Sure enough the bus turned up and we were on our way bright and early. A helpful local had warned us to try and reach the park before high tide due to the precarious nature of the boat transport required to get you there and the fact that is was the wet (read monsoon) season. We had therefore packed all our electronic gear away in our waterproof sacks. This turned out to be quite a sensible idea, but only because the heavens opened as soon as we left the protection of the bus to head to the wharf.
After signing in for the park we were assigned a boat and a driver. Ours was a nice chap who quickly drove us straight over to where a small (only a couple of metres long!) crocodile was lounging on a makeshift pontoon.
What a handsome chap. I wouldn't want him hanging around my house mind.
They always look like they've got something to smile about I reckon.
Nicely weighed down with all our stuff.
Shortly after this shot was taken the driver hit a log whilst going full tilt with his little outboard. It jammed the prop to the right and we did an almost right-angled left turn at speed. It was pretty freaky, but he apologised and we went on our way, only slightly more nervous than before. As it turned out there was almost no swell when we left the river for our first sight of the South China Sea. The route kept us well close to the shore and we arrived the park headquarters after about 30mins without a problem.
Our driver heading back to Bako village. We had arranged for him to pick us up in a couple of days time.
Telok Assam (Assam Bay), where the park headquarters were located.
The start of most of the trails left from just beyond this raised boardwalk/wharf. I have to say the construction and maintenance weren't quite up to the Kiwi standards. Some of them genuinely felt like they might give way at any moment.
A rather surly chap was on the registration desk who made sure we understood the park rules and regulations, including signing out and in when attempting any of the trails. He gave us our key and we made our way to the 'semi-detached chalet' that was to be our home for the next couple of days. It was pretty basic and rather mouldy, but perfect for our needs, and you couldn't really expect much more in the incredibly humid climate.
After trying some of the quite acceptable food in the canteen on site, we decided we would start with the 3 hours and 30 minutes Lintang trail first. Before we had even left we found some other trekkers snapping pics of couple of snakes just off the main boardwalk in the middle of the site. I think this first one is a pit viper, Borneo's only poisonous snake, but they are very docile unless provoked.
This beautiful specimen was also right in the middle of park headquarters and like the pit viper, it didn't actually move at all over the 3 days and 2 nights we were present. We entertained the idea that they were very convincing fakes, but a guide assured us that they will regularly stay in the same position for up to 2 weeks if nothing disturbs them.
A fairly constant presence around the site was the long-tailed macaque, the hoody-wearing teenager of the monkey world. We were warned to be very aware of our belongings when they were about. Door and windows had to be shut and locked as they are quite capable of getting into rooms and trashing the place. My favourite quote however was from our grumpy park ranger, who insisted 'Don't look them in the eye!'...I found this hilarious, and genuinely couldn't stop myself and as you'll find our later, we got our come-uppance.
Finally we set out on our Lintang trail, amazed with all that we had spotted just in the park headquarters. The walkways looked great as the tide had receded, revealing the muddy surface of activity below.
Clairy snapped a piccy of this gnarly tree root as we slowly made our way up the first proper hill. It was extremely hot and unbelievably humid. We were both sopping wet after the first 10 minutes. The trails were very well marked with painted colour codes on trees and signs every 100m letting you know just how slowly you were progressing.
Before we had reached the top of the first hill we both had to take a break and get some water down us. Clairy was really suffering, but we realised we were both actually hugely dehydrated after walking around Kuching for the previous couple of days, sweating buckets and hardly drinking any water at all. We hoped the measly 1.5 litres each we had bought with us would last the 3 and half (plus) hours to go.
Clairy spotted these beautiful snails on the way up.
After reaching the top of the first hill the vegetation changed completely from dense wet jungle to boiling, scrub vegetation on the sandstone plateau. Here I am a little too boiling to be photo'd.
Clairy loved the dark brown colour of the water.
It reminded her of the cans of iced lemon tea that we have become addicted to since we've been here.
The trail would repeatedly drop down into varying zones of vegetation. Here Clairy snapped this lethally spiky bamboo variety that she kept accidentally trying to grab onto to steady herself on the slippery jungle floor.
One of the more disturbing aspects of the walk was the seemingly endless noise that surrounded us that we christened the 'Dentist Drill' cicada. Here's a short vid that Clairy took.
After a little while we reached the Bukit Tambi viewpoint. Clairy took a breather while I ran up to take a few piccies.
It looks so clear and beautiful now. It doesn't seem like it could have been as outrageously sweaty and humid as it was.
On the way back down I spotted this humongous millipede and had to get
Clairy loved this foamy tarn that looked like it had gone into a tiger stripe pattern.
There were all sorts of strange sandstone formations due to tropical weathering effects.
And here's the lady admiring some.
Incredibly sweaty biatches. I took one of my legendary Barry White-style hand towels in order to mop the brow, but it was swiftly overcome by the sheer volume of moisture produced!
Shortly after the photo above was taken we suddenly realised we were surrounded by one of the main things we had come to Bako to see and we hadn't even noticed. When there was so much green around it really was difficult to pick them out, but eventually we got to recognise them all over the place. It was the carnivorous pitcher plant!
Their steep sides are coated with a slippery surface that is attractive to insects who fly down and slip into the liquid filled bowl below. They are then trapped unable to get a purchase on the sides to escape and are slowly digested by the plant for nutritious purposes...lovely stuff!
There were many different varieties. The pitcher grows directly off the end of the leaves on this particularly attractive variety.
Clair's brother Mike used to keep and eagerly feed them back in England.
Beautifully savage things.
There were lots of these gaulds on the stumpy trees in the brush vegetation sections.
'Yeah...still really hot and sweaty...not ideal times for pictures.' My t-shirt looked worse than a night out raving with Capes.
Up on the plateau again. We were loving the walk, but running very low on water. We vowed to bring at least twice the amount each tomorrow. It wasn't that the walk was even particularly hard, or long, but a trekking guide we had looked at said that the heat and humidity would make 1 mile in the tropics feel like at least 2 elsewhere, and they weren't wrong.
Pretty.
A lot of the forested sections consisted of a dense tree root path that was very slippery and required a lot of concentration to stop you from ending up on your bum.
Here we encountered another, almost as painful sounding cicada, that we named the 'Sawmill' cicada.
As we reached the final descent we got nice view down towards Telok Delima (Delima Bay).
Clairy got this nice shot of the mist rolling over the jungle.
On the desent we kept encountering vast sandstone boulders that looked geologically impossible. How on earth had they got there, barely touched by vegetation and sat in totally improbable positions. I considered it...but couldn't see the light as you might have hoped from this picture.
More strange weathering effects.
Me stomping on ahead. We wore our gators purchased in NZ initially because we thought there would be leeches (Borneo is known for being infested with them!), but a slightly superior German chap told us on the way out that we didn't need to wear them as there were no leeches present. Ignoring him, we carried on undeterred because they really are great for stopping mud getting all up our legs (that's more just me unsurprisingly). They also provide a water proof barrier covering the top of our boots, and that really helped on some of the trails which were essentially just streams.
Lush green views.
When we reached this gaping chasm we could here a loud bassy rumble from below which was an underground river engorged by the rain.
The rain was actually a blessed relief cooling us down significantly. I increased the effect, by sticking my head underneath this rocky run off.
The path was clearly marked by the red splodges, but the ladders and steps could have done with some loving.
Lovely virulent growth.
Another of Clair's friends.
We loved the look of this twisted creeper.
Some full-on 3 dimensional spirals.
And finally we reached the last bit of boardwalk.
Yet more viciously spiky bamboo on the way back.
The showers that we took on our return to our hut are probably up there with some of the most needed showers yet on our travels (and that's saying something...for me anyway). We got changed and headed out for some more tasty buffet-ness from the canteen. Whilst there we encountered our next essential wildlife spot for Bako National Park...wait for it...the bearded pig!
What a total legend this strange looking fella was. His head was absolutely enormous.
And he effortlessly poked that huge snout into the mud and pushed all the turf out the way looking for grubs. He made a right mess of the lawn in seconds.
He seemed totally fearless though and quite happily went about his business as various tourists stomped past him.
What a beast. I keep thinking that its me in animal form, but maybe its actually just my new DJ name.
No comments:
Post a Comment