Braving Borneo

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.” )