“Don’t dream it’s over” (Crowded House)

From Borneo we headed back to the mainland, and then the next morning we caught taxis to Singapore. A little weary after the travel from the day before, food, shopping and relaxing were the main priorities for our time in this city. After the Westernised cities we had been in recently, it was a little surprising that Singapore was even more Western, with familiar names (including Top Shop and Dorothy Perkins) dominating the shopping mall. The prices were also definitely reminiscent of London!

Singapore: Singapore’s cleanliness and efficiency is well reported, and for good reason. Their underground train network is a pleasure to travel on, and took us to the waterfront bars and restaurants where we soaked up the atmosphere and re-honed our people watching skills, before heading back to the hotel to prepare for our final night. We all got dressed up (well, as dressed up as we can get, bearing in mind our very limited wardrobes!) and headed off to Raffles for the obligatory Singapore Sling. It can best be described as a Colonial experience, and took a few people by surprise as we all munched on peanuts and threw the shells on the floor, and it was a great way to say farewell to the trip. After a quick bite to eat we returned to the hotel to sit and reminisce about the trip over a couple of quiet drinks.

Raffles:

Elaine, Jo and myself enjoying the Long Bar at Raffles:

Cheers to Odyssey Overland 2008:

The next day seemed to just be one long farewell as there were several different departure times from Singapore airport. In no time at all it was time to board the plane, and head to Sydney. For me, it was the end of the trip, but for others it was the start of the Australian phase of theirs.

197 days and 25 countries after leaving London, I arrived into Sydney. It is difficult to summarise everything that I have done and seen and experienced other than to say that all expectations were surpassed!

Now to the next adventure…

“Tourist” (St Germain)

After all the fairly unadulterated wildlife we have had the pleasure of seeing in Borneo, our visit to the Turtle Islands brought us back to the more unappealing aspects of mass tourism. It was all very slick, and in the end a lovely spectacle, particularly the releasing of the baby turtles (no wonder only 3% survive, they almost all went the wrong way and headed back up the beach!), but it was true conveyor belt tourism.

The Green Turtle eggs which had been collected by the ranger (108 in total): Measuring the mother turtle after she had finished laying the eggs. Her carapace (I would have called it a shell) measured over 1 metre long, and almost 1 metre across:

The 25 baby turtles that our group got to watch being released. They were very cute!:

Today is our last day in Borneo from where we are heading back to mainland Malaysia, and then on to Singapore, before I head to Sydney, others to Darwin, Melbourne or back to the UK. Difficult to believe it has been over 6 months!

“These boots were made for walking” (Nancy Sinatra)

Or, alternative titles include, “Promiscuous” (Nelly Furtado) or “Since you’ve been gone” (Avril Lavigne), both of which have just been played at a volume which exceeded the speakers capabilities in a taxi to Sandakan where I am currently sitting in front of a massive television, enjoying wifi, and the feeling of being clean for the first time in a couple of very sweaty days! But first, how did we get hot and sweaty? From Sepilok we headed off to Uncle Tan’s Wildlife Adventure. The Lonely Planet promised us that that the accommodation was fairly basic, and they weren’t kidding, but I have to say it was pretty luxurious after the previous jungle camp of a tarpaulin on the ground. Travelling round Borneo involves a lot of “hurry up and wait” which can be a little frustrating at times, but fortunately we were well fed while we were waiting to head out to the jungle camp, so it was all good.

Waiting, waiting:

Our 3 days, 2 nights in the jungle involved boat safaris, walking through the jungle (including a very muddy walk at night, hence the boots), sitting inside reading while it rained, feasting on 3 meals a day plus afternoon tea, and not showering (there weren’t any! Going 3 days without a shower in Kyrgyzstan was a doddle, but the heat and humidity in Borneo make it quite a different prospect!). We were able to see large saltwater crocodiles, heaps of macaques and proboscis monkeys, hornbills and many other birds, and even a couple of huge monitor lizards wandering around camp or swimming across the river. I will never win any awards for wildlife photography, but here are a couple of photos from our time there.

Sunrise:

Ready for our morning jungle cruise:

Dawn and mist over the river:

With Rich, preparing for our night jungle walk:

Pete, enjoying the river safari in his own way:

Rich, taking Pete's lead:

"I am, you are, we are Australian"

From Brunei we returned to Malaysian Borneo, the province of Sabah this time, and the town of Kota Kinabalu (KK). We re-joined Jo, and headed to the waterfront area for a drink and some dinner. After walking through the Aussie pub (imaginatively named, “Aussie Pub”), the smell of the sausages and steak on the BBQ was too much for us and we had to stay for dinner. Jo and I were quickly regretting our choice as some Australians (we later found out they were fresh off the rigs and had drunk the pub out of Bundy Rum the night before), put on a show which demonstrated ably all the stereotypes of the Aussie blokes and sheilas. While most of our meals were great (mmmm, steak sandwich!), Pete’s steak was definitely not the rare that he ordered, and when the chef (Bob, from Australia) came out to see it, he suggested that if Pete wasn’t happy, then he should cook it himself. Ummm, not quite the right answer. The combination of the feral Aussies and the unbelievably rude Aussie chef made a couple of the group wonder why they had just spent 6 months of their life trying to get to Australia, but hopefully Jo and I managed to convince them that it would be worth it!

Elaine, looking enthusiastic about going out to Sapi Island:

That's better!:

With Michael S and Jo on the way to Sapi Island (yes, they are slightly dark clouds in the background):

The next day, a couple of people had sore heads after a visit to the nightclub, Bed (a name which enables hilarious lines such as, “will you come to Bed with me” etc etc), but after a bit of coercion, Rich, Jo, Elaine, Michael S and myself headed off to the island of Sapi off the coast of KK. We spent the afternoon lazing in the sun (while it lasted before the storm came through!), snorkelling (where Rich rediscovered his fear of fish) and generally lazing about. We returned to the mainland by speedboat, just in time to catch a gorgeous sunset.

Sapi Island:

Sapi Island (artistic photo, thanks Rich!):

Yep, a perfect day for the beach:

Sunset - Borneo has really given us some amazing sunsets so far:

Sunset:

From KK we abandoned our overlanding ways, and flew to Sandakan, on the east coast. Our first port of call was Sepilok Jungle Resort, only a short walk from the Sepilok Orang-utan Sanctuary. We turned up for the 10am feeding and some of the group got very up close and personal with the Orang-utans, and others saw them in close proximity in the trees above the boardwalk. Feeding time was slightly manic with about a hundred people (and a hundred cameras) watching as about 7 or 8 Orang-utans came in for a feast of bananas and what looked like milk. They are incredibly graceful creatures as they swing along the ropes and manoeuvre round the trees and platforms. We were all really glad to have had the opportunity to see them again.

Close encounter, of the Orang-utan kind:

Borneo is all about wildlife and jungle really. On the way to dinner at the Jungle Resort, Rich, Jo and a couple of the others saw a small snake, and managed to get heaps of photos of it. It was certainly not the first snake sighting of the trip, and caused me to utter the immortal words “I haven’t seen a snake yet this trip, everyone else has”… Well, within an hour of saying that, Alexa and I saw a cobra on the road – it was fortunately more scared of us than we were of it, so it slithered off, flared its neck slightly, but then decided that it was a better option to get the hell out of there, so it did. We had to agree!

“Sultans of Swing” (Dire Straits)

From Miri seven of the eight of us embarked on a somewhat convoluted journey to Bangar Seri Begawan (or BSB as the locals rather sensibly refer to it), the capital of Brunei. For some unknown reason, crossing into Brunei via a land border rather than the airport requires Australian passport holders to have a visa, so Jo decided to fly straight over the top of Brunei and spend another couple of days in Kota Kinabalu (or KK, bless those sensible locals) in Borneo instead. I was expecting BSB to be a mix of Ashgabat (gold statues of their leader) and Baku (an excellent example of the fact that money, particularly oil money, doesn’t necessarily buy taste). However, I was to be pleasantly surprised. From our short time there, BSB seemed to be a very unassuming town. The money was obviously there, but there was none of the ostentation that I was expecting. The prices, however, certainly did reflect that there is a lot of money around – it was like being back in London. Sunset over the Mosque:

The main part of the city is on one side of the river, and opposite are floating villages – houses, mosques, schools, shops etc that are linked by raised walkways. The river is constantly being crossed from all directions by a flotilla of speedboats piloted at huge speed when empty, and only a slightly more sedate pace with passengers on board. Sitting watching the boats zooming around doesn’t do much for conversation, but is a fascinating way to spend a couple of hours, particularly as the sun sets in the afternoon and all the locals come out to play.

The water taxis:

A floating house (complete with satellite dish):

Friendly local kids waved to us all along our tour:

The city centre is dominated by the Omar Ali Saifudden Mosque – quite an impressive sight from the outside during the day or night, and inside the beautiful decoration is marred only by the presence of an escalator in the right hand corner (not sure where it went). The Royal Regalia Museum provides a useful insight into the fact that foreign heads of state and other senior representatives have very limited imagination when it comes to gifts to bring to the Sultan (what do you give the man who has everything, no really, everything, including 2,000 cars and a couple of helicopters) – how many writing sets and daggers do you think one man needs?

By day: By night:

The Royal Palace sits nestled amongst trees on the banks of the river, but is not readily accessible to the public, and we were afforded only a brief glance on our boat tour of the floating villages. We were lucky enough to do the tour at sunset where we were treated to an amazing sunset, with lightning off in the distance and some fairly intense black clouds which threatened, but never delivered fortunately.

Pete, Elaine, Michael S, Jen and Rich on the boat tour:

"In the Jungle"

So from Bako National Park we headed back to Kuching for a night (and some washing!) before our next adventure which involved a couple of boat trips through Sibu to Kapit where we had a chill day, not even managing to make it to the lake! From there we headed off in boats again to get to Belaga, a small town on the river which is used as a base for visits to longhouses and treks into the jungle. After some swift negotiating by Pete, we ignored the Lonely Planet’s recommended guide and headed out to the jungle with Ham and his friends. Our first day started slowly with a gentle boat ride up the river (until we could go no further due to rapids), and a nice gentle walk through the jungle along the edge of the river. After a brief stop mid-morning for a sip of the all important rice wine, we continued our journey, which got a little more exciting, with some rather dubious “bridges” (usually a slender moss-covered log above a ditch) that needed to be crossed. Before the trek (Rich, Alexa, Jo, Elaine, Jen, Pete, Michael S & me):

It was about 2pm before we rolled into camp, dripping with sweat and all feeling quite good about ourselves for having done so well. We spent the afternoon hanging around the camp, swimming in the river, and, that which we do best, chatting. It gets dark around 6.30, and it was just before then that our guides prepared a hearty meal of rice and chicken, and some small river fish, freshly caught. Little were we to know then how much strength we would need for the next day, or perhaps we all would have gone back for seconds…

Elaine was enjoying it... honestly...:

Our home for the night was a tarpaulin with some mozzie nets underneath – not our most luxurious accommodation, but certainly an experience, particularly when the rain started to come down by the bucket-load (well, we were camping! What could we expect??). While we slumbered (or attempted to!), our guides headed off into the wilderness to catch / shoot / spear / hook breakfast… And a fine feast of frog, mouse deer and spicy 2-minute noodles it was! So, suitably sustained, we headed off for our second day of trekking. We started back along the same path that we had come along, and spent a couple of hours meandering along, until Ham said (rather ominously), “Now we go over mountain. Oh, I mean hill”. No, he meant mountain.

For the next couple of hours we slogged up the hill, using our walking sticks (freshly cut for us the previous day) and tree trunks and roots to haul ourselves up a seemingly never-ending mountain of dense forest! The most disheartening times of the journey were definitely when our local guides shot off up the hill past us, not needing to haul themselves up, but rather seeming to spring from slippery mud to rock and back again, while we carefully placed each of our feet! We arrived at the top with an immense sense of achievement, only to hear our guide say, “and now we go down”. If going up had been hard, coming down was quite an experience – I don’t think any of us managed to stay on our feet the whole time, with even the most sure-footed of us (of which I am definitely not one, hence the bat guano incident in Niah National Park which I will talk about later) ending up on our bums at some stage!

A rather sweaty version of me, by the buttresses of a huge tree:

We finally reached the bottom, exhausted, filthy dirty, sweaty and generally smelling and feeling quite foul. So it must have been a real treat for the people in the longhouse to invite us in for coconut juice! A bit of sugary water helped to revive us enough to head to the jetty and to the boat back to Belaga for a shower and change of clothes before we would head back to the longhouse to visit properly.

This was only half way through...:

Into the boats for the trip back to Belaga: The longhouses are, as you might expect, houses that are long. The Borneo equivalent of the terraced house? We had brought gifts of rice wine for the adults and balloons for the kids, so after arriving, and being offered a small glass of rice wine (more than enough!), we spent quite some time blowing up 100 balloons, and giving them to the kids. There were those who were too scared to come up to get one, but sent their parents instead, and then there were others who seemed to finish the afternoon with tens of balloons which someone had helpfully tied together for them to let them run along the balcony with the balloons streaming behind them. The balloons were very well received by the kids, some of their enthusiasm could perhaps be attributed to the fact that they had all been away at boarding school all week, but were home for the weekend!

The longhouse we visited:

Ah, digital cameras and balloons, all you need to keep kids entertained: We were lucky enough to be invited into one man’s house which gave us a really good idea of the layout of the houses and a bit of an insight into how the people live. Our guide, Ham, told us a little bit of background to the inhabitants of this particular longhouse. A new dam is under construction upriver from the longhouse and it has caused the river to silt up, which has killed all of the fish and driven away the crocodiles, and is making life very difficult for them.

After a good night’s sleep in Belaga, we headed off in two 4WDs. Accompanied by a rather eclectic mix of music (Celine Dion to Barbie Girl, and some very hectic dance music), we headed up over logging roads dominated by logging trucks that have supreme right of way, and free licence to travel on whichever side of the road they choose. A couple of hours later we arrived at Niah National Park, and checked into some very lovely cabins – 2 large rooms with 4 beds each, and then a living area, and, most exciting of all, a BBQ! For both nights we stayed there we were treated to a BBQ dinner (chicken wings, apparently the rest of the chickens are exported, so only the chicken wings remain in the shops…) and, SALAD! Despite my earlier statements in the Stans, tomato and cucumber have never tasted so good! Perhaps it was the lack of dill…

A red millipede:

Niah NP is home to a huge cave housing approximately half a million bats, and about the same number of swiftlet birds. On our second afternoon at Niah, I headed off with Rich, Elaine and Pete to explore the caves. Armed with headtorches we headed deep into the caves, finding bats (and their associated guano on which I managed to slip and graze my elbow… who has a grazed elbow at my age?) and eventually some of the oldest cave paintings in the world.

To the bat cave, batman:

From Niah we headed to Miri, our first proper city for a while, and planned our celebration for the fact that tomorrow is our 6 month anniversary of leaving London! Time has flown.

“Welcome to the Jungle” (Guns’n’Roses)

After 24 weeks and 3 days it was time for the group to split, with 8 of us (including 1 crew) heading to Borneo and Brunei, and the remaining 11 (after Carolyn had left us a couple of days earlier in Kuala Lumpur) headed to Singapore and then on to Australia, Hong Kong, or back to the UK. It was hard to believe that we had been away for over 24 weeks, and that people who had been strangers but were now like family would no longer be around, so there were a few tears shed by various members of the group as the Borneo crew headed off in a mini-bus to Johor Bahru airport for the short flight to Kuching in Sarawak, Borneo.

But perhaps I should start with the farewell that we had had the night before. What started as a sedate dinner at a nice café (but, let’s face it, was never destined to remain so) ended up with Mike T performing his now world famous song “My Lovely Truck”. For those who have never experienced it, it is hard to describe, but suffice it to say it was an experience that no-one in that bar will ever forget, no matter how much therapy they attend. Hopefully Rich will upload the video so you can see for yourselves on his blog… Brace yourselves… We had also had a round of the first truly drinkable “Odyssey Blue” cocktails (perhaps because Pete had not been able to add tequila into the mix), and had worn party hats and scared off other diners with our frequent and ferocious use of the party blowers that had been provided for Mike H’s birthday.

And so to Borneo. We arrived into Kuching late one evening and headed straight out for a quick drink to have a chat about what was to come in the next couple of weeks. As Pete has not been here before, the trip is largely exploratory, although guided by experiences of friends of his who have been here before. After a night in a dorm (must have been a bit of a surprise for the guy in our room to wake up with 5 girls asleep around him!) we headed off to explore the town of Kuching (but not before moving to air-conditioned twin rooms it must be said!). The town is based around a river and has several colonial style buildings, together with some Chinese temples and a strange fascination with cats (there are several large cat statues around the town).

Michael S, Elaine, Jen and Jo at the water feature in front of the War Heroes Monument in Kuching:

In the afternoon we headed off to the Orangutan sanctuary and were lucky enough to see 7 orangutans feeding - they are truly amazing creatures (the first of several amazing creatures we have already seen in our 4 days here) and it was fascinating to watch the interplay between the adults and the children, and the adults themselves (including the female who, protecting her baby, gave one of the males a very decent punch!).

The mother with the good punch picking up some take-away for dinner: The next morning it was off to Bako National Park which involved a trip on a local bus (very bouncy!) and then a boat ride to the park HQ.

Michael S, Jo and myself on the boat to the national park:

After a quick lunch and putting our day packs into storage we headed off on a walk through the jungle to find a beautiful beach which was populated only by some large Dutch tourists.

On our beach, the Borneo crew - Rich, Alexa, Michael S, Elaine, me, Jen and Jo (with Pete behind the camera):

With Elaine on the beach:

Fortunately there was a boat on hand to take most of us back to the main HQ, and an afternoon was spent chilling and reading books until we heard that there was a large group of Proboscis Monkeys near the jetty and we headed down there and were lucky enough to see them feeding and moving through, including a huge male with the characteristic massive nose.

Mr Proboscis Monkey: After a little more chill time we eventually headed to the beach to watch the amazing sunset, had a bite to eat (fortunately without the nasty monkeys that had haunted our breakfast as they stole food off our plates!) and headed out for a night safari.

The sunset: Given my experience in Chaing Mai I have to say that I was a little hesitant… but there was no need to be, as this was a true night walk through the jungle with a great guide who was able to find things that we never would have seen without him! Highlights included the green pit viper (not a highlight for me, it must be said, still hate snakes), noisy frogs, amazingly intricate stick insects, and the fireflies under a starry, moonlight sky.

The girls readiy for a night safari, complete with head torches!:

Froggy:

Stick insect:

Horrible green pit viper (thanks to Rich for this photo, no way would I have been this close!): The next day I headed off early with Pete (Rich, who had agreed to come along the night before decided to sleep in, who would have thought??) and we walked up and over a massive hill, through jungle and then scrub reminiscent of Duke of Edinburgh hikes in Australia, and then finally descended down to what turned out to be our own private beach! We had expected crowds to arrive, but no-one appeared other than a couple of water-shy tourists with big cameras, and a very patient boatman who was kind enough to take us back to the main centre after we had spent a couple of hours reading and trying to decide whether the animal head that we saw in the water was a crocodile, otter or water monitor lizard… We liked to think otter.

Private beach:

Private beach and chauffeur to take us back home!:

Amazing rock formations: