Exploring S(e)oul: Malaysia

Wednesday morning we took the transfer boat from Mabul back to Semporna. Here we made arrangements for a bus to take us to Sepilok, where we would spend the next portion of our trip. The boat ride back was wet! We kept getting sprayed by water. At first, we both thought the driver was doing this on purpose then we came to terms with the fact that the water was just really choppy and he was truly trying to avoid big waves which meant us getting drenched! We arrived in Semporna and had to change head to toe which was unfortunate as we both had new, dry clothes on. Which by this point of the trip was getting rare and our clothes were not drying even when laid outside. This was another outfit that we would not get to wear for the rest of the trip now - into the wet bag!

On the boat back to Semporna

We had a few hours to kill before our bus was departing, so we ended up back at the Divers Lodge Restaurant/Bar, at the same table we were at a few nights earlier and grabbed lunch. With the little map provided, we made our way to the bus depot. I think it was then that I really felt like a traveller, wearing my travel backpack, trying to decipher a hand drawn map, winding through streets and loads of people and cars. Of course getting the usual attention from the locals. I'm sure we were a pretty funny site. Made it to the bus though.

The bus was an interesting adventure. I honestly expected to be piled on to an open bus like the one I experienced in the Philippines, but this one had real seats, windows, aircon, a bathroom and movies for us to watch! Although it was a bit confusing at one point because we stopped and had to transfer to another bus. We didn't really know what was going on, but a kind boy told us to move buses. As a bus, we watched a super edited version of Spiderman and a really awful Jackie Chan movie - sorry for any fans out there. Other fun facts about the drive: it ended being about 6 or 7 hours long, one road basically through the jungle. A child across from us vomited, that was lovely. But generally the children on the bus were quiet and well behaved. Here are some pictures from the drive:

We arrived in Sepilok after dark, and were dropped off on the side of the highway kind of in the middle of nowhere. It was dark, there was one street lamp. We didn't know where we were going really, for the past half hour there was lightning in the sky so we were just waiting for the thunder and rainfall. Not the most ideal situation, but luckily there were two other foreigners on the other side of the road. (Unfortunately for them, they had been waiting an hour already at that point for the bus to come along and pick them up going the other way. Ahhh the life of riding buses in other countries, so unpredictable.) Their "taxi" driver, and by that I mean a man with a truck, was still there so we asked for a ride. He didn't speak English but we pointed to the sign for the resort we were staying at that night. He ended up calling the place for us to have their driver come and get us. Apparently they could get there in about 10 minutes so we waited and the "taxi" driver waited with us. Another guy came out of the truck, the nephew of the other man, and they decided that they would just drive us since no one else had shown up yet. So, half reluctantly, we jumped into the truck. Just as we were about to pull away, the van from our resort pulled up, so we got out switched and headed on our way.

This whole night ended up being a bit bumpy. We arrived at Sepilok Jungle Resort and checked it. We booked at 4 person shared room. Two people were already staying in the room so they had the key and they only give out one key per room. That meant we were left standing for a bit until the maintenance guy was found to come unlock our door for us. Starving, we dropped our bags and went to get food. Unfortunately the only table available was near a massive group of loud British teens and after a long bus drive, and being hungry, it was quite annoying. Not to mention that the service was lacking, we had to keep getting a waiter and they didn't bring everything we ordered. Brush it off right? As we did. We headed back to our room to shower and settle into bed only to find that our roomies were not in the room yet, so again, we could not get into the room. Apparently it did not occur to them that we wouldn't know these other two people - not to mention we hadn't even seen/met them yet so wouldn't even be able to go find them for the key. So after some begging, they gave us their last spare key for the room. But really, how can they expect 4 strangers to share one key?! The power ends up going out after we both shower - no big deal but at this point it we were both sitting on our beds, staring at each other, both depressed, wondering why we were there and not still on Mabul Island diving.

Just then, we hear a loud bang and shortly after two girls run into our room. Turns out it began raining so hard the roof in the dining area collapsed ... on top of a bunch of people. No one was hurt, thank goodness, but what?! How does the roof collapse?! I have a feeling it rains hard there, a lot, how is that not something this place is prepared for?! Our room-mates were super nice though, both from Holland and had also just done their OW diving course. We chatted then all fell asleep. Honestly I'm sure the place was really great, but we just had a series of bad incidents so we didn't care for the place, and wouldn't go back. I didn't even take pictures of the place.

Thursday

We set off early in the morning in the wrong direction to the Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Centre. After going the wrong way, and then double backing, we finally made it to the centre. The centre opened in 1964 and has been rehabilitating orangutans and returning them into the jungle since. We arrived just before one of their feedings which allowed for some great viewing of these cool animals!

This one came up out of the bushes I was standing next to

What was really cool about the centre was that nothing was allowed in. No bags, no water, nothing. This allows them to keep the habit clean and free of garbage and anything that could contaminate the environment. We also had to use hand sanitizer before entering. We were allowed to bring in our cameras, but of course there was a fee for that. We watched the orangutans eat until they all disappeared back into the greenery. I learned that there are other types of monkeys living in the centre who have arrived their on their own over the fences who choose to live there. There are supposed to be walking paths throughout the whole centre, but on that day they were closed. There is a type of bear which is unique to this part of the world, the sun bear. There is a sun bear centre next door, and that week one of the bears got loose and they still have not found it. So all paths in the centres are closed until the bear is brought back. It was too bad, but also a bit funny.

Afterwards we sat in a cafe until we were picked up by the Uncle Tan's van as we booked a jungle stay with them. While in the cafe we met a guy who after explaining about our long bus ride, informed us that we could take a flight back to Tawau from Sandankan (which was a bit more north). Amazing news! We really didn't want to deal with another long bus back to Tawau if we didn't have to. So once we arrived at the base for Uncle Tan's we booked flights for Friday back to Tawau! Yay - Malaysia Airlines!

At Uncle Tan's we were debriefed on what our stay in the jungle would be like, then eventually we got into vans and took the hour long ride to the river. At the river we split up into groups and jumped in small boats that would take us another hour down the river to Uncle Tan's camp in the jungle. During our ride on the Kinabatangan River we saw so many macaques (grey monkeys) and a crocodile!

The Kinabatangan River

Mr. Crocodile

Approaching camp!

Standing outside the dining area

This is what all of the walkways looked like - on stilts above swampy jungle ground

We had a three walled, open cabin to spend the night in. It had a mattress pad on the ground, and we were give a thin blanket and of course it had a mosquito net. It was really cool to fall asleep to the sounds of the animals in the jungle.

We had some time before we went on our night boat ride, so with the our room-mates here we headed to the dining area to play a card game. We roomed with MJ, a fellow teacher from Seoul (the first one we met on the entire trip), as well as three people from France. We played a French card game called Love Letter. I was happy to remember enough French to be able to read the basic rules. It was a fun game that I would like to try and find to play again. After dinner we went out on the boat again to try and find some animals! We saw different types of birds, a baby crocodile and a few Civets (the animal that digests and gets rid of coffee beans that we then turn into really expensive coffee).

Friday

We were up early at 6:30am for another boat ride. We saw a lizard, many macaques, and a gibbon. We had breakfast before Mel and I headed back to the base as we were only doing the one night stay. I tried fried bananas for the first time and they were delicious. We were back at Uncle Tan's Ops Base by lunch, so enjoyed lunch there then waited for our taxi to take us to the Sandakan airport to catch our flight back to Tawau. The flight was 45mins and went smoothly. Honestly, with everything that has happened with Malaysia Airlines in the past month it was a bit unsettling flying with them but it was okay. For the record, all of our other flights were with Air Asia. When we landed in Tawau, we took a taxi to our hotel for the night. I think the best part was the huge dead rat outside the entrance. Aside from that, the place was clean but not entirely helpful or friendly. When we asked for a recommendation for dinner, the man behind the counter just said "anywhere down the road" - you don't want to know where we ended up! When we got back we just settled in and went to bed as we would be up early again to catch our flight back to Kuala Lumpur. We had asked them to arrange a taxi for us in the morning, but that didn't happen either. Friday was just a travel day, honestly staying in the jungle was cool but I would have been content without this part of the trip. I expected to see more than we did and I was craving for some more dive time. No regrets though, we made some awesome memories and met MJ who we have since met up with and hung out with in Seoul!

And some awesome shots courtesy of MJ from our morning boat ride/river cruise:

White Crane