Solo Mission: April 2011

After a night out with my gangster-type buddy David that lasted until 4am, I hopped a train at 6:30 am and headed south to begin our trip to the island of Sabah, Malaysia/Borneo. After a few hours our plane landed at a small airport where we hustled through customs (where the penalty for smuggling drugs is death) and headed toward our backpackers lodge that would house us for the next couple nights. After checking in and throwing our luggage in our small quarters it was time to explore the city of Kota Kinabalu. After feasting on local cuisine we decided to make our way down the strip with no particular destination in mind. After walking a decent distance, Nathan decided to search out an actual spot. A small but pretty famous chocolate shop that specializes in combination chocolate (durian chocolate, banana chocolate, chili pepper, mango, coconut, coffee, etc.) would soon be our needle in the proverbial haystack. After asking several locals and looking at maps every which way, we came up empty-handed and decided to just park it on a boardwalk for a little while and slowly make our way back to our room. At the end of day we walked a debatable distance (I say debatable because by our Taiwanese companion’s measurements we walked about 40km, we say it was but a few miles…we’ve yet to determine the actual distance)

Day two brought us in close counters with our primate ancestors (for those creationist religion types who are reading this who are offended by the relation of monkeys to humans…you’ve never spent the day with a, or many, crazy 10 year old kids). Our first encounter came in the orangutan form. Sabah is host to two rehabilitation centers for orangutans who were saved from poachers or somehow abandoned in the wild. The reason for two separate locations is one keeps watch and takes care of the younger kids while the other is home to the adults. We went to the younger joint and got to watch a few of them play around, eat, swing through trees, mess with tourists (they are pretty comfortable with humans so its no surprise to actually have personal encounters with them, as one guy found out as one of the little orange hair balls played tug’o war with him for his hat before scurrying off after being yelled at by a caretaker). It was pretty cool to say the least. The next encounter came along a river we boated down to see these weird looking bulbous-nosed monkeys called Proboscis Monkeys. They're kinda funny looking...

Aside from Disney-esque cartoon monkeys, the river is also home to lazy, tree lounging, monitor lizards and croco-gators (we saw no sign of said gators). After being treated to a dockside dinner, we went back on the boats at night to scope out the fireflies in the trees. They glimmered like a Christmas tree. That’s about all you can say. It was cool, but ill take a Cleveland lightning bug anytime over these poor excuses for nature night lights.

Day three took us out to a small island about an hour and a half bus ride north and another hour boat ride off shore.

(this was the first thing we saw on our way to our boat that was to take us out to the island...)

The little island is famous for snorkeling and diving, which we did. The beach was straight out of a Corona commercial…until you actually walk the beach and see all the garbage scattered among the foliage and sand. Come to find out that what we thought was mostly due to the washing up for trash from the main island, was actually mostly produced by the small village that survived on this little island. Locals are given supplies once a month via helicopter but most of the trash from these deliveries stays on the island and ends up an eyesore for both visitors and local folk alike. From what we were told, massive cleaning efforts are made monthly as well, but unfortunately it seems the garbage outweighs the help. After venturing around the beaches near our hut we’d call home for the night, we decided to see what the other side of the island is like. We took some paths through the village and walked along the beach on the opposite side of the island until sunset. At this point we decided we wouldn’t make it all the way around and decided to cut through the thick jungle that separated both of the islands shores. After walking for a few hours we were finally shown the right direction by a machete wielding local we stumbled upon outside the village. (This is where I’ll say walking through this village was pretty awesome. These people live off the land in small self-made sheet metal and plywood shacks with no electricity during the day and generators at night. They have a limited water supply and eat whatever fruits are in the trees and what they fish out of the water each day. It was way cool to see how content and happy they seemed and how friendly they were to travelers.)

The next day we did some more snorkeling and played beach volleyball with the boat drivers and diving instructors before catching our boat back to the main island. Once we got ashore we decided to stick out the rest of the night without a hotel room because our flight was at 6 in the morning. So we decided to begin our long night at the market. After walking through the maze of tents through a treacherous downpour we decided to park it and order some fresh seafood from the surrounding waters. Stingray, tuna steak, giant prawn and full on squid had no chance against us. After we sat down for the second part of our feast (chicken rice and avocado juice) and gave it time to digest, we headed to the airport for the night. I’ve done the overnight airport thing before but this really blew because sleeping on airport seats with a Sebastian-red sunburn isn’t the most comfortable way to spend a night. But I did it. And hours later we were on the plane towards Taiwan. And that was the trip…or so we thought. After arriving at home the seafood bit us back. Nathan and I spent the rest of that day and night swapping post in our bathroom as our bodies rejected the poisons ingested by the previous night’s feast. Ha! It’s all good though. I’d do it again…which is actually a serious consideration at the moment…

Airport

our room - closely sleeps 3, and sometimes i snore.

our first meal

the market

night time seafood feast

catch of the day

tuna steaks

enormous tuna head

tuna steak, sting ray, giant prawn, squid...our meal to end the trip. it was delicious until it poisoned us a day later.

market shot

orangutan rehab center - current enrollment

rehab graduates

swingin

...

grubbin

hangin around

watching people watch them

baby

the onesy is hilarious

sunset on the river

Outbreak monkey

boat monkey

river - said to have crocodiles, no sightings.

this dude was so happy to show us what he reeled in

sylvia ready to take on the river

testing the rape and rescue whistle

nathan modeling his life vest

dock path

the river

nathan was on a mission to find this chocolate shop...we finally did through crazy luck on our tour

mt. kinabalu - highest peak in southwest asia

the neighborhood

our digs

the view from our porch

beach

water

sylvia postin up

small village on the island

crazy fruit tree - not edible but the leaves are used to make food smell good when serving it

pro environmental graffiti

snork

snork 2

action shots

the school for the island kids - only goes to grade 6. if they want to continue education they have to move to the big island and live at a school there to finish it out.