We survived the jungle!After a 2+ hour road trip then a short boat transfer we arrived at our lodge. We had a decent room & the wildlife was on our doorstep. Longtailed Macaques were everywhere & the are pretty cheeky. After lunch one jumped up on the table & ran off with the sugar bowl!
The afternoon was spent moving slowly up the river in a boat looking for wildlife. We saw lots of Longtailed Macaques, Probiscus monkeys & different birds. There were ten people at the lodge & there was an interesting evening with Tiger beer & then it was time to get under the mosquito net!
Early start in the morning with five of us & the guide moving along a wider river in search of wildlife. One of the big moments was seeing a wild Orangutan! I'd kept on about us seeing one of the Pigmy elephants, that are only found in Borneo. The guide said it was very rare to see them & he hadn't seen any for two weeks. We pulled up at the riverbank & jumped off the boat ready for the jungle walk. we were looking very exotic resplendent in leech sock with t-shirts tucked into pants! Within 5m of leaving the boat the guide was signalling for total silence & then we could hear trees being ripped out - we were actually tracking an elephant. Talk about awesome - even with the guide indicating that we might have to dive behind a tree if the elephant came towards us! It was terribly hard to get photos because of the camouflage from the tree but we were only about 10m away from him. We tracked him for a while but the guide was worried for our safety & he'd been doing this job for a long time so we just carried on through the jungle. We came across numerous amounts of fresh dung & large footprints in the mud. We were covered in mud but the experience was worth it. Our next animal encounter was a monitor lizard swimming beside us.
Returning to 'camp' we went to clean up for lunch & as I started down the steps of our room I saw a snake - far too close for comfort! It disappeared over the boardwalk & I made a long leap from the steps to the boardwalk & was running along it when a twig fell from a tree - I beat the high jump record!
Another leisurely cruise down the river ended up with some people going on a night walk - Valda & I declined! The guide & one other came back to find that they had 3 - 4 leeches attached to their bodies! Staying behind then seemed like a very good decision!
Today we are back to a civilised hotel & we have clean clothes & the ability to laze around the pool.
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