Wild Things

We had the opportunity to visit the Amazon Basin while we were in Peru, but passed because of the cost and logistics. While it was the right decision, we were both disappointed that we would miss out on spending a few days in the rainforest. It turns out that it wasn't our last chance to get into the jungle, as Borneo offers multiple areas with interesting flora and fauna. After quickly researching our options, we settled on a three day, two night stay at a jungle camp on the muddy Kinabatangan River. The camp warned us in advance that accommodations were spartan, but with the chance to see animals that are rarely or never seen in the wild anywhere else in the world, we were more than willing to accept that.

To get to the camp, we drove an hour outside of the town of Sepilok and then took a forty-five minute boat ride up the river. On the way, we saw a number of different animals, including white egrets, long-tailed macaques, a silvered leaf monkey and our first orangutan. We wanted to temper our expectations for how much we'd see over the next few days, but the amount we saw right off the bat was making that difficult. Unfortunately, it's difficult to get too close to the animals as they often run or fly off, or they stay high up in the trees. Magge kept bemoaning the lack of a fancy camera with a telephoto lens as none of these pictures were up to her high standards. After our orangutan encounter, the skies opened up and we were hit with a torrential downpour, so our captain hit the gas to get to camp as soon as possible. It didn't matter, as I got completely soaked, which isn't how you want to start a three day stay in the humid jungle.

Before the storm

Wild man (woman?) from Borneo

It's tough to tell, but there are at least five macaques in this picture

Once at the camp, we were shown our indeed spartan accommodations.  Our room consisted of an open-air bungalow.  It might almost sound romantic, except that we shared it with two other couples, our mattress was on the floor (protected by an IKEA mosquito net, because the Swedes know a thing or two about jungle mosquitoes), and the lack of a door or screens meant that we had animals running around our feet and heads at night (and I don't think they were the cute kind of animals).  I'm not even going to write about the bathrooms.  It is times like this that I really appreciate how much of a trooper Magge is, because there are plenty of spouses out there that would have not taken our lodging in stride.

Uncle Tan's camp

Three day, two night romantic getaway

During our stay, we got to go on two morning boat rides, one evening boat ride, one night boat ride, one afternoon jungle walk and one night jungle walk.  The guides were excellent and really seemed to care about our getting to see as many animals as possible.  We didn't see any orangutans on any of these excursions, but we saw plenty of other wildlife: a leopard cat, a common palm civet cat, a proboscis monkey (found only on Borneo, it's a hilarious-looking creature that looks like a cross between a baboon and Walter Mathau), Bornean gibbons, a variety of kingfishers, hornbills. insects and others.  The night jungle walk was our best opportunity for getting up close to a few animals, mostly birds, and Magge was able to take some great shots.

Pygmy squirrel

Giant forest ant

 Black-backed kingfisher

I don't remember what kind of tree frog this is

A fruit bat eating... fruit

A Malaysian blue-flycatcher (or was it a Bornean blue-catcher?)

 A slightly unfocused, but still very cool, lantern bug

Bornean gibbons, which are probably the most fun and acrobatic monkeys to watch

Some type of hornbill and a I-don't-know-what 

After three days of sweating, no showering, bad sleep and avoiding going to the bathroom, it was time to leave. We closed the trip like we opened it, spotting an elusive orangutan on a boat ride. During our three days, we saw every animal we wanted to see, except for a Bornean pygmy elephant.  I neglected to mention earlier in this post that they were also mostly animals we had just seen in the Singapore Zoo.  Why would we spend extra money to see animals we had just seen closer up in more comfortable environs, when the animals don't really do anything different in the wild, they don't really look different, and they can enter your room at night?  I don't have a good answer, but it was worth it.

One more orangutan for the road