Into the Jungle again - Sepilok, Sukau & then off to Sandakan

This time we were heading to Sepilok on the bus. Unfortunately I felt incredibly nauseous & had to throw up twice before we reached our lodge in the jungle called Paganakan Dii.
Wow-this was a great spot. Once again the Flashpacker was here. We met them all including a lovely lady who lived in Calcutta who had a school in the slums where she taught the children art.
We also met Hannika & Jose who would be our nature pals as we hunted down animals at night!
From this spot we got to see the Orangutans & the Proboscis monkeys as well as a host of other living creatures. The Proboscis monkeys were my fave though.

The alpha male is always greased up & ready to GO!

They are able to leap huge distances, hurling themselves from tree to tree

The group members have smaller noses & are not so "ready to go" as big ol'Alpha male

We saw these orangutans at a "rehabilitation center" where ropes have been strung p for them to learn to swing on

We had a great little hut with a semi-outside bathroom. The Dutch girls, Hanneke & Jose had rats but we got away with perhaps only one on the last night (though never saw him).

This was our amazing cabin where which actually had AC & a semi outside bathroom

The basin was a wok

From here we took a ride to the rivers edge about two hrs away in Sukau. We had planned to take some boat rides during the day & night to espy creatures along the way. The Dutch had done the same so we were a merry group snapping away with our rather crappy cameras. Once again-most people had giant lenses for this kind of photography. 

A sighting of some rather rare pygmy elephants. We spent hours waiting for them to get closer & it just got tiresome so we left

 

I nearly knocked this Kingfisher off his branch with my camera.

These swiflets were living in this rock. If you click on the picture to enlarge it you'll see there's a coiled snake ready to munch on these birds when he gets hungry. The snake was a poisonous Dogtooth snake

The downside of this adventure to Barefoot Lodge was that the huts we had to stay in here were unrivaled as yet in rankness! Dave & I got privately angry about it until we understood that this was normal in the area.

So we stuck it out & saw some incredible animals in the river, on the river & by the river.

Barefoot Lodge at the edge of the river-unmatched in rankness

Fantastic bathroom complete with a varied selection of exotic spiders & blocked drain

Our room was cramped, full of bugs & filthy. It wasn't even that cheap, but we found this was the norm in this part of the jungle

This monitor lizards fed on the chicken bones & scraps that the cook threw out onto the mud by the river. Checkout the size of some of the other footprints though...this one was just a baby!

This one was pretty large

The animal sightings were really worthwhile, though I got a bit tired of the birds & even the proboscis monkey began to bore me a bit by the end of it all. By the time we were ready to leave we were all absolutely stinking & sticky with bugs in our hair & leaves in our shoes. 

Being on the river really brought to mind Apocalypse Now

Walking into town!

 

 

 Funnily enough we still had not been suckered by a leech. Like us Hanneke & Jose had wanted to be prepared for this great onslaught of leeches we’d heard about & had even bought leech socks. But nothing! Not one. The closest we’d got was catching one trying to get into Dave’s boot. That was it-nothing more. Actually kind of disappointed!
We’d eaten enough eggs & papaya to sink a boat & we were pretty desperate to get outta there. But we’d had such a good time with the Dutch it was kind of sad to leave them. I hope they come to NYC one day & we’ll show them the wildlife of NY!
Next we took a ride to Sandakan in Sabah where we were going to take a plane to Kuching. Actually we had to take two planes, as we couldn’t get one direct. So right now I’m writing this in the departure lounge at Kota Kinabalu while we have a six hour layover before our plane to Kuching.

View from the roof of our hotel in Sandakan

Our Climb Up & Down Mount Kinabalu

The day has arrived for our journey to the base of the mountain.

We waited a couple of hrs for the bus (normally they're pretty on time in this country). We took it to what turned out to be the most rank hotel we've stayed in so far, The Cottage Hotel. I think I shall be submitting a scathing review to TripAdvisor shortly. By the time we reached this mountain town the temperature had dropped quite a bit as we were at such a high elevation. As soon as I got to our disgusting room I went to the toilet to throw up. I think it was the effect of the rather sudden change in altitude.

A massive torrential downpour occurred trapping us in one of the local cafes for a while. We were a bit worried that it'd mean we wouldn't be able to scale the mountain which loomed over the dirty town

However, the next morning the sun shone & we were off to get our climbing permits & meet our guide. 

Our "guide" turned out to be just a boy on his first climb who had not a drop of English, just lovely smiles. We learned that the use of a guide on the way up is merely a formality & it was only to be on the way down that we'd actually need help.

Mount Kinabalu

We learned that there were going to be about 100 people climbing up that day but only a handful of people had opted to take the long way down by way of the Via Ferrata. We realized that we were amongst the handful. When I chose this option on the web I hadn’t realized what a big deal it was going to be. I thought the pictures looked amazing but I didn’t realize that it would involve real live climbing with harnesses & rope & clipping onto hooks in the rocks & hanging by wires & ropes over sheer drops!

So we reached the Pendant hut after 4 hrs which was a good time, the pace set by a lovely guy named Kenny. He was a dear Danish boy of a mere 20 yrs old full of action man spirit & about to enter the army.
There were two huts below the peak. We were to stay here until 3am when we’d start the ascent to the peak.
That evening we practiced putting the rope techniques for the descent.
We loaded up on food & everyone was in their dorm beds by 8am.

Firstly I had to get up to cover a flashing light (someone had thoughtfully plugged in their phone which was flashing blue like a strobe in the darkness).
Then the snoring started. First on & then another. We were in a dorm with a teacher & some younger guys . I was getting more & more wound up until I had to say something. Basically the snoring was relentless. The guy would stop for a few seconds after I’d shout out & then he’d just start up again. I was getting increasingly worried as we only had a few hrs in which to catch some sleep. What should I do? I could do nothing but plug up my ears & wrap a hoodie around my head. Dave says I slept about 30mins that night. I think it was around 10!

 Finally we surfaced (Luckily we’d showered in the rudimentary cave bathroom the night before as there was no way I was gonna shower at this hour and at this temperature) 

As we were pretty fast, (due to Kenny’s fervent pace) we overtook pretty much everyone who’d started the ascent earlier. It actually became really bothersome trying to find an opening whereby we could pass without seeming like an ass on the mountain.
There were a ton of Malaysians climbing, old & young & all at varying speeds & conditions.
We got to the peak amongst hoards of rats & people. Yes rats! It was disgusting & we have no idea why they were there. There was no rubbish up there & it was absolutely freezing cold.
Little by little the small area got more & more dangerous as people politely shouldered their way to the absolute peak where they’d want a photo. I mean of course they did. They’d just got up at a godforsaken hour to climb up here, of course they needed a photo. We needed one to. Only we were so cold & we just wanted to get outta that place. Dave had succumbed to some altitude sickness & the rats were freaking us out in the darkness.

So cold...waiting for our mountain guide

We finally got to the point where we were going to meet our climbing guide who was going to take us down the long way round. As we’d ascended fast we had to wait some time before our guide appeared. We got really cold but Dave’s altitude sickness abated.
At last the guide appeared carrying all the harnesses, ropes & helmets. We got all kitted up & started our descent. Kenny led the way clipping the ropes onto the iron hooks in the rock first, then me, then Dave & then the guide. So it was a line of 4 people descending the mountain on ropes.

As the sun rose I couldn’t believe my eyes. We were on the face of this mountain literally secured by rope if we fell. I guess we were really mountain climbing. (or descending) It’s something I’ve always wondered about doing but never actually done.
It was so thrilling. Sometimes I found myself imagining if I had no rope could I do this? Well-No I couldn’t of course. But only once did I slip, so in effect I did the whole climb of 5 hrs as if I had no rope (apart from the one slip which I guess could have killed me). 

Just trying to get a foot hold y'know

Actionboy Kenny-just so happy to be on the wire

About to enter the magical forest

Half way through the descent we entered a magical rainforest with gnarled & twisted trees & exotic lush plants. We donned our silly ponchos & exited the rainforest into torrential rain & waterfalls lashing down the mountainside. How were we to traverse this? Our guide was ever confident & just told us to get our skates on as the water really was shooting down on all sides.
It all became very slippery & the clipping & un-clipping of the ropes became increasingly more difficult with our ringing wet gloves & poor visibility.
Finally we made it to the Pendant hut. We were wet to the bone & were given cold baked beans toast & hot tea to comfort us!!
We couldn’t hang around however as we still had to get down from here & that was possibly another 4 hrs!


We packed our bag & changed into dry socks over which we tied plastic bags. We then started the descent from here in the relentless cold rain. The rocks we’d climbed the day earlier now seemed treacherous as we tried to put a confident step forward. Basically we were now climbing down this last part of the mountain through small rivers. A lot of concentration had to be used so as not to put your foot in the wrong place as it was all so wet, slippery & steep to boot!
We finally reached the bottom after 3 hrs of persistence & made our weary way back to our nasty hotel where we ate some nasty food & crawled into a nasty bed. (Oh –I forgot to say there were cockroaches here to-though not visible in the bed thank god).