Early in the morning we were picked up and delighted to find that we were the only two people on our tour!! We took a boat trip to one of the three islands within the Turtle Islands Park.
The day was spent relaxing and exploring the island, with all the fun to come in the evening. Before dinner we took a look at the exhibition centre and watched a DVD which helped us to understand the programme better. After dinner we all had to wait outside until the first mother turtle came ashore to lay her eggs. Hearing the words 'Turtle Time' everyone rushed to where the ranger was on the beach. We were first to the scene as the Saga tour hobbled along behind, many aided by walking sticks! When we arrived the mother turtle had already dug her body pit and hole for the eggs an begun laying her eggs. It was very interesting to watch and she laid 71 eggs in total before resting for a few hours. We then watched the ranger transplant the eggs into the hatchery before releasing some hatchlings into the sea. This was an incredible sight as the newly born baby turtles ran helplessly to the sea by instinct.
The following morning we took a boat back to mainland and headed to Sepilok Orang-utan rehabilitation centre. Here we watched another video about the programme there before heading to the viewing platform which overlooked the feeding platform.
To begin with there were about 4 smaller orang-utans happily eating away. Then the big dominant male with large cheek flaps appeared. Apparently he is a rare sight and our tour guide had only seen him twice in four years. His arrival to the feeding platform quickly resulted in the other orang-utans leaving. We were luckily enough to get up pretty close to some of them as they walked along the edges of the board walk. Unfortunately though some people did not listen to the warnings and one man got a little too close. This resulted in the orang-utan enveloping him and trying to obtain some sexual gratification (by shoving his genitalia in the mans face). This was all amusing until the orang-utan refused to let go of the man and started becoming aggressive. Everyone was quickly ushered behind the gate however ourselves and a few others did not quite make it in time and ended up trapped at a dead end for a rather scary 5 minutes as the ranger tried to get him to go away. All in all it was an interesting experience!! From here we headed up to Bilit Rainforest Lodge, where we would be spending the night, and went on an evening river cruise. Whilst on this we saw maccaque monkeys (with the long tails), proscerus monkeys (with the long noses), orang-utans (a rare sight!), monitor lizard, viper, king fishers, hawk bills and white herons.
For our final day in Borneo we firstly visited the G caves which are where thousands of swiftlets live and build both black and white nests using their saliva and droppings. The white ones are used in the Chinese birds best soup! The caves were interesting but smelt horrifically of guano and were covered in cockroaches....we didn't stay there long! For lunch we headed to the English Tea Rooms perched on the top of a hill overlooking Sandakan city. This is the poshest meal we have had and enjoyed home comforts of fish cakes and chicken, bacon, mash and gravy. As our first English meal in over 2 months, they were heavenly!!
To end our tour we visited the water village, a Chinese Buddhist temple and took a look round the local market.
From Borneo we flew back to Kuala Lumpur where we spent 2 days visiting the local sights. On the first day these included Batu Caves, Merdeka Square, Central Market, National Mosque, National Monument, Islanic Arts Museum, Botanical Gardens, Chinatown and finally the fountain show outside the Patronas towers.
After walking miles the first day, we decided to get the hop-on-hop-off bus round the city the second day. Our first point of call was to see the Patronas Towers in the daylight and wander round the surrounding gardens. From here we headed to the KL Tower which gave us some awesome views of the city from 186m up! This was an I retesting experience as Em doesn't like lifts and James is petrified of heights - a great combination!! But we made it up there and it was definitely worth it! From here we jumped back on the bus to the butterfly park before heading to the station for our overnight train to Singapore.
Our time in Singapore was also limited to 2 days but we managed to squeeze a lot into this time. We started off by heading out to the Bird Park, followed by the botanical gardens and Orchard Road. Orchard Road is the Oxford Street of Singapore and this was our first sighting of true Christmas decorations and we even heard a number of Christmas songs!! Although we still don't feel like its almost Christmas at all. Following a walk down this road we decided to go and splash out on a Singapore Sling from Raffles. This hotel is just awesome as was the cocktail! And throwing peanut shells all over the floor just added to the experience. Our next stop was the Singapore Flyer which provided excellent views over the city and after much persuasion James actually stood up!! From here we headed back through Chinatown night market to our 12 bed dorm.
The following morning we ventured over to Underwater world on Sentosa island. This was good but not quite as good as we were expecting. The island is basically an array of theme parks where one could quite happily spend a few days if you have sufficient funds. Our next stop was Little India which is completely different to the rest of Singapore and smells so good everywhere! Back to Chinatown and we took a look round the Buddha Tooth Relic temple which was very impressive with lots of gold everywhere! That evening we decided to defy our age an visit the night safari. This was awesome and exceeded a expectations - definitely worth it! This ended our time in Singapore on a high before we flew across to Bali the following morning.
On arrival to our hostel we had the pleasant surprise of our 4th free upgrade of the trip from a standard to a deluxe room. However, Bali was not what we were expecting. For the first time all trip we may have chosen the wrong area to stay in. Where we are staying is like the Australian's version of Ibiza and considering the Aussie schools have just broken up the place is crawling with 18 - 21 year old Aussies!! This made James in particular feel quite old!! This area is more suited to surfers and is probably the worst beach we've been to but that's not really saying much as it's still pretty nice. Bali is also the hottest place we have been to so far! We spent out first day lazing on the beach trying to top up our tans. The following day we decided to take a trip to a couple of the temples including Tanah Lot which is on a rock in the middle of the sea, only accessible at low tide. We also visited Gitgit waterfall which was pretty awesome and a Bali coffee production plant.
The following day was our day for diving!! We headed across to Tulamben, where the US Liberty ship was sunk by a Japanese torpedo in the 1940's. This dive site was amazing 0 literally crawling with marine life, from small nemo fish to larger puffer, trigger and snapper fish. After lunch we headed out to the marine wall and coral garden, again which were very impressive although not quite as impressive as the wreck dive. Our final day in Bali was spent lazing on the beach again before our flight via Singapore to Perth!!!!!
We think you have enough facts about Southeast Asia to have both kept you entertained and also prepare you for a trip here if you decide to (which you should)! So the feature of this blog post is ways in which we have turned into 'gap year tragedies' over the last few months:
- Our collection of bracelets is accumulating rapidly!
- We have a large selection of tourist t-shirts.
- James has started wearing wife beaters.
- We have accepted the fact that our feet will never be clean again.
- We have some pretty funky tan lines.
- We have become artists at packing our bags quickly and efficiently, to the point were our walking boots sometimes fit in!!!
- Our bartering skills have improved significantly (with our latest purchase starting at 900,000rp and finishing at 260,000tp)
- We have a large collection of DVDs that we are not sure when we'll be able to watch!
- We love a good fruit shake.
- We care less and less about the places where we eat - cost is more important!
- We can handle spicy food.....ish!
- We are being as cheap as possible to the point where Em cut James' hair.
Next time you hear from us we'll be in Australia and it'll almost be Christmas!!!!
Take care and try to avoid the floods!!
x x x
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