Braving Borneo

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.

Tags: experiences, Uncategorized

This entry was posted on Tuesday, November 13th, 2012 at 4:23 am and is filed under experiences. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.