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In order to get to Borneo a overnight stopover was needed in Kuala Lumpur, unwilling to spend a night on the metal airpot benches we booked a hotel near to the airport for a much needed 6 hour sleep. We arrived nice an early in Kota Kinabalu (KK) in Sabah, Borneo. A shuttle bus to the quite pleasant and navigable town saw us at Victory Hotel in the main square. We eagerly set about planning our Borneo and Brunei trip, however is was very quickly obvious to us as our list of activities grew, we would have to concentrate all of our time in Sabah in Northern borneo and not travel South to either Brunei or Sarawak. With a 2 week itinerary loosely in our heads we headed of to book a Mount Kinabalu trek and a flight for the following morning to Sandakan for some serious nature tourism. All booked we headed to the seafront to enjoy a well earned dinner. As often happens when travelling we were quickly in good conversation with fellow travellers, an Austrian couple this time, we left having not paid for a single drink and a firm offer of accommodation in Perth should we visit, score!
With cheap flights being the only available option to cover off Borneo's highlights we were on our first of 3 the next morning. We landed at the charming seaside town of Sandakan and preceded to book with some difficulty the much coveted 2 day Turtle Island tour, followed in quick succession by the Semporna orangutans and finishing off with a 2 day river tour. Well in the space of 4 days we managed to sleep and snorkel on a desert island paradise, witness wild turtles nesting and laying eggs, release hatchling turtles into the sea, watch an orangutan feeding session soon to be topped by a sighting in the wild (a once 3 month chance to see a flange male nesting!) Peer at the famous Proboscis monkeys, crash into a crocodile, stare at a storm stork and in the dark of night with all lighting off we floated along the river in silence tilting our heads back to witness the majesty of the Borneo night sky, thousands of twinkling stars and the vast milky way stretching across the sky.
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Gillian Wonderful