July 2011
Borneo Rocks
28/08/11 14:27
The biggest rock in Borneo is Mount Kinabalu. In
fact, it is the biggest rock (4,040 m) between the
Himalayas and New Guinea, and by the time we were 3/4
up, it felt like it.
We took a diversion on the way back to NZ in June; we thought we might take a few walks in real tropical jungle, you know, do a bit bird watching on the side, spend some time with an orangutan or two, have a chat with the crocodiles, or a hornbill, cuddle up with a python or tarantula. An elephant and a whiskered pig would be nice, and as for tarsier, well, t’would be good if we bumped into one of those, such big eyes. Just something a bit more exotic than our usual fare of paradise flycatchers and sea eagles, sigh.
So when we discovered we could fly direct from Tokyo to Kota Kinabalu, off we went. The flight was a shocker … took us a full day diving on a coral reef to get over the jet lag. Then there were the buses, crawling up over the Crocker Range through the mist and the rain up to Mount Kinabalu National Park.
We stayed in a small village by the park entrance, about 1,500 metres altitude, then climbed to about 2,800 meters before turning back. Climbers have to hire a guide and spend two nights on the mountain in hotels (owned by a private chain) which makes the climb expensive as well as exhausting. So we turned round at the last gate, and wandered back to our cheaper hostel along the first of our real jungle walks.
It’s quite different from what I imagined, at least up in the ranges. Hot and sticky yes, but some places are quite open, and the trail was good (apart from one cliff section where I managed to sky dive into a bush just above a 40 m drop).
On down to Sepilok near the coast. We stayed at a lodge near the Orangutan sanctuary – basic but comfortable – and I saw three otters in the river running through the grounds. The sanctuary was worth a visit, but it is a bit like an open zoo. It takes five years or more to ease an orphaned youngster back into the wild and the animals are much harder to see in the wild.
And the sanctuaries are sorely needed. Much of the accessible primary rain forest has been converted into palm oil plantation. Traveling down from the mountain, we drove for three hours and saw nothing else, thousands of square kilometers, industrial scale planting for industry oils, cosmetics, and latterly biofuel. Now that’s a green own goal if ever there was one, and a difficult ethical/political/developmental debate. New Zealanders hardly have any right to tell developing countries not to convert native landscapes; given our prosperity is, historically, based on the full exploitation of our landscapes. Why shouldn’t tropical countries take a similar path. Nevertheless, the disappearance of such a huge area of wilderness in such a short time (60 years since WWII) is sad and frightening.
There is also a secondary issue; any prosperity gains may well be temporary. Palm Oil was once liquid gold, but like other commodities such as lamb and milk in NZ, real prices have fallen steadily for 50 years. The wealth generated has been captured by a few companies and families, I wonder how much has benefited Sabah people, and is steadily declining.
But where the plantations press to the river, the remaining animal life has been squeezed into a corridor. We spent the next three days in a jungle camp on the Kinabatangan River and saw a staggering number of animals. Unlike zoos, or even the rehabilitation centre, most views are fleeting and far. So the guide will say there is an Orangutan up there, and, once one gets one’s eye in, the nests are easy enough to see, and maybe the movement of a lazy hand that pulls a leafy curtain too. And as for gibbons … I can do a good gibbon call … you might get a good view through binoculars (for half a second) before they leap out of view.
The first camp was great fun, but somewhat spartan. So we finished with three days in the Borneo Rain Forest Lodge, 80 kms down a gravel track on the edge of one of the largest remaining primary forest reserves. Quite the most luxurious place we have ever stayed. We arrived just after lunch, and were somewhat startled to be allocated our own guide – apparently we were the only people wishing to concentrate on bird watching. Vivian was fantastic; he’d spent two years learning all the local bird-song and would stop, head to one side, then point with a little laser at some tiny little bird we would never have spotted on our own. By the time we left, we could almost bluff a rufous-fronted from a chestnut-winged babbler. We counted up over 70 different species; four out five hornbill species, fish owls, tarsier, tarantula, proboscis monkeys, agamid lizards and, on the very last day, on the track on the way out, an elephant, and a whiskered pig.
Back to cold damp NZ, much house maintenance and visiting when we were able. Now we are back to Tokyo for one more year.
Hotter and less comfortable than Borneo, but winter is coming.
Love to you all.
We took a diversion on the way back to NZ in June; we thought we might take a few walks in real tropical jungle, you know, do a bit bird watching on the side, spend some time with an orangutan or two, have a chat with the crocodiles, or a hornbill, cuddle up with a python or tarantula. An elephant and a whiskered pig would be nice, and as for tarsier, well, t’would be good if we bumped into one of those, such big eyes. Just something a bit more exotic than our usual fare of paradise flycatchers and sea eagles, sigh.
So when we discovered we could fly direct from Tokyo to Kota Kinabalu, off we went. The flight was a shocker … took us a full day diving on a coral reef to get over the jet lag. Then there were the buses, crawling up over the Crocker Range through the mist and the rain up to Mount Kinabalu National Park.
We stayed in a small village by the park entrance, about 1,500 metres altitude, then climbed to about 2,800 meters before turning back. Climbers have to hire a guide and spend two nights on the mountain in hotels (owned by a private chain) which makes the climb expensive as well as exhausting. So we turned round at the last gate, and wandered back to our cheaper hostel along the first of our real jungle walks.
It’s quite different from what I imagined, at least up in the ranges. Hot and sticky yes, but some places are quite open, and the trail was good (apart from one cliff section where I managed to sky dive into a bush just above a 40 m drop).
On down to Sepilok near the coast. We stayed at a lodge near the Orangutan sanctuary – basic but comfortable – and I saw three otters in the river running through the grounds. The sanctuary was worth a visit, but it is a bit like an open zoo. It takes five years or more to ease an orphaned youngster back into the wild and the animals are much harder to see in the wild.
And the sanctuaries are sorely needed. Much of the accessible primary rain forest has been converted into palm oil plantation. Traveling down from the mountain, we drove for three hours and saw nothing else, thousands of square kilometers, industrial scale planting for industry oils, cosmetics, and latterly biofuel. Now that’s a green own goal if ever there was one, and a difficult ethical/political/developmental debate. New Zealanders hardly have any right to tell developing countries not to convert native landscapes; given our prosperity is, historically, based on the full exploitation of our landscapes. Why shouldn’t tropical countries take a similar path. Nevertheless, the disappearance of such a huge area of wilderness in such a short time (60 years since WWII) is sad and frightening.
There is also a secondary issue; any prosperity gains may well be temporary. Palm Oil was once liquid gold, but like other commodities such as lamb and milk in NZ, real prices have fallen steadily for 50 years. The wealth generated has been captured by a few companies and families, I wonder how much has benefited Sabah people, and is steadily declining.
But where the plantations press to the river, the remaining animal life has been squeezed into a corridor. We spent the next three days in a jungle camp on the Kinabatangan River and saw a staggering number of animals. Unlike zoos, or even the rehabilitation centre, most views are fleeting and far. So the guide will say there is an Orangutan up there, and, once one gets one’s eye in, the nests are easy enough to see, and maybe the movement of a lazy hand that pulls a leafy curtain too. And as for gibbons … I can do a good gibbon call … you might get a good view through binoculars (for half a second) before they leap out of view.
The first camp was great fun, but somewhat spartan. So we finished with three days in the Borneo Rain Forest Lodge, 80 kms down a gravel track on the edge of one of the largest remaining primary forest reserves. Quite the most luxurious place we have ever stayed. We arrived just after lunch, and were somewhat startled to be allocated our own guide – apparently we were the only people wishing to concentrate on bird watching. Vivian was fantastic; he’d spent two years learning all the local bird-song and would stop, head to one side, then point with a little laser at some tiny little bird we would never have spotted on our own. By the time we left, we could almost bluff a rufous-fronted from a chestnut-winged babbler. We counted up over 70 different species; four out five hornbill species, fish owls, tarsier, tarantula, proboscis monkeys, agamid lizards and, on the very last day, on the track on the way out, an elephant, and a whiskered pig.
Back to cold damp NZ, much house maintenance and visiting when we were able. Now we are back to Tokyo for one more year.
Hotter and less comfortable than Borneo, but winter is coming.
Love to you all.