Published: April 10th 2007April 10th 2007
We stayed at the Sepilok Jungle Resort which really is a jungle resort. It was a stunning setting with wooden walkways through the trees to the accomodation past lakes and over bridges. There was so much to see there, loads of birds, butterflies, beautiful plants, big lizards, turtles and the noise they all made was incredible! The cafe was full of people swapping stories of their adventures so far in Borneo, people had been up mountains, through jungles and down to the depths of the sea! We didn't boast about how many James Bonds we had seen as we knew they'd all just be jealous.
After an early night we were up bright and breezy for breakfast (eggs, would you believe?) and then off to the Sepilok Orang-Utan sanctury just along the road. It functions as a rescue and rehabilitation centre for Orang Utans and just lets the tourists in to help raise funds to keep it going. There are very few proactive animal welfare centres in Asia so this place is doing such an important job in preserving the environments and population of this species. All over Malaysia and Indonesia their natural habitat is being chopped down to plant
Palm trees for the booming lucrative Plam oil market. The facilities were really good, there was an informative museum and a film show which just made me want to find myself a baby Orang - Utan to take home - they are so cute! The centre raises rescued babies - they are dressed and taken home each night by the staff for their 4 hourly feeds! They have a huge 'Jungle Gym' type place for the wee ones to go and learn how to climb, play and hunt - they look and behave just like human children, cheeky and playful!!! Once they can cope with that environment they are taken into a close by part of the jungle where they are encouraged to stay, build their own nests (2 or 3 per day!) and find their own food. Food is provided for them twice a day at a platform (where we were able to go and watch) just for the initial settling in period but as they become more independant they tend not to come as often.
It was so cool to watch their behaviour on the platform. There were 2 young ones who were just best friends and
so playful. When one was ready to go he just kept on hiding, tapping his pal on the shoulder to make him look round and then hiding again and other things like that. Some of them were really curious about their audience they would get a big bunch of bananas and then hang upside down eating and watching us. When the dominant male came along he just bullied his way into the food, knocking everyone else out of the way. We went back again in the afternoon which was much quieter so we were able to see them without loads of tourists in the way. It was so hot and humid in the jungle and there were loads of bugs feasting on our pale western skin so we didn't hang around all day, we escaped back to the comfort of our bug-free air-con room!
We've got loads of photos and they will get on here, promise!
We headed off to Sandakan the next day for a look round there and to catch our early morning bus the following day to Semporna. Sandakan is going through a bit of a refurbishment at the moment and will be lovely when it's done. There's a whole new waterfront development under construction which will make it a nice place to visit. Until then, I wouldn't rush.
Our bus journey was quite interesting. We were going on the longest journey that the bus station offered yet our bus was the most ancient, beaten thing we had seen so far! The seats were ripped, the cooling system was the windows and it was just manky! We waited in the bus station (patch of cleared unsealed scrub land at the side of the road) for about 2 hours after the scheduled departure time while the several staff hung around outside and chain smoked fags and the bus filled beyond capacity. When we started off on our mammoth journey our first stop was the petrol station and then we stopped to pick up one of the staff's kids whose grandfather wouldn't let them go so the bus guy came to the bus to get an iron bar to hit the granpa with! All of this went on in front of the (now screaming) kids! Eventually they all got on and the staff continued to chain smoke their way to Sandakan (hours away!).