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After two sweltering nights in Kuching we headed to the Bako National park to camp it up in the rainforest. We arrived by traditional speedboat with the 3 Germans we met and it was a choppy ride. Great fun but got soaked to the bone. Luckily I was wearing my expensive Bear Grylls safari shirt so dried off in minutes. About 4000 minutes.
As soon as we touched down on the beach we saw monkeys. Langurs (silver leaf) and the great cocknose! (proboscis). Look it up and you'll know what I mean. The locals call them Dutchman monkeys as they are Ginger with big red noses. Dont think they like the Dutch much as they were the first europeans to start wrecking this lovely place.
So to start our trekking we opted for a mid range 5.8km walk called Lintang trail. Mid range my arse, it took 4.5 hrs and was the hardest walk I ever did. You could look at photos but it just doesn't cut the mustard when it comes to doing it justice. Painful on the legs but the amount of wildlife we saw was spectacular. Among the best were flying lemurs, earless
Monitors, a huge spider(not sure what yet) yellow kingfisher, giant millipede and, of corse, the monkeys. Giant centipedes, ground squirrells, black spotted rock frogs, pitcher plants, geckos, mangrove crabs, mudskippers............there was just so much!! I made friends with the local wild boars sharing an orange for breakfast. I called them the Pumbas. I'm sure every tourist who has seen The Lion King did the same like.
Obviously we camped for the full experience, a feat which only one other person dared do and for good reason. Hard, wet ground and constant squeeks and chirps not to mention the biters and stingers! Was the cheapest option though so saved a few pennies there.
So we spent two nights an three days here each morning packing up our tent so the common makaques didnt steal our kit, and headed back to the bright lights of Kuching. Wonder if the del-boyesque hosteluer has sold our bag? Fingers crossed......
Just a quick after note to mention that on the boat trip home we witnessed a rare White sea eagle pluck a fish from the water about 6ft away from us. That really was full of awsomeness! Me, Katie and our three nameless German friends were all gobsmacked. It was like watching a David Attenborough special in 4D.
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