Into the heart of Borneo

  Sibu, Sarawak, Malaysia
Wednesday, September 8, 2004

Thurs 26 August 2004 Sydney - Singapore
We always wait for some sort of inspiration when deciding where to go on our next trip. We had a voucher for A$541 from Gulf Air (because we'd been "bumped" on our Abu Dhabi-Paris flight last year),which was about to expire, so this was taken into account in our decision, and basically meant somewhere in Asia ( in fact this turned out to be irrelevant, as after we'd already made our booking, they actually gave us cash for the voucher!). After a bit of research, we found that Air Asia was offering very good flights around Asia, so our decision was made to book a Gulf Air return flight to Singapore, then use Air Asia to go from Johor Bahru to Kuching, Sarawak. We'd then go overland through Sarawak, Brunei and Sabah, and fly Tawau (East coast of Sabah) to Kuala Lumpur, then get bus back to Singapore for our flight home. We allowed six weeks for this, which we considered would be plenty of time.
After handing over our newly-renovated apartment to Lisa and Julian, we get a lift to the airport about 7pm and start to get into travelling mode. However, we are still not fully organised, and get to the customs to find we have left one of the boarding passes somewhere (a first for us). Fortunately, it is still at the check in. Buy our traditional bottle of Bacardi and some locks and get into the aircraft about half an hour behind schedule.
The Gulf Air flight is going straight through to the Gulf, and the passengers look pretty ethnic, with a lot of young children, so we have no great expectations of a good flight. The fact that the toilets are full of paper and blocked in the first half hour is a bad indicator, but the main problem comes from the elderly Anglo couple behind us, who keep the light on, talk and crackle wrapping paper incessantly. For a short flight, it seems like a horror trip, and we are not feeling all that flash by the time we get through the airport, walking to terminal 2 to get the MRT at about 6 AM.
Friday 27 August Singapore
On the MRT we talk to a German girl who has been able to check her baggage in early into SIA. We nut out the system, change lines and get off at Clark Quay, and walk along the river to the Robertson Quay Hotel which we booked on the internet for S$81.90, about half of the going rate (includes breakfast). Check-in is not till 2pm, and it's only 7am and we're exhausted, so settle for paying for an extra day so can get a bed straight away (we're definitely weakening in our old age), and collapse into bed till 11 AM, too late for breakfast.
We're very pleased with the position of our hotel - right on the river, with lots of restaurants all along it.
Singapore's certainly changed from our first visit in 1976, when there were just a few government-run concrete hawkers' stalls. Our hotel is also pretty good value - fairly small room, and basic bathroom, but has a swimming pool. We check out the area, and find a typical sliced BBQ pork cafe and order. MP rediscovers Asian condensed milk coffee. DP has to go on an ATM expedition to pay for it. Check out the Cold Storage supermarket, then have another sleep in the afternoon. We'd been pushing ourselves to finish our bathroom renovation before we left, so we were exhausted. Meet John and Caroline at 7pm, and off to dinner.
They had reserved a waterfront table at the Sundanese Food Place - Indonesian food from the Sunda region. Quite good and not too hot, with jugs of tiger beer to cool it further. After, we walked to Harry's Place, a Jazz bar once frequented by the infamous Nick Leeson. They know the staff and the piano player (John has been workingin Singapore for five years, which is where he met Caroline, who is a local).. Have unnecessary extra beers, and walk back to the hotel. Walking 10.7 kms
Saturday 28th August 2004 Singapore
Up in time for a late breakfast with surprisingly little hangover. Start out walking south toward Chinatown. DP (who has been having hot flushes for a couple of weeks ) is feeling the heat (it is VERY humid), so we duck into the air conditioning from time to time. One of the A/C malls has a watch seller, where DP settles for a $45 Casio 50M waterproof watch instead of the $200 Citizen We find Chinatown proper, and buy some early season rambutans, including an unusual red fruit which turns out to be an upmarket rambutan . We walk back over the Pearl's Hill City Park to the hotel, and have an afternoon swim.
After a long PM sleep (Dianne has come to the conclusion that the aches and pains she has are not just from the painting of the unit, but in fact she has a bit of flu), we walk the full length of the river to the new Durian shaped theatre, then back on the South side. Unfortunately we didn't take the camera, as the night lights are pretty spectacular. Have a late night satay feed at the nearby shopping mall, then hit the sack.
Sunday 29 August 2004 Singapore - Kuching
Lazy morning, revelling in the 12 noon checkout, watching HBO and typing diary. Check out right on 12, then do some internet. Decide to head out to Johor Bahru (across the causeway in Malaysia) without looking further around Singapore. Dianne has found out from people on the Lonely Planet website about the fairly new airline, Air Asia, which is supposed to be the Asian equivalent of Ryan Air or Easyjet, and has booked, on the internet, tickets from Joho Bahru to Kuching for two for a total of A$88 (yes, that's for TWO people).
As an extravagance, we take a taxi, costs us about S$6 dollars and no hassles, to get to the Queen St bus depot in time to catch a leaving 170 bus at the depot gate. We take up 4 seats with our bags and us, and hope that the bus doesn't fill up. Costs S$1.40 each for the trip to the other side of the country!
We negotiate immigration OK, get a 3-month Malaysian visa, then try to get back on the 170 bus to take us to the Kota Raya bus station, but can't get a start - everyone thinks it is walking distance and easily found. We resist the advances of a taxi driver, use the underpass and the only operating escalator to get us back to the surface to wander around looking for an obvious bus terminal. We are more hopeful, having seen a Kota Raya shopping centre with some sort of local live concert in action, but when we get there we can't find a bus, or get money from the ATM.
DP asks at a nearby hotel, and is directed to the Landmark Hotel, which, indeed, can be seen a long way off, and we drag our baggage through the mid-day heat towards it. We arrive at a bus depot, Kota Raya #2, and, on the far side of it see the new, air conditioned City Lounge we have been seeking. It turns out that the facility is operated by the airport, not Air Asia, and the shuttles to the airport are free and frequent. The girl at the desk apologises for having to charge us 2RM per bag to mind our luggage, then only charges for one bag. We then set off looking for a bank and a meal.
Having been knocked back by a local ATM, MP is keen on getting to a recognised bank, and after sorting out the map, find the air-conditioned 24-hour section of the HSBC, where Dianne sits exhausted. It is very hot, the humidity is about 100%, and between coming from the Australian winter, a touch of flu, and hot flushes, she's finding it hard-going. Get out 1500 Ringgits. Down in the bottom of the valley we find a reasonably interesting commercial area, with a BBQ pork restaurant. After, we find that there is a quite active and interesting commercial centre, and we navigate through a large multi-storey mall to find a covered walkway up to the bus station road level.
There is a bus just about to leave, and we get on for a comfortable half hour trip through sometimes-heavy traffic to the airport. The road to the airport is nicely landscaped, but the airport building is adequate, but not flash. We check it out, put our bags through the X-ray, but not our backpacks, then wait till 6PM for our flight to be checked in. We are there in a flash, as we don't know the over-booking situation, but it all goes quickly and smoothly, and we end up with baggage tickets and two thermal-paper printed ticket/boarding cards (these are ticketless flights, and as they seemed too good to be true we don't quite believe it is true until we actually have a boarding pass. It is open seating, so, having watched the scramble for the previous flight, we are up and lined up as soon a move is made at the lounge desk. The plane has arrived about ten minutes late, but they manage a quick turnaround, and we have a choice of a number of seats as we walk down the aisle. MP's first choice is knocked back by DP, as the seats are extraordinarily close together, and we settle for behind the exit row, which has excellent legroom, worth the hassle of putting the bags up.
The staff seems efficient enough, and the flight is quite satisfactory, although during some medium turbulence one might have wished for a newer plane.
We're spending the next four weeks in Sarawak and Sabah, the Malaysian states of Borneo. We're not going to Kalimantan, the Indonesian side. We're also going to Brunei.
James Brooke, invalided from the British East India Company, was installed as rajah of Sarawak in 1842 by the sultan of Brunei. He, his nephew and his son continued to rule until the arrival of the Japanese in WWII Afterwards it became a British crown colony, until the formation of the Federation of Malaysia in 1963, of which it became a part.
Kuching has a full international airport and we have to pass through immigration again, where we get a 30-day visa for Sarawak, and no hassles. There is an American woman on the flight with a blond 1-year old who reminds us of a young Adam, and he keeps us amused during the wait.
Outside, we buy a 17.5Rm taxi voucher and have a long drive through mainly built-up areas to the town proper. Are let out in the foyer area of the Crowne Plaza Riverside hotel, a very flash-looking five-star hotel which we have booked over the internet for an amazing price of A$59 per night. They have our booking, but seems we have been upgraded to a Kingsize room instead of a standard, which is even more amazing considering the price we paid (one-third of the rack rate). They take a Visa impression and we go up to find a room much better than we were expecting, with an immense bed, separate office, and full-length windows on two sides, looking over the town and river. Can see lots of fancy architecture all lit up, and lots of fairy lights along the riverside. Quite impressive.
Now about 10.30pm and we're exhausted, but we haven't eaten (our plane fares didn't include food or drinks), so we go out straight away to get a feed at the Khatulistiwa Cafe, the recommended restaurant on the river bank across from the hotel, in a circular building with a conical roof like the big temple in Beijing. Noodles were OK, but DP's fish was pretty ordinary. Price was right, though. We slept pretty well in our big bed, once the air conditioning was cut back to less than freezing.
Monday 30 August 2004 Kuching
We have a late start, about 10, and walk through the shopping centre next door, to emerge unexpectedly from the back of the second floor at street level on the hill behind the hotel. Because we are so far up, on the 11th floor, most of the land had appeared pretty flat. Back down at the river bank, we walk the promenade, taking photos of the numerous cross-river ferries. These have a steering oar aft, a small petrol engine, and two oars forward, arranged for standing rowing, and used to manoeuvre close to the jetties. The steering oar is operated from forward by a long bamboo pole strapped to the gunwhale outside the boat.


The town is quite interesting, but not exotic. Reminiscent of a lot of tropical port cities, but quite clean and tidy, with stone and concrete seawalls, substantial handrails and landscaped foreshores. In the commercial centre there is a fruit, vegetable and fish market, with a wide range of goods, and unusually presented spices, in paste, rather than powder form. There is not a lot of fruit, but the vegetables look good.


We talk to a travel agent, Borneo Fairyland, who had some pricey longhouse stays, then had lunch in a Chicken-Rice cafe. The food was plain, but good, with a hot sauce to give it some sting. Tried salted lime juice, which was better than expected, but not as good as sugared juice. We had a good talk to the owner, then headed for the Tourist info, where we ended up booking two nights at Bako National Park in a semi-chalet, starting Wednesday night. Go to the Museum in the afternoon (free). Have a reconstructed longhouse, and good photos of tribal people from the beginning of the 20th century. Murray not impressed with instruments for putting metal pieces into penises!
Tomorrow is a holiday as it's Malaysia's National Day. There's a concert in the park at night, but we decide not to go as there are lots of young people out on the streets in the late afternoon, and we're not sure what may happen. From our 11th floor room in the hotel we can see lots of cars and motorbikes going up and down the streets, with flags flying, and crowds of young people waving as they go by. There are fireworks at midnight. Can still hear and see lots of people in the street below even at 3am. Walking 5.5 kms
Tues 31st August Kuching
Wake to find it raining, and the streets deserted. We had read that they started cloud-seeding yesterday as they needed rain in the catchment area - why couldn't they have waited another few days! One good thing about the rain is it clears the air a bit. There have also been a lot of articles in the paper about fires in Kalimantan, which have resulted in lots of smoke over Sarawak. We can see some mountains out our windows this morning, which have not previously been visible. Rain clears later in the day. We go out for a walk, and have another chicken rice for breakfast. Pass more cat statues. Kuching means "cat" in Malay, and there are plenty of fairly kitsch cat statues around the town, most of which we photograph.
Later catch the free "tram" for tourists which takes us all around the town, a lot of which we've already walked. Get out near the bus station, and catch the 1pm bus, which takes us the 32kms (for 1. 50 RM) to the Semenggoh Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre which is famous for its orang-utans. Not supposed to be open till 2pm but when we get there at 1.30pm there is a mother orang-utan and her baby, plus a 6 year old, near the Visitor's centre, and one of the staff gives them some bananas. Only a dozen or so tourists around, so get to have a very close-up look. Dianne goes within hand-reach to have a photo taken. The mother is Delima, and is 18 years old, and came to the park when she was two, after been rescued from a cage. The older orang-utan is Anuar, her baby born in October 1998, and her newest baby Selina, was born on the 29th March this year. She looks like she's having a "bad hair day" with these funny long hairs on her head. She's also putting the fruit in her mouth and sucking on it, but appears to be doing it more in imitation of her mother, rather than actually eating it. Orang-utans are not weaned till they're 42 months old, and stay with their mothers for 5-6 years.


At present there are 20 orang-utans in this park, and 50 have gone through the program here. There are 20,000 orang-utans in Borneo and Sumatra, and about 1,000 in zoos around the world. Semenggoh was made a forest reserve in 1920, and was opened to the public in 1975.
More locals arrive (it being a public holiday), and we wander around, when suddenly we hear a loud commotion. Hurry back to where the mother and baby are, and see a local limping around. Apparently he tried to pat the mother, and she grabbed him and rolled him round the ground, and bit him on the knee. Told that she also bit someone this morning. Everyone then keeps their distance! Also a few macaque monkeys around. Follow a trail, and find a shed with about ten porcupines all huddled together sleeping. There are also some large estuarine crocodiles in cages. Now 3pm, and all follow a ranger along a path into the jungle, where there is a wooden platform set up across from the track. Also a number of ropes hanging from trees, serving the same purpose as vines. Ranger puts the fruit out, then calls out a number of names. After a few minutes we can hear crashing through the jungle, and eventually three orang-utans arrive, swinging through the tops of the trees. The last one is ENORMOUS - he's Ritchie, the father of the tiny baby. As he swings quite close to us, the sapling he was on broke, and he just managed to grab another before he fell on the ground. Watch them eating for half an hour, then Ritchie leaves, which then allows another male, who's obviously been waiting, to come and eat. We head off to catch the 4pm bus. When we get there, told that it's left early (not sure whether this is just a line, or the truth, but when it gets to 4.05 and no sign of the bus, weaken and take a minibus for 5RM each, rather than risk being left 32kms from town with no transport.
Back in town, walk to cafe opposite our hotel and have either very late lunch, or early dinner at 5pm. Back to room to rest. Out about 10pm for noodles and another banana split, and to use hotel's free internet to try and book a cheap hotel at Damai Beach. Have email from Lisa saying Wharf Restaurant is available for their wedding on the 19th March, so confirm that is OK with us. Walking 6.5 kms
Wed 1st September Kuching-Bako National Park
Check internet again, but no answer from hotel yet. Book out, have breakfast of chicken/rice on the way, and walk to bus stop in time to catch what we think is the 11am bus to Bako. Getting concerned by the time it turns up at 11.25, especially as we'd knocked back a 20 rm minibus earlier, but had had no offers since. Couple on bus say they waited one and a half hours, so glad we hadn't rushed to get the non-existent 10am bus. There is one main way out of town, same as yesterday, and we cross the river and come back opposite the town. There are a number of well-spaced monumental buildings, and landscaped roads -bit reminiscent of a planned city being built, like Canberra or Brasilia. Housing looks quite affluent, but eventually gives way to enormous timber mills and industrial projects on reclaimed wetlands. There is a steel mill and a power station. We take a leg off the highway into a more typical village area, then drive out along some large dredge pipelines to get to Bako village and the Park depot. There are two women from Denmark, and an Asian couple and us for the boat ride. The Danes have no accommodation, but someone rings ahead to check, and they decide to overnight, as it is now too late to see much and get back tonight. The boat is small, narrow and flat bottomed, with four benches and room for luggage forward. The freeboard is very low, and it could be a bit exciting in a chop. The tide is very low, and the river very muddy. There are several dredges operating, and we have to carefully cross their pipelines. We get out into open water and make good time until we touch bottom and have to find the channel again.
The park is around a headland to the north, but we have to stand well off to keep in deep water. The last couple of hundred metres we walk and pull the boat. The bottom is surprisingly firm, and it is no trouble. We are able to pull the bags for half a km across firm sand to the shore and the park HQ.
The room we get is pretty good by National Park standards, - everything very basic, no frills, but with a kitchenette, fridge, food locker and reasonably clean bathroom. It is just about lunchtime, so we check out the self-service cafeteria. Nut out the system (costs about 1 RM for each item, no matter how much of each you have), and get a quite tasty lunch for about 3 RM each. After lunch we have a quick look at the information centre. Particularly interested to find out about the Proboscis monkeys, for which this park is famous. There are about 150 in this park, and only about 1,000 in the world, all in Borneo. The male has a pendulous nose and a bulbous belly, while the females and young ones have shorter, upturned noses. The bulbous stomach helps them digest their food of leaves and fruit, and contains a lot of bacteria that enables them to break down the food, and also de-activate any poisons which allows them to eat plants that other animals can't. Decide on Telok Paku, one of the shorter walks where the Proboscis monkeys are frequently sighted, and set out along the foreshore, across the creek and across the mangrove flats on a walkway elevated about 2m above the mud. There are a few shelters along the way, and the walkway ends at a waterfall with water supply tanks and pipes.
There is a steep climb up the sandstone cliffs, over a mat of rainforest roots, then along a shelf about 50 metres up through dense forest and vines, looking down at the canopy of pandanus, palms, rainforest trees and mangroves.
We come upon another couple watching something in the bush that turns out to be a group of proboscis monkeys. They are hard to see in a tree behind other bushes, but can make out a large male, a female and one baby. We sit down to wait, but they do not come any closer.
Further along, we hear crashing in the bushes, and see a whole family group close enough to have a good look. Find them very entertaining, and VERY unusual looking. They continue parallel to the trail, and we follow quietly. They then start to cross to the other side of the trail, and it's then that they notice we're there, just below one, and we have to retreat amid a lot of vocalising and alarm calling. Further along a large group of mid-sized proboscis monkeys, probably bachelors, caught us up and were all around us. We stayed watching for a while, but they weren't as interesting as the full-grown male and the mother and baby.
The track led down to a shelter and a small beach, where the other couple had just finished a swim. Dianne paddled in her undies, but MP declined.
After we walked back and talked with the English couple (Ian and ?) who were travelling extensively, having retired and rented out their house in north London three years ago. We continued to talk at the restaurant, then carried over to the evening meal, missing the monkey video at the Info centre. There are lots of macaque monkeys all around the chalets, and the make a big nuisance of themselves by stealing food and belongings. Luckily we have no problems, but those staying in the hostel do, as the glass is missing in some of the windows. There is also a very large bearded pig that grazes on the lawn. Walking 7kms
Thurs 2nd September Bako National Park
Saved from getting up early by a very heavy rainstorm about 6am, but it clears by 9am when we set off. Decide on a big day of walking - first we'll go to the lookout at Telok Pandan Besar, then the beach at Telok Pandan Kecil., and then complete the Lintang circuit track.
Come across a big group of proboscis monkeys in a tall tree just on the edge of the camp. No-one else around, and we lie down and watch them for ages. Most entertaining.


Eventually a group of tourists comes and makes noise and frightens them, so they decide to leave, by making an enormous leap from the tree they're in, to a much lower tree on the other side of the path. They look like they sit there plucking up their courage for a while, looking at where they're about to jump to, then take a big breath and JUMP, grabbing a branch and holding on for dear life.


It is a fair climb up to the top of the sandstone escarpment, with natural stairways of exposed roots and a number of timber step ladders, with big rises between the steps.


Pretty hard on the legs. Because the terrain is about to become dry and sandy (the kerangas forest), there is a smokers stop near the top. The bush here is very much like Australian sandstone country, with leached, sandy soil, and some clay in the watercourses, which have clear, running water in them from the early morning storm. MP is still carrying the Macaque-attack preventer stick from the day before, but we leave it where we stop to photograph a particularly colourful pitcher plant, the other specialty of this park.


The pitcher plants are passive carnivores, and have even been known to catch rats. Insects are lured to the opening of the pitcher by a combination of bright colours and the promise of sweet nectar. Once inside, they lose their footing on the smooth waxy wall and plunge into the liquid below where they quickly drown and are soon digested by enzymes.


We stop for a rest and a look over the gorge at Besar, where DP hears rustling in the bushes and surprises a park ranger "fixing signage", but probably relieving himself in the bushes. It is a fair step back to the Kecil turnoff, where we run into an Italian couple walking our way.
There is a good view from the sandstone bluff over Kecil and the famous sea-stack, followed by a steep climb down through ravines to the beach and shelter. DP goes for a swim, talks to a boatman, who has good English, but no education, and is a boatman as an alternative to fishing like his father. Fishing is a lot harder work. He is fishing politely for a fare back to the park HQ. DP is not interested, but suggests the Italian couple might later. We rest for a while in the shade of boulders, then move to the shelter, which is in fair condition, but has been undermined, and slopes about one in ten toward the sea, making sleeping on the seats difficult. The English couple turns up, and takes the boat back with the Italians for 5R each. We find out later that they were given a good tour of the coastline on the way back. We decided to persevere, and when a bit of the sting had gone out of the sun, and it looked like clouding over, we set off, with DP walking in swimmers for most of the climb back to the plateau.
We remembered a few of our old tricks and doused hats and shirts in the clear water in the watercourses to take some sting out of the heat, and lay down for a rest in the shelter at the top of the climb, back near the main track. The maps and signs were pretty good, but the walking times seemed a bit strange, as it showed only 45 min back the way we had come, and yet it seemed to be a reasonable fraction of the whole walk. DP is feeling pretty puffed, but we decide to carry on, and find the next reference point on the map sooner than we expect, but the next is a long way off, and the track is like a roller coaster, mainly up. The bush is pretty scrubby along the top, but gets more like rainforest as we turn the corner and head down toward the HQ, on terraces in the sandstone, with cracks in the rocks which go down out of site, and springy root bridges over them.
We get another nasty surprise when we get to the second last turnoff and the sign shows another hour to go. There is a good lookout over the coast, and we can see we are still a long way up. We descend through giant boulders on a series of staircases, then have to detour to a scramble down roots and loose earth beside the electricity cable, which is run in steel pipe. The reason for the detour becomes plain when we see a smashed staircase with a large tree along it. Fortunately, the time sign was wrong, and we arrive at a long broadwalk, which leads into the park HQ. There is a welcoming group of monkeys on the boardwalk, so we get a second stick and prepare for battle, but the monkeys are surprisingly timid, and move off the track well before we get to them. These may have been the third species, Silver Leaf Monkeys, but we assumed they were macaques, and didn't look too closely at them.
We have nearly run out of water, and glad we had the foresight to buy drinks and make ice, so we could change out of our wet gear and take our drinks and ice across to the canteen and take it easy before tea. We talked to the English couple, plus a pleasant young Englishman, and a Dutchman who was keen on birds, but not a twitcher, and had been most places, particularly Indonesia, where he recommended diving on a small island off Sulawesi (can't remember its name, but think it started with an "M"). He offered to buy beers all round, but the others had had plenty, and we were OK with coke.
After another good meal, with the curry a bit too hot for DP, we went to see the movie, made by a German couple back in the '80s, possibly about monkeys in this park, but certainly in mangrove country, which they claimed as the main Proboscis habitat, although markers left by park staff indicated sightings all over the park. They filled in a fair bit of the program with other wildlife such as crabs, sand lobsters, slow loris and wild cats.
We called in at the canteen, arranged to share a boat in the morning and hit the sack. A lot of school kids next door were still active late at night, but we got to sleep OK. Walking 11.6 kms (LOTS of up and down)
Friday 3rd September 2004 Bako-Damai Beach
Muesli breakfast, pack and meet at the canteen about 8.30 to book a boat through the office. Get a boat number and a time. Walk to the beach when a boat appears around the point, but he goes all the way up to the creek and jetty, so we have to re-check at the office where we should be picked up, and tow our bags up to the creek. No sign of our monkeys from the day before but our boat, #24, with no number on it (might be a generic number) turns up and we head out. The tide is reasonably high, so we can shortcut the point and make good time up the river past the dredges without slowing down, and get to shore before 10am
We are pointed at the bus stop, and wait on the wrong side of the road at a bus station. A minibus driver makes us a R5 offer which we can't resist, and we make good time until we hit the traffic around the maidan. We drop the English couple off at the Borneo Hotel and continue on to the Holiday Inn. The driver, who is the same one who offered us a Rm10 trip out, drops us outside, and we go in to check our Damai booking. The desk lets us use the internet, and we find our booking has been cancelled, so enquire about rooms in town and out at damai. They can do a weekend rate of R145 in town, or R175 at Damai lagoon, and we take the latter.
We decide against booking the 12.15 shuttle, but leave our bags and hotfoot it into town to find the Ferry office, to make a booking for when we return. On the way we see jetski racing as part of the regatta, find that we don't have to book the ferry, and get back to our round restaurant for mee hoon and banana split before getting the 12.15 shuttle, which turns out to be as many mini-buses or cars as they need, so no problem with missing out. The trip is comfortable, if a bit cold, and gets us to the Damai Lagoon Holiday Inn by about 1.15pm, late enough for us to check in for 2 PM.
Due to wrong instructions, a shocking hotel layout plan and poor signage, and our reluctance to involve a bellboy, we see a fair bit of the hotel before we finally find our room. The "small" room is enormous, with two 3/4 beds, a balcony, fridge and TV. We settle in, then out to look at the Sarawak Cultural Village so we won't miss the dance show at 4.15. We buy our tickets at the hotel for R42 instead of R45, and at the gate we are given a souvenir passport to get stamped in each of the ethnic areas. The long house examples they have are quite large and airy, and architecturally sophisticated, possibly a lot more so than the real McCoy, and have thatch roofs and virtually all timber construction. Most houses have some sort of musical show, fairly brief, a preview of the show. One local instrument, like a solid wood guitar is quite loud, but it turns out to be an electric local guitar.
The nomadic Penan, or Orang Ulu (upriver) types have a blow-gun range, three goes for one ringgit, and Dianne manages to hit the pig two out of three times. Next was a jungle blacksmith's forge, with a display of well-made tools and knives. The old man running it was making a t-shaped handle, but stopped to demonstrate the home made forge blower, twin vertical cylinders of bamboo, with the pistons operated by rods connected to overhead wooden slat springs to counterbalance them. It seemed to work pretty well, although he had a more modern, but still antique, rotary fan blower as well.
The Melanu, or coastal people have a sago-palm based diet, with the once wild palms now cultivated. There is a big, fat sago palm beside the tall house, and a processing plant with a clay drying pan oven, rasps for powdering the amazingly woody palm sections, and mats for pelletising the nearly dry cake. We were offered sweetened sago flakes, and were pleasantly surprised by the taste.
The Chinese farmhouse was quite large for a single family dwelling, with stamped earth floors, whitewashed walls, and a good collection of artifacts including mechanised winnowers and huskers for pepper, which starts black, and becomes white if washed.
Before going into the theatre, DP ordered a large ABC drink (after they explained what it was), with sugar water, sweetened condensed milk, various lumpy condiments, including corn, green worm-shaped something, sago balls, and topped with shaved ice. It was definitely "interesting", and managed to drink most of it (leaving a few strange bits) before we had to leave it, as no drink was allowed in the theatre.
The dancing and singing from each ethnic group is quite good -they actually look like they are trying, unlike a lot of ethnic shows. The costumes are brilliantly coloured, and well lit. They do the dance where you jump in and out of the sticks, and the semi-naked Penan warrior puts a few darts (from the blowgun) into the roof, and one through a balloon on the far side of the stage.
After the show, DP wants to see the Holiday Inn Damai Beach, so we walk uphill, past the start of the trail which goes to the top of the mountain 810m up, and over the hill down to the hotel, which looks newer and better than ours, with a better pool, but faces the same muddy sea. We can't see how we can get a free shuttle, so trudge back up the hill and back to our room, where we recover then get into our swimmers, collect our pool towel with our voucher, sign our life away and try the pool. It is cool at first, then we get used to it and find it chilly out, when we cross over to the lower pool with the waterfall. The waterfall is strong enough to give an inexperienced swimmer a hard time. Back in the main pool, we do a couple of training laps then Murray reads the paper while Dianne tries the inside spa, after once again signing her life away. Then try and find our way back to our room through the labyrinth. We front down for dinner at about 8 - find it pretty deserted. Order spring rolls and nasi goreng, but a better looking meal belonging to a couple we nearly shared the shuttle with, is accidentally delivered to our table. Find out it is called Kway Teow noodles, and DP, who, naturally enough, is still hungry after her spring rolls, orders this and a Pineapple Coconut pie as well (total bill, with two cokes is 54 RM). Have to leave some of it. Back to the room via the internet room. DP internets while MP off to watch TV and catch up on papers and travel research. Dianne gets very little sleep, as the mattresses, like the rest of the place, are showing their age, and are a bit saggy in the middle. Ends up sleeping on the floor in the early hours. So much for 4 star hotels! We're now ready to go back to our usual one star or less. Decide we don't need to stay here any longer - OK, but nothing special. Walking 12.5 kms (a lot of which was finding our way around this badly designed hotel!)
Saturday 4th September Damai- Kuching-Sibu
. Have a violent thunderstorm in the early morning, but has cleared up by 7.30
Go out for our included breakfast at 8.00, and line up transport. Murray gets lost in the labyrinth again. Buffet breakfast, not too bad. Toaster is another disaster, no local coffee, crook fruit juice, but still manage to eat too much. We continue to urge at the reception until the travel desk girl shows up, as seem to be a lot of people waiting. Dianne onto internet, but shuttle arrives early, so doesn't get to check our bankcard records, which wouldn't come up last night.
Takes a while to fill, with some shuffling of passengers, then calls into Damai Beach, where they discuss passengers, but don't pick any up, then out to the Country Club, past a flash golf course to pick up our last passenger.
In town, we get stuck in traffic around the maidan, where women's groups are parading, as part of a festival (get some photos). Dropped off at Holiday Inn. DP to Chartered Bank for ATM, MP with bags to bus stop. Get a couple of photos of the regatta being held on the river.
We're now heading up the Rejang River, the main artery of trade with the interior of Sarawak. We're hoping to see some of the longhouses of the Iban and other tribes.
Bus 1A turns up - a new-type bus with sealed windows, and non-functioning air-conditioning, which makes for a very hot 6km trip. Not sure if it is the right bus, but seems to be going in the right direction. Don't get too much indication from the driver when we ask, but a bloke in the next seat tells us when to get off and which way to go.
We have seen something which looks like a jetty, and further advice from a local woman puts us on the right track. It is not much of a terminal, but there are some stalls, a shelter, some people waiting and some signs advertising ferries, so we figure we are in the right place, but a bit early at 10.30 for a 12.45 ferry, so set up camp, do diary and fill in time.
The crowd swells, uniformed staff turn up, and boxes and crates go down to the pontoon, so we figure it is time to get close to the gangplank, as we have no idea how big the boat is. There are some queue jumpers who are sent to the back, and others who push forward through the people coming off, but we manage to get in with the first wave, and set up in a row of four seats with our bags to wait for the dust to settle, and maybe get upstairs. When it becomes clear that the boat will not fill up, we hang on to the 4 seats, and go upstairs to watch the river as we leave Kuching.
The town recedes rapidly, but we are going the same way as the bus to Bako, so see the steel mill and power station plus the bulk of the National park peninsular on the way out. The shipping channel is marked by buoys for miles out at sea before we can turn east and head out of site of the low coastline. There are heaps of small fishing boats in close, and larger trawlers further out, but it takes at least an hour to get to reasonably clear water. The boat has twin diesels, probably V12's and gets along pretty well. With a slight headwind, it is difficult to look directly ahead, and certainly not for hat wearers.
Heading back inshore, the mouth of the river is several kms wide, but settles into a defined channel up to a km wide, with low, muddy banks and a metre or two of sloping mud from the mangroves to the water. Further inshore, most of the vegetation looks like oil palms, with a few high trees scattered. There are ships loading timber from barges, mills on the shore, and, further up, rafts of logs stranded on the shore, and stacks of logs piled at right angles to the river. We stop for passengers and to drop off an envelope at a timber mill landing. We pass clamshell dredges recovering gravel and sand, timber and cargo boats, and barges with timber or gravel. We start to see a lot of the long, skinny ferries that look like wingless aircraft, both on the river, or dead on the bank. There are a number of shipyards building these ferries, larger ferries and tugs.


There is a large town, which we think is Sibu, but it is Sarikei, which looks pretty modern, and has a large ferry terminal. We pass another new town, but don't stop. At one point we get into a narrow channel, maybe 100m wide, which opens out onto the main river, which is at least a km wide. At another, we do a very wide loop to port to avoid the middle ground before taking the starboard channel, where there is a marker saying 15 miles to Sibu. There are lots of timber mills and loading yards all the way into Sibu (which is 60kms upstream from the sea), where we pull in at the flash, new ferry terminal. We notice a large jet powered ferry with a Kapit destination. This is well up the river, and the jet can probably handle low water conditions. There seem to be plenty of ferry departures, so we head along the waterfront toward the Hoover House hostel, but find it full, so get the last room at the Villa Hotel, in the centre of town. We're now back to "one star if lucky" for 40 RM, which includes very sparse furnishings, but clean, with air-conditioning, local TV, and own bathroom, and what was a big surprise, hot water.
We now haven't eaten seriously since breakfast, so head out looking for the food stalls near the covered market, but walk right through the general section without seeing the food, through the closing general market all the way to the ferry terminal before heading back to find the food.
Unfortunately, although it looks really good, there is no seating and everyone seems to be buying take-home food, or eating standing up, and after a very long day in the hot sun (and after practically no sleep for Dianne), the one thing we want is to sit down, so we head back past our hotel to the north of town, and find a concentration of suitable cafes around the recommended Ga Ho. We get 3 fruit drinks and coffee for about 6RM, and two noodle dishes for 4, which is pretty cheap eating. Have a short walk around the town, which has a good feel, with plenty of activity going on, then head back for an early night, with Murray watching local TV. Dianne collapses into bed about 8.30pm, and ends up sleeping through to morning, a world record for her)