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Bako National Park, established in 1957, is the oldest national park in Sarawak, eastern Malaysia, on the island of Borneo it is at the tip of the Muara Tebas peninsula at the mouth of the Bako and Kuching Rivers. Millions of years of erosion of the sandstone have created a coastline of steep cliffs, rocky headlands and stretches of white, sandy bays.
Wave erosion at the base of the cliffs has carved many of the rocky headlands into fantastically shaped sea arches and seastacks with colored patterns formed by iron deposition. Some of these rock formations can be seen on entry to the Teluk Assam Beach, which fronts the park. The park can only be reached by a 20-minute boat ride from the village of Kampung Bako."
I especially wanted to go because of the proboscis monkey's or long-nosed monkey, known as the bekantan in Malay. They are a reddish-brown arboreal Old World monkey that is endemic to the south-east Asian island of Borneo. The monkey also goes by the Malay name monyet belanda ("Dutch monkey"), or even orang belanda ("Dutchman"), as Indonesians remarked that the Dutch colonisers often had a similarly large belly and nose. This species of monkey is easily identifiable because of its unusually large nose. The proboscis monkey is a large species, being one of the largest monkey species native to Asia
It was such a good idea because all of our Village in the Cloud troopers had left and it was just me and Dave and we both really wanted to go, Dave also made an excellent trek buddy especially since he had dropped the bombshell of the whole "Gay" thing.
So woke up and the weather was nice and we said "lets do it." We jumped on a bus with all the locals heading to Kampung Bako for the grand price of 5 ringgit. When we arrived at Kampung Bako village, this is where the boats are stationed to get to Bako.
To get a cheaper price on the boat it was a question of grabbing who was close to you to split the price. Unfortunately for us we were last and missed out on the buddy system, I seem to remember the boat journey to the Bako Park wasn't cheap it was around 50-60 Ringgit each maybe more, it was totally worth it though, we had a fishing boat to ourselves with a powerful engine and a nice little canopy to keep us in the shade. The ride there was AWSOME all the locals were pulling in their nets in to see there catch and there were birds of prey circling above to get in on some free fish (not seagulls). The cliffs and rocks and the view was amazing. (Just so wicked that the only way to get there is by boat.) Arriving onto the beach was like a scene out of a paradise movie. Just gorgeous. We then arranged with the taxi boat driver to pick us up at 3ish the next day.
The actual centre where we were staying for the night was abit grubby. The cabins were really basic, made of thin ply wood and old rickety beds, and the toilet and shower was like in another wood cabin and looked ancient. When there was a storm that night I honestly thought the roof was going to cave in. We dumped our stuff and got some brunch from the canteen. We decided against a guide because we were pretty certain that we would spot some Proboscis monkey's anyways.
We saw some amazing sites. Sprawling jungle roots creating steps, more jungle. After 2hours of walking stumbled upon this beach that we saw over a steep cliff and over close inspection we notice someone had written in the sand "Dave woz ere". Then we clock on we could climb down to this beach and sure enough after enough poking around we found some death defying stairs ASIAN STYLE just perched here and there 200m downwards. Always up for abit of danger me. It was like a scene out of the Beach what more can I say?
Patas Monkey's (the little grey ones) where all around as they are quite common in Asia, we heard all the Proboscus Monkeys in the trees but we only saw one for a fleeting second when it ran past. There were loads of crabs on the beach, tiny ones the size of a 2 pence peace, just borrowing away and digging out a hole by making sand into little balls, if you looked closely the whole beach was alive with them, they also had green shells, pointy shells and one claw bigger than the other.
The Bako centre had some long-term visitors in the shape of Big Boars with really hairy noses, an mama pig had just had a little litter. I ventured on a night tour and saw a green viper snake, jungle frog, a big ugly long centerpeed with really big legs, a white spider, glow flys and last but not least and massive black scorpion poking its head out of a tree. The guide said he got bitten by one of those once and could move for 3 to 7 days, also very painful I think he said.
After waking the yellow route (the shortest one) we eat from the canteen and watch the lovely sunset, which set over an neighbouring island.
That was enough for me and that was the end of our Bako trip. The funniest moment was when we had re-named the proboscis monkey's "Big c*** nosed monkey's". We had been walking for an hour and a half and to no avail of a sighting of these monkey's, so I pluck up the courage to actually ask the guide group leader (we had been following) if they had actually seen any…. But my question came out as "Excuse me have you seen any big c*** nosed monkey's?" Thankfully the lady was german and didn't understand! Dave was in stitches because I hadn't eve realized I had said it. Woops.
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Koen Yea monkeys! I might just check that out, I want to see my fellow dutchman-monkeys hehe.