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Hi, it's Kate, jon wanted me to say it's me as app I've disjointed his blog entries now! I'm just writing my own interpretation of going to bako, it's a tad long, but as jon told me I like a good waffle! Anyways onto me story . . .
Leaving my hostel, which I think is the malaysian version of 'nelson mandela place', with my landlord being the equivalent of del boy trotter himself, I was quite jubilant of the prospect of seeing wildlife other than the colony of ants and fleas that plague my shower and bed; the lonely planet def did not describe kuching as the city that had lost it's battle to fleas in the 2010 edition that's for sure. Screw mosquito's and malaria, I've only had bout 5 bites in my entire trip, but covered in flea bites, I now feel and look like a big issue seller!
We had to get a bus to bako, and when it pulled up it looked spanking and I was looking forward to an air conditioned ride after a half hour wait at a stifling bus stop, due to the Germans we were travelling with and their damn insistance at punctuality. However, when we stepped on to be greeted by air as thick as chicken soup we realised we'd been duped by the ever growing trend to buy a new shell to put over your crusty old banger, so despite looking like a porsche it had the innards of a cortina, and the air con pipe looked like it had been robbed from a toilet.
Once at bako you had to get a motor boat to the park itself. It was no jet boat cruise like I took down the
Chinook river, more like a bath with a shower curtain draped over the top with an engine the size of a peddle and pop, and we had a cheeky chap who tried to overcharge us on account of monsoon season despite their being price lists everywhere. The Germans came in handy at this point as we let them do battle to save ourselves about 40p each! It reminded me of when I was in Kenya and the driver locked us in our matatu and we had to climb out the windows as he was trying to rip us off by about 10p each! It's the principle of the situation though!!
All this was forgotten though when we rounded the corner from the estuary into the south china sea to see our first glimpse of bako. It felt like the scene on the new king kong film when they first arrived at the island as it felt like we were entering a new world. It was easy to forget the run down shanty towns with houses on stilts as we were greeted by mangrove swamps in front of jutting limestone cliffs that were marbled in colours of deepest purples through to oranges and whites with giant trees in all shades of greens blanketing the topography of the land. The view actually left me speechless (I know it doesn't happen often!), and in the words of marjorie dawes from little britain, "it really was summat else!".
As you got closer the light was so bright it actually hurt, and the bark of the mangrove trees looked bleached by the sun, so much so that they looked like bones sticking out the ground, which was quite fitting as it was hard to imagine that the habitat could sustain any kind of life form; yet as you got closer the beach actually looked alive with the carpet of crabs that were scuttling around, all in bright shades of blue and pearlescent White, with their trademark pink and White claws.
There were various viewing platforms and when you took the time to
Sit and watch it was both fascinating and amusing to see crabs doing battle with one another; displaying who had the largest claws and forcing eachother out of their territories and down the numerous burrows that made swirly patterns almost like the shape of lizard prints across the beach. On one particular viewing session we were lucky enough to see a crab meet it's demise to an earless monitor lizard. We watched fascinated as the lizard stalked it's prey from behind a log, caught it then manouvered the crab around it's mouth to avoid a nasty surprise from it's claw before chowing down on the freshest seafood of the day!
I tell you what, buy jon one craghoppers shirt and he turns into Attenborough! I never thought I'd be calling him eagle eyes on account of his vision impairment likening him more to a mole, but he turned out to be a great spotter, all those Years of sky discovery obviously paid off!
The sound of the forest was what surprised me most though, as soon as the engine of the boat was cut you expected silence, yet the screaming noise of the cirrcadas was never ending, and when you factored in all bird and monkey calls, the intermittent sounds of toads and countless other noises and rustles you couldn't fail to realise you were completely surrounded by wildlife, which was made abundantly clear when in the first 5 minutes of stepping off the boat we were lucky enough to see all 3 species of primate found at the park; the macaque, the proboscis and the usually elusive silver leaf monkey with its wizened old man face, which seemed more timid than the other species, well at least the macaques anyway, who were obviously the more adventurous; you couldn't leave your bag alone for a second or they would be all over it like a tramp on warm Chips searching for contraband food items! Jon let a peanut slip and about 5 had a mad scramble for it, the victorious one shoving it in shell and all before it could be lost. One macaque took exception at jon for this and chased him away rather angrily! Other than this they were quite placid even in close proximities and if you greeted them with raised eyebrows they'd reply!
As we were camping there was no need to check in and we got stuck in to what we saw as an easy 5.8km loop trail to break us in gently so to speak. . Famous last words! About an hour and a half in and we still hadn't made a km! Now before you think you unfit b*****s, let me tell you, even linford christie would struggle to make his personal best in this terrain. Traversing around the rainforest is no easy feat, it's a combination of wooden platforms, boulders and a network of tangled tree roots, using dangling lianas as handrails. What we thought was a nice loop trail turned out to be a series of steep climbs and descents, some of which you would be doing for at least half hour only to realise you had tackled 100m! Then, as if that wasn't difficult enough you were doing battle with the humidity that made you feel like you were cooking like a roast potato on a sunday afternoon. I'm tempted to write stern words to berghaus about my day pack I purchased, with a supposed freeflow section down the back to keep you cool! My back was dripping like the river ghanges and the free flow only hindered me In the sense it took out a huge proportion of my backpack space and limited the amount of water I could carry, I mean where do these numpties test out their products to make such stupid claims; the bloody lake district!
Halfway through the trail we decided to take a break, and we were Chatting bout how we hadn't seen any spiders, and how you had to be careful about how you chose your spots to sit down etc, when jon calmly said, "you might want to move" it was only when I moved that I saw that I had sat 'little miss muffet' like directly under the largest spider I had ever seen, it was easy the size of my palm, and was big and black and had bright red feelers. I have not had the joy of Identifying it yet to see if it's poisonous as all we got out of a ranger was that it's very beautiful, his and my opinion obv differ somewhat! All I can say is Paul if you're Reading this, you may have your spiderman suit, but jon is now calling himself spiderman as he has spotted loads, so your eternal one upmanship in this area can continue! And also, dad you're bloody lucky I never asked you to kill one of these before bed when I was a child, there wouldn't be toilet roll big enough!
After I'd stopped soiling my rather sweaty pants, I was overjoyed to spot my first of what turned out to be many pitcher plants. I'd only seen them on documentaries before and we saw all 4 species found at the park in one afternoon! We saw ants crawling around the lid and it was tempting to push one in to see what happens next but I'm not that mean, and the ants had immense grip :)
We finished the trail in 4hours and had to celebrate by pitching our tent, in the empty campsite that clearly wasn't used much, but we weren't ones to shy away from a challenge, and we had no choice as the bloody Germans got to the booking office 5 min before us and took the last dorm room! After deciphering the rather sketchy instructions by Coleman we erected it and it looked so lonely all on it's tod. The plastic door immediately steamed up and we knew we were in for a
Scorcher, but the Mozzie net was fully functional so hey ho! We didn't know there was public showers for campers so we had to turn up for tea looking rather sweaty and grimmos with helmet head hair. It was rather amusing to see the looks we got, everyone else had had the luxury of tarting themselves up for a tea of fishheads! They all sat there with their expensive guides, but we had a sense of pride that we hadn't had help in spotting what we had and what we lacked in plant knowledge we made up for in enthusiasm and had a right laugh making spoof documentaries about the great jungle spider, or the jungulus crabulis, or the jungulis brownus tortoise we found, I'm sure you're seeing a theme Here!
The sunset was spectacular, beautiful shades of pinks, yellows, reds and oranges enveloped the mountains in the background, and the small pools of water on the beach shimmered in the light. It truly was breathtaking and as you walked down the beach the falling light transformed the mangrove trees to black which made amazing silhouettes against the soft hue of the sunset. As the light fell completely away you may think that the forest would also 'fall asleep' so to speak, however, as the sun faded away to allow the spectacular sight of a full moon to appear, the forest came alive in unexpected ways. The calls of the birds made way for toads and frogs, and I dread to think what else, and as we sat at the jetty we literally saw the trees come alive with fireflies, which twinkled like fairy lights on a Christmas tree in a soft green glow. We decided to go on a night walk to discover what else the forest was hiding under the blanket of darkness and we weren't disappointed. Our guide had lived there for 16years and was truly at one with the place, which was evident when he spotted a stick insect about 2foot from the path which was amidst a tangle of other branches, it was amazing. We saw pit vipers a metre from the path which made you think twice about straying from the trails I can tell you! Other sightings were of wild cats climbing high up in the canopy, flying lemars clinging to trunks, crazy centipedes with long spindly legs, lizards, frogs, one of which my lovely guide thrust at me and it jumped on my face! We also saw luminescent fungi which was a result of the residue of glow worm slime, and when you switched off your light the leaves all emitted a purple light almost reminiscent of glowsticks at a rave and made me hanker for one more night at the Wine bar to relive my youth! Then again, maybe not! My favourite sighting though was of a yellow kingfisher fast asleep on a branch. It didn't flinch even
With the countless flashes going off, and it was so beautiful, made me chuckle thinking of the countless hours people spent at potteric carr finding them, then waiting for them to stop flying, and here one was peaceful as you like, as deep in slumber as me after a night on the strongbow!
If only I had such a restful nights sleep. .. Being mindful of the fact there were pesky macaques about, and I didn't want them to locate my
Bag before I rose (I shouldn't have worried, you don't have the luxury of lie Ins here!), we had to cosy up with the rucksack in our bejuis cosy tent! We had nothing to use as pillows as we'd packed so light for the trip and it was about a Zillion degrees, so I slept like a smackhead doing cold turkey! Before I knew it, it was time to emerge from the tent, slightly less elegant than a
Butterfly from a chrysalis, and def less beautiful, I was one sweaty beast! I tried to hose myself down with the water which was bright orange from iron ore in the rocks (I was going to use the solar shower vic but it would be too much temptation for the monkeys!), but i had to Abort mission clean due to mozzies! After 2 mins I had ping pong ball like lumps on ankles and arms and I was getting weird enough looks due to the sweatiness so didn't want to completely alienate myself by looking like elephant woman!!
When I went for breakfast, my guide from the night before had said if he'd known I was camping he wouldve let me stay at his. He kept emphasising he had place all to himself and I was welcome to stay that night in case it rained. I was overjoyed seeing as I could barely move my neck and I was knackered so said I'd tell jon. His face dropped and muttered something about a boyfriend and the invite was swiftly taken away!!! Looks like ashfords still got it!!!! ha ha, jon found it well amusing, especially since everytime we've been out in Kuching, he says sweet looking old men will be walking down the road then when they go past their eyes are on stalks checking out my rack. App. despite still being a shortarse in Asia, my miniscule
Chest has now been Promoted to 'jordanesque' territory!!
Our second day was spent exploring the Coastal trails, which were good. I felt like starting a beach clean up though cos the beaches were littered with bottles and bizarrely a tv screen. I did feel a tad cheated by the view at one beach though. We'd busted our arses to get to Padan kecil to see the famous sea stacks, which are 2 great limestone stacks slightly offshore as a result of erosion. We got to the cliff to realise you could only see them by boat as they were round corner, gutted or what!!
Didn't really manage to uncover much life at the beaches barring mudskippers, but did see barnacles filter feeding which was cute. Jon saw a monitor lizard disappearing behind a rock and judging by it's tail and foot prints he was quite a big boy. Despite hearing countless diff bird calls we didn't see much bird action, apart from a diff species of kingfisher, which was a nightmare to focus on. It was irridescent blue on it's back with a White chest and yellow markings on face, very beautiful but also a pain in the arse as it wouldn't stay still, it was like a kid on xmas morning!i did actually think someone was having a laugh and playing a cd of bird sounds cos I was seeing so little but never mind ey!
The kids who lived at the national park were gorgeous, quite a few worked in the cafe; where everyone hung out in the evening. It was a strange place, you were surrounded by beauty then in the corner was a tv hooked up to Malaysian sky, where the kids watched s*** sitcoms on all day. Most annoying is that i still couldn't escape from lady gaga, justin bieber and worst of all, alex bloody ferguson! There was one mischevious little boy though, couldn't have been more than 6, and he liked creating mischief. People used to give him empty cans and he used to put them on his feet and use them as shoes before going off with big sticks and whacking everything. He made me piss myself one night though, there were wild pigs that came snuffling for scraps and ze Germans had spent ages getting their massive canon lense all set up, only for the little kid to come and scream in the pigs face sending it hurtling into the bushes! Our picture was perfect- ha ha! He also flashed us one breakfast which was quite amusing, cheeky lil b*****!
On our return journey we were expecting it to be uneventful but bako had one last parting gift for us. A sea eagle came and dove down and caught a fish about 5 foot from the boat then flew alongside us and gave us an amazing view for a few 100m! We were in awe. A spectacular end to an amazing trip; terima kesih bako!!!!
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