a 30 minute break to chill out and watch the bats fly around, then dinner and gearing up for our night jungle walk.  So here’s the thing and maybe you can help me understand it.  I wasn’t really worried about snakes (which are mostly poisonous around here), but I took tremendous pains to do whatever possible to ensure no leeches could get me (which are harmless creatures).  How does that make sense?  We all had to wear rubber boots because there’s been a lot of rain and mud – I was late picking mine up and ended up with some 3 sizes too big.  Oh well.  Left them on the porch and went in to pull on another pair of socks.  When I came out again, my boots were gone , apparently swapped out by some german students living in the dorm next to us.  And a pair of boots 5 sizes too big left in their place. Hmmmm.

Off into the dark we marched, flashlights on, boots sloshing, jungle sounds all around.  It was pretty cool.  At first. And then we reached the first mudhole.  Squish, squash, boot stuck, no – got it, squish, made it.  Sigh of relief and march on, looking for a ghost monkey and finding a flying lemur.  Next mudhole: squish, squash, stuck boot, pull, squash, squish, stuck…falling off!… no, falling over.  Hard to keep your balance in a jungle mudhole when trying to prevent your boot from falling off AND worrying about leeches

room-mate #5

at the same time.  And unfortunately, that was it.  I had trouble enjoying the rest of the walk and was very happy when we got back and I could dive into the (kind of scary looking) shower.  After getting cleaned up, went to bed, said good night to my female roommates and roommate #5  (a friendly gecko perched on the wall next to me) and slept away.

Day 2 was supposed to start with a 6:00 river safari.  Unfortunately, it started with someone’s alarm going off at 5:00.  Followed by her rummaging around for 20 minutes finding her stuff before heading to the bathroom.  WHAT?  Who gets up an hour early to go on a river safari?  Are you kidding me?  The rest of us had set alarms for 5:45 – I mean, how long can it take to pull on clothes and brush teeth?  It’s the jungle for crying out loud. I doubt the monkeys care how you look.

Mortal Lizard

Grey Eagle

Macaque - deep in thought

A wary Mama macaque, watching out for her baby

Safari was again great, followed by a big breakfast and packing up.  I am a bit sorry to leave this jungle – the beautiful trees and landscape, the mysteriousness of it, the wildlife and the pure nature here – this is how I’ve always imagined Borneo.  Next time (if I get back here), it will include a longer stay in the rainforest!

Macaques are amazing jumpers, covering up to 4-5m in a single leap

after 2 days in the jungle, I am now back on line in the seaside town of semporna.  I’ll catch up with my back-blogging in a bit (jungle was beautiful!), but for now let me share some first impressions of Semporna.  And admit to making my first 2 rather big-ish travel mistakes today.  Well, aside from the losing-lens fiasco, but that was more like an incident than a mistake.

Getting to Semporna worked like a charm : our transfer out of the jungle lodge was on the phone with the Sandakan/Semporna express bus driver and the two buses basically met up at a junction and we moved from bus 1 to bus 2.  I was about mid-line to get on bus 2, and after a few people got on, the rest of us were informed that upstairs was sold out and there were only VIP seats downstairs available.  Which would cost 50 ringgits, instead of 40.  (this is a difference of about 2.80€)   I pushed my 50 ringgit note at the guy and said it was fine, the other backpackers followed suit.  Perhaps the best 2.80€ ever spent.  We had big, cushy, reclining seats with footrest, there were only 8 seats on our floor (double decker bus), TV screen with movies playing, etc. So what could have been a cramped 4 hour bus ride was actually a nice nap, some reading, and sharing stories with my fellow travelers!

So now I’m here, and mistake #1 happened immediately.  2 couples also coming from the Nature Lodge did not have their stay in Semporna booked.  I told them about Scuba Junkie (with whom I’m booked), and that after my research it seemed like the best deal in terms of value for money.  So we shared taxis from the bus depot into town, and they all signed on with Scuba Junkie.  so far, so good.  BUT until that all happened, apparently there were only 2 people in the dorm room where i’ve booked a bed.  There are now 6 people.  🙁    Live and learn.

Mistake #2:  after dropping luggage at the lodge and signing in for my dive trip starting tomorrow, I went for a walk about town.  Feeling like I’m now on dive holiday, I didn’t bother changing clothes and so went out in my baggy capri pants and tank top.  Until today, I have not felt hassled at all in Malaysia – that all changed dramatically.  This may be a town where dive adventures commence, but it is still muslim Malaysia, and I felt that quite quickly.  I won’t be going out with exposed shoulders anymore.   Which frankly is annoying – the men wear whatever they want to be comfortable in the heat, but women are expected to cover themselves up or be treated poorly.  As much as I try to be tolerant to different belief systems and ways of life, this one gets me.

And finally, after my not-so-pleasant stroll through town, I realize why the guide books don’t have much to say about Semporna. There’s not much here, and it is not exactly a pretty town.  Really glad I’ll be getting on a boat first thing tomorrow morning and heading out to Mabul island.  I won’t be missing anything here.

Today started early, up at 4:30 so I could get to the airport in time to catch the first flight to Sandakan.  By the way, inter-Malaysian flights are incredibly inexpensive, usually costing between 20-30€ to get from one city to another.  You could also take a bus for only about 8-10€, but then you’d spend 6 hours on the road.  Hence, I’m flying.

I was at the S.O.R.C by 8:00, giving me an hour to have a coffee, check my luggage, etc before everything opened up.  Orang-utans are native only to Borneo and Sumatra, with 90% of the remaining Orang-utans living in Borneo.  They are highly endangered due to de-forestation and very low reproductive rates.  The name Orang-utan, btw, translates roughly to “man of the forest” which is a pretty accurate description as they share 96.4% of the human genome.  The rehabilitation center is set up to rescue orangutans (orphans, illegally kept pets, injured, etc), treat them, prepare them for and eventually release them back into a life in the wild.  It’s pretty cool.

I took about 100 photos and need to sort through them, then I’ll update this post.  But right now, my ride is arriving for my next trip: on to the Kinabatangan River!

P.S.  Jill, as per your request, I’ve adopted an orangutan.  Her name is Chikita, she was rescued when she was only 1 month old and she’s now 2 years old.  And happy to have a new family!  Better start reading up so you know how to care for her – I’ll be there in December, you know.

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Okay, here are a few pictures added.  I actually took 141 photos, I’ve so far sorted them down to 82.  I’ll have to keep working it, in the meantime here are a few of my favorites to give you some views into the Orang-utan visit.

Last night was not what I would call restful. I was staying at Pendant Hut, which sits at about 3250m on Mt. Kinabalu, in a dormitory room which luckily was not full.  So the problem was less the other people (there were only 3 of us, no one snored, actually I was probably the most annoying as I had to keep getting up to go to the toilet – it seems I am doomed to have the need to frequently pee repeatedly be my altitude effect #1).  The problem was the strange hour at which we went to bed (19:00), the slight headache (altitude impact #2), the questions about the day ahead, and then during the night the onset of a storm.  It rained from 20;00 – 21:00 and then stopped.  So far, so good.  It’s monsoon season after all, periods of downfall and then  dry in between is perfectly normal.  But then at shortly before midnight, it started to REALLY rain.  I mean, in torrents.   And then the wind picked up and I honestly wondered if our little hut was going to be blown off the mountain.  At that point, any additional sleep was hopeless.  So I laid in bed listening until one of the hut attendants knocked on the door at 2:00 and informed us that breakfast was ready.  Really?  We’re going to climb out of our warm sleeping bags into the very cold hut, get dressed and have breakfast because we’re scheduled for a 2:30 summit departure…with THIS storm raging?  I went down to the bathroom (trip #4 since going to bed at 19:00), then asked the hut guy what the plan was.  He suggested we get ready, and when the mountain guides arrive at 2:30, they’ll tell us.  Okay – pretty clear.

So my guide Jano arrives at 2:30 and informs me it’s raining.  Very helpful indeed.  We pulled on all our rain gear (I am soooo glad at this point that I carried the full, heavy backpack up yesterday) and headed out into the darkness.  Since there was  100% cloud cover, we had no benefit of moon- or starlight, so the world outside of the small beam from our headlamps was completely dark.  We trudged up the mountain, feeling totally alone in the world.  We arrived at the gate to the summit trail just as the ranger came out of his hut to unlock and head up to his checkpoint station.  So we followed him through the newly opened gate, and headed up.  Many steps, trail, scrambled over some rocks, the rain continuing to fall and water dripping down off my hood in front of my face.  And I am loving it!  I actually said a prayer of thanks – that I could be up here right now, experiencing this alone-in-the-darkness-and-rain-on-the-side-of-the-mountain.  It was beautiful!

Until we got to the rope.  Where the trail turns into a rock face, they’ve laid a rope pretty much all the way up to the summit.  In some places (like right at the beginning), it makes sense to pull yourself up the rope because the wall is at a severely steep angle.  In most places, you don’t actually use the rope but follow it along so you don’t lose your path and stumble off an edge somewhere.  I put down my things to pull on gloves and blow my nose, and in that instant, I blinked.  And my right contact lens just popped out and fell into the rainstorm.  This is a big deal.  First, I’m more or less blind in that eye without that stupid little piece of custom-designed plastic.  Second, due to the custom design it also costs 500€ to replace.  I shout out and fall to my knees in the rain and trickling water, searching and hoping.  My guide comes over to help, eventually the next climber and his guide turn up and they help for a few minutes.  Then the next group.  After about half an hour, I finally acknowledge that the running water everywhere has surely washed it on down the mountain, and give up.  So I toy with the fact that my climb is probably over and my vacation a mess.  And then tell Jano “let’s go” and head up the mountain – in the wrong direction by all reasonable counts.  But I decided, my climb has now become even MORE expensive, all the more reason to get it done!

It’s a nice climb up the summit trail, scrambling over rocks and walking across an enormous rock field.  And going up, it was easy enough to feel my way  and not worry too much about the lack of eyesight.  Annoying, but since everything was dark anyway, it seemed to matter less than I expected.  I was extremely angry, however, which gave me frustration to work off and propelled me much faster than I should have gone towards the summit – thereby reaching it already at 5:00.

I made it! Quick photo and then down out of the wind

Sunrise is at 5:50.  I decided I was not going to wait around in the howling wind, and started heading back down.  And now was confronted with a severe lack of depth perception.  So for the 9 km down the mountain I had to complete, virtually every step required a leap of faith as I guessed how far down that next rock was.   I managed to turn my ankle once or twice, and do a bit of a job on my knees, but finally got down off the mountain at about 13:00.

Oh – if you’re wondering.  I was supposed to do the Via Ferrata, which I was still determined to do.  I had to wait 30 minutes in the cold for the Via Ferrate guide and the other 2 people in my group. So was absolutely trembling nonstop by the time we geared up (during a lull in the rain).  Just after getting started, the rain picked up again and we had to cancel the whole thing.  So I chucked my gear, virtually throwing it at the guide, and busted my butt as fast as possible to the next hut, a cup of hot tea, and chance to get slightly warmed up before the rest of the descent.  Bummer that I couldn’t do the via ferrata – I am sure it’s great: but not in those conditions.

On the way down again

My guide, Jano, on the way down the summit trail

Back in Kota Kinabalu, having taken a very long, very hot shower (I think this is the first time ever, that a hot shower felt good to me when it’s 31 degrees and very humid out!), gone out to dinner and enjoyed black pepper crab, I’m now packing up for the next leg of my journey.  Which starts bright and early tomorrow morning at 5:00.  But just before I climb into bed, I’m headed to the spa for a whole body massage.  I’m beginning to love Malaysia.  🙂

On my way up the mountain today, I saw a body going down the other way.  Wrapped in plastic bags, on a makeshift stretcher and carried by four porters.  How is that for a wake up call?

Especially when you consider that this is a tourist climb.  It is not an expedition, it is not at tremendous altitude, the trail is well prepared and maintained.  And therein lies the danger.  Climbing Mt. Kinabalu has become such a standard tourist activity, that people who really should be nowhere near a mountain try to climb up this one.  Even though it’s a tourist climb, it’s steep and very strenuous (moreso than I had expected!).  And then there is  altitude to contend with, particularly for people who have spent their entire life at sea level and suddenly find themselves wandering around at 3-4000m.  This particular (dead) tourist was apparently a Japanese middle-aged man who died during the night, while everyone was sleeping (and hopefully in his sleep).  The assumption is heart attack, to which they lose a number of people every year on Mt. Kinabalu – this was number 5 in 2012.

Aside from that sobering encounter, my climb is going well so far.  I was worried about not being fit enough, but we made it up to Pendant Hut in near-record time, arriving at 12:20 when planned arrival is between 14:00 and 15:00. I enjoyed all the exclamations and congratulations, of course, even though I find it a bit premature since we still have a summit to reach and via ferrata to complete.

The scenery is very nice.  We started in rainforest and transitioned into alpine bush.  And the trail is not bad; a little too prepared for my taste (LOTS of steps, either build up stairs or carved into the ground with metal/wood supports), but I guess anything that 300 people will walk up and down every day probably has to be like this.

Time for a nap, final summary tomorrow: hopefully with stories of success!

The flight from Brunei to Kota Kinabalu, in the north-east Malaysian part of Borneo, was relatively uneventful (okay, there was some heavy turbulence that had me  wondering exactly how reliable Royal Brunei Airlines is – I mean, an airline company for a country with 400,000 people?).  And despite the multiple attempts of my Malaysian taxi driver to fulfill his apparent death-wish, I made it safely to my hotel. I’m now enjoying my first “splurge dinner”  (if you consider a sum total of 10€ for 2 dishes, drink and service a splurge).  After two meals of eating on the street, it’s a luxury to sit down, have service, and eat off of porcelain with silverware.  And fresh-pressed watermelon juice on top of a wonderful meal.  Sorry Juli, once again I have forgotten to take pictures of the great food – I’ll try to get it right moving forward.  The descriptions are as follows:

Ayam limau purut: chicken cooked with lime leaves in thick coconut milk

Rendang Beef “Nyonya” style: tender beef cooked with fresh herbs and fragrant coconut

(Eventually I’ll establish a “reviews” section like in previous blogs, rating and summarizing the hotels and restaurants.)

Now I need to run over to the supermarket and pick up some water and a couple of snacks. My transfer is picking me up at the ungodly hour of 6:15am tomorrow, to head to Mt. Kinabalu where we will proceed over the course of 2 days to go from 600m to 4102m elevation, and also do a 4-5 hour via ferrata (fixed climbing route).  I’m exhausted already from lack of sleep, hopefully I can suck it up and still reach the summit and complete the climb. I’m unlikely to be online again until after it’s all over and I’m back in town – so check in on the 13^th to find out how it was!  And if I’m still alive!  (sorry mom – I mean “fit enough to type.” )

Brunei Darussalam, the complete name of the country I’m currently visiting, translates to the title of this post.  And in many ways, lives up to it.  Whether walking along the waterfront, watching and waving to the water taxis zipping past, or coming home in the night along jungle-lined lanes while listening to the frogs and crickets chirp, it is certainly a relaxing and peaceful place to be. Not to sound like a tourism brochure or anything.  But hey, maybe the Sultan will read this and decide he needs to hire me to do his marketing.  🙂

This morning I braved the public bus system.  As I’ve come to expect, the hotel staff was a bit shocked, if not somewhat appalled.  The very nice guy behind the reception desk this morning looked at me with wide eyes and explained where I needed to walk to the bus stop, which buses I could get on, and then emphasized twice, “…but they don’t run on a regular schedule.”  I said that it’s fine and asked how much time in between buses coming by.  I probably shouldn’t even be surprised,  but his answer was ‘it just depends – maybe 15 minutes, maybe 30 minutes, there’s no way of knowing’.

As a matter of fact, bus 22 pulled up to my stop about 10 meters ahead of me. I jogged and stepped on just in time, to a bus full of smiles.  I guess the locals liked watching a tourist jog to make it.  Bus driving, by the way, is a two person job here – one person to drive, one to open and shut the door and collect fare.  And when I promptly handed the fare collector the standard $1 brunei just as if I do this everyday, I scored another smile.

In town, I walked along the waterfront until a water taxi waved me down and suggested going for a ride.   We negotiated the tour I wanted and a reasonable price (I had enquired at the hotel and they warned me it would cost $20, so when the taxi driver suggested $20, I acted shocked and explained it was too much, how about $15? He accepted and off we sailed! well, motored.)  We cruised towards the Sultan’s palace (couldn’t see much, mostly just golden roofs sticking out above the jungle) and all along Kampung Ayer, a water

village spread out along the river with over 8 km of wooden walkways holding it together.  This is a beautiful place, which has a bit of everything, all of it built on stilts over the water:  run down shacks made of scrap parts, beautiful houses, police station, multiple schools, mosques, a hospital, a market, a tourism center, and a couple of small snack bars. Oh – and of course, a gas station for all the water taxis to fill up!

Back on the mainland, I wandered about and was enthusiastically greeted by at least half the people I walked past, including old market stall vendors, some guys hanging out looking like gang members, a policeman, some fishermen and just random people walking around.  You see, I stick out like a sore thumb.  There are people who can travel and just seem to blend in wherever they go – I’m not one of them.  And especially here, where I’ve seen exactly one other not-black-haired person since I boarded the plane yesterday.  I am so obviously out of place, and everyone wants to know my story.  What are you doing here?  For how long?  Are you by yourself?  Where are you from?  What’s your name?  What are you doing while you’re here?  What do you think of Brunei?  While sometimes I wish I just fit in, mostly I find it endearing and enjoy the easiness of having conversations with the locals, even if sometimes we only understand half of what the other is saying!

On my walk back to the hotel, i found a guy who had strung line across a little drain running through town and was pulling fish from it. And then just 50m down the road, I found yet another fisher. Neither of them was appreciate of my photo-taking and disappeared while I was snapping away.

Walking along, it started getting hot. And then very hot.  A guy drove by and asked if I wanted a ride, which I politely declined (intent on saving taxi fare and walking home).  He mentioned that he thought I was heading in the wrong direction and of course I insisted he was wrong.  Which in hindsight, is at minimum presumptive and in all right even rather stupid, given he’s the locall and I’ve been here for a whole 19 hours.  (in my defense, he didn’t seem very sure, and I have many years of training in exuding utter confidence regardless of reality!) He left, I consulted my map, and realized (surprise!), I had missed a turn and was heading in the wrong direction.  I turned around and headed back.  It got even hotter, and quite uncomfortable.  10 minutes later my friend the would-be taxi driver came by again and politely suggested maybe he should take me to my hotel (as I obviously was lost).  I gave in and asked how much, only to be completely surprised when he said – nevermind, he just thinks he should take me.  Which he did, with no expectation of remuneration of any kind.  The world really is filled with a lot of good people.

Here are a few more shots from around town, enjoy while I head off to the airport.  Next stop, Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia!

The "flowers" line the streets around the main mosque - they have loudspeakers! No wonder the call to prayer woke me up

Rambutan tree growing along the street

Mosque in the center of Bandar

my lunch getting cooked