Russian Spy is back!

I landed back at Heathrow earlier this morning, and once I've sorted a few things out, I'll write a post to wrap this blog up. But for now, I was just going through my emails as I couldn't always gain access, and can't believe what I've found. Back in early April it would seem I got an email from 'Russian Spy' whom I met on the train in January (for anyone who's forgotten, check out the 'Plans for World Domination' post). Complete with picture on the right, it reads as follows;

'hello Nicola! I'm sure u remember me. that crazy russian in the train to Irkutsk early in spring. honestly speaking I'm not that sort of people. how was your journey? succesfully? P.S. request for maintenace a friendship. if your response is negative- please send a blank message. my name is Alex(ay)'

Any ideas what my response should be?

I'm on my way home

:(

Look how high the mountain was

When flying across from Sandakan back to Kota Kinabalu, most of the group who were sitting on the righthand side of the plane were treated to the sight of Mount Kinabalu, from really close distance. I'm assured that mountain was actually equally as high as the altitude of the aircraft, which I found hard to believe until from the airport, I took a picture of the mountain in the distance. It is quite high.

Anyway, thought you'd be pleased to know that I managed to get my flight to Singapore successfully in time. It was a tricky flight, that called by Kuching in Sarawak, Borneo. I thought I may have messed up when 5 minute after stepping off the plane for the 45minute stop, urgent calls for me came across the loud speakers, but when I responded to them, nobody seemed to care. I waited nervously for the flight to board and I think the ploblem was that I'd forgotten to pick up a new boarding pass, I found it creased up on a table near the gate.

I'll miss Borneo, it was a really interesting country, and my two weeks flew by. Tourism isn't too high there at the minute, but guess it'll soon take off. As a result, the locals seem genuinely pleased to see you and keen to help, rather than viewing you as a source of money to be exploited, which can often feel the case in many other places I've visited.

It's made for sitting on

I like the idea that there are people well travelled enough to be staying in a hostel in Kota Kinabalu, yet still won't have encountered the western toilet system.

Bad Monkey

Camera Shy

Wildlife of Borneo

The main reason I wanted to visit Borneo for so long, was to see Orang Utans in the wild. During my jungle time we did manage to make the most of a dry morning and get out for a dawn boat ride, and fortunately succeeded in spotting one in some trees. We also saw a big family of Probiscus monkeys too, and plenty of long tailed monkeys along with lots of other interesting creatures. But after packing down our muddy camp and leaving without a trace, we moved on to Sandakan, where, from there we got into a another boat and set off for Turtle Island. This is a collection of three real desert islands type places, surrounded entirely by bright yellow sand in the clear blue waters just off from the Phillipines border. These islands are a protected conservation area for the survival of the turtles. Every night up to 80 of the animals crawl ashore to lay 40-120 eggs in the beach before covering them over and returning back to the sea.

Only one of the islands is open to visitors, and during the day there isn't much to do other than snorkel or relax of the beach. But in the evening, every visitor (only about 25 of them) waits in the canteen for the call of 'Turtle Time!'. Then from there, be it 9pm, 3am, or anything in between, we drop everything and go out to watch the process as one of the turtles lays her eggs as the ranger sneakily steals them whilst she looks the other way, before they get buried somewhere else safe from lizzards and other preditors. Finally we're able to watch as a freshly hatched batch of eggs from two months prior get realeased into sea.

The eggs are buried in a pen filled with mesh cylinders, one batch of eggs lie below each cylinder. During the day there's not much to see, just sand, but once the sun goes down, up to 30 of this cylinders fill with mini turtles who'd just clawed their way to the surface. For me, that was the best bit of the evening. One minute there's nothing, then all of a sudden there are hundereds of turtles everywhere. Most pop up with their mesh pen, and a ranger gathers them into washing baskets. I saw him fill three right to the top. He doesn't wash them though, just carries them to the water. Apparently the survival rate of baby turtles is incredibly low, 1% or something even less maybe, and I can see why, some hatchlings were reappearing back up the beach after mistaking the lights of the main lodge for the moon...good luck little ones, you're going to need it!

After turtle island, it was another really early start to get oursleves back over to main land Borneo and to Sepilok Orang Utan Rehibilitation Center to catch the morning feeding time. Only three Orang Utans came for their breakfast of bananas and milk, but it was cool to see them clamber their way out of the trees as they slowly get closer. The Center is good, mostly rainforest with one viewing area, so when the Orang Utans feel ready, they can venture further out into the woodlands and fend entirely for themselves. I like Orang Utans, I think they would be my favourite, but I also took the opportunity to visit a Probiscus Monkey Sanctuary and see the big-nosed creatures a bit closer up. This sanctuary was good too, as again the monkeys were free to roam the rainforest, but 3 families and group of batchelers decided to stay closer by. It was intersting and clear to see how the four groups interacted and the hirachy of importance between not just them as collectives, but between the individuals with in their circles too.

As much as I liked all the creatures mentioned in this post, I've decided to head it up with a picture of a generic pest of a monkey.

To the Jungle

Reunited with my washing, the time came to set off for the Jungle. Due to a flat tyres that couldn't be fixed until a driver vs. mechanic game of chess had been played, and heavy ran that eventually worked it's way through the seals of the bus for an internal downpour, we arrived very late and were forced to write off any plans of jungle stays that night. Instead we were split up and distributed around various villages and spent the night in the houses of local families. Not expecting us until the following night, most households were caught by surprise, mine weren't even home when I arrived. The stay was good, but maybe not as productive as it could have been. For the best part of the evening we were back at main base for dinner and a cultural performance, then when we returned 'home', were advised to rest. The next half day with the family was largly the same. We did spend time talking to the family, but attempts to help with household chores or meals found us sat waiting for food whilst watching Asian X-Factor after being told once more to rest. My family were lovely though, and they did live a very remote and traditional life, it just would have been nice to help out more.

By the early afternoon the next day, we'd all moved out of our houses and reconviened ready for our jungle time. Armed mainly with waterproofs and hammocks, the boats were loaded, and after a couple of little stops along the Kinabatangan River, we climbed ashore to hang our beds before the usual afternoon downpour struck. After a quick lesson, we all managed to get hammocks, mozzie nets and shelters up in good time, and I think all passed the weight tolerance test, eventually.

The rain did arrive as expected and forced boat trips and night hikes to be called off, leaving us sat around all evening playing cards, drinking Milo and chatting. We all were on high leach alert so had everything tucked into everything, and daren't look down incase we caught site of one of the Jungle Superbugs about our person withing the light our headtorches. It's probably the most still I've sat for a long time.

Bed time soon rolled around and it was discovered that although the hammocks were up, not everyone managed to get the water-proof shelter in place as effectively as it perhaps needed to be! Anyway the guides donated their beds to those with unsleepable situations, leaving one of them a comfy spot on the camp table. Since being in the rainforest, I've seen giant versions of most regular bugs, so didn't envy that Jungle dude.

The Hammocks were great, quite enclosed with the net and all, a little coffin like and claustraphobic maybe, but if you don't mind that and are short enough, then it's really quite comfy. The rest of the group were taller and didn't like it, but I personally (after listening to the Jungle Book for effect) had a great nights sleep. One thing I did learn about my group however was, as nice and helpful as they all are, if you find a big bug in your little hanging tent, no matter how pathetic and desperate your cries for help may be, once safely and stable in their beds, no-one will dare risk moving to help. Instead it would appear to be more productive to laugh. Cheers for that!

No boiling eggs...

...whilst in the hot springs. And don't wash your towel in there either...maybe feet are also banned, I'm not sure.

Jungle Bugs

After completing our stroll up the mountain it was time to chill in Poring and enjoy the hot springs that it had to offer. In need of the oportunity to soak in some hot water (cold showers tend to be the norm) after a few aching muscles, the hot springs didn't quite manage to live up to expectations. The springs aren't as natural as you may expect and although the water is hot, it is actually to be enjoyed within one of the many outdoor bath tubs that take a good hour to fill. It's a funny place though, being a popular stop for those that climbed Mt. Kinabalu the day previous, the villagers of Poring must think that all tourists walk with a limp and grimace!

Still keen to make the make the most of the grounds of the Poring Hot Springs area, and determined to loosen my leg muscles off some how, I set off alone on the 3.5km walk to what was promised to be a spectacular waterfall. Most of the group had decided to spend their day doing anything but walking, apart from two others who'd set of much earlier for the same waterfall.

By the end of my water-logged decent of the mountain, my boots had puddles in them so were out to dry. My clothes were also dripping, so to take the presure off me drying the stuff, I splashed out on the local laundry service (as run by an 8-year-old). Anyway, this left me with just shorts, T-Shirt and flipflops to walk in. This was fine until the rain started...again. I didn't think to much of it, just an annoyingly wet walk through some woods. The route seemed to lead me to edge around river rocks and wade across smaller waterfall pools before disappearing into the trees. I realised this wasn't as an obviouse path as I'd expected and a few times found myself confused which way to go. It's only then I realised I'd not informed anyone of whereabouts as I'd supposed to, so wondered what I would do if I didn't pick the right directons on my way back. I wasn't the only one. When reaching a section of fallen canopy, the deep bramble appearence with armies of ants on patrol created a difficult barrier for me, and looking down a I found a note left by the two other group members. Apparently they too were concerned about getting lost forever so left themselves a paper trail for a rescue party to find.

It was then that it started and I realised I was in a jungle. As I moved for a closer look at the note I spied a problem, it was an attack of the Leeches! They're horrible. Freaked out, I went to brush the first off, but it was still there, stuck fast. Eventually I detached it and turned my attention to the rest of my legs when next I caught one crawling up the soul of my footwear towards my toes...fast. It wasn't quite there yet so I just wiped the edge of my flipflop on the ground and was stressed to see it was still hanging on, crawling nearer to reaching me. It was like some sort of super bug, everytime I brushed it off, it got knocked off balance a little, but quickly steadied itself and wriggled on. I scraped the soul on the ground, a fallen tree and used a twig (which consiquently snapped) whilst all the time shouting at it, and still it just rolled a bit then climbed up more. I did eventually win the battle, and in celebration decided I'd seen waterfalls before so best I be getting back...quickly. My walk was more of a fast march to minimise the time each foot was on the ground, thus preventing leeches getting docking time onto feet - I didn't want a repeat of the last fight. When walking through long grassy sections, I even comtemplated ways to stop both legs brushing through the wet greenary and being subject to high leech risk, but excepted hopping wasn't going to help matters.

It was a funny walk back. I saw things like giant earth worms (like small snakes) and giant milipedes. I was torn between taking a picture of these rare sights to me or getting quickly to a safe zone, so found my self marching back and forth as I battled with my decisions. Eventually the camera always won over and I marched stupidly on the spot until I was ready to shoot, stopped to avoid camera shake, then began my enthusiatic steps the second the shutter clicked. I stopped for regular leech spot checks on my walk back and caught further seven in the act. I wasn't happy.

Making it back alive, the one thing I learnt was why you must always where long pants in the jungle, and as we were headed there for the night the next day, I was harassed to discover my (and only my) laundry had gone missing. So I'm leech-hating and trouserless. All that I can buy in this tiny, tiny village are braceletts or t-shirts, which aren't going to help, at this rate I'll be jungle trekking in my PJ bottoms, which I guess is the SE Asia way, but not ideal. After asking everyone I met in the village if they'd seen my clothes, eventually the owner came home from school and put her homework to one side and finally found my stuff under the cabinate or something! That was a happy moment, and to be fair my clothes were smelling the best they have since I left in January, just like mum had washed them.