Long time, no write (infact, i think that may have been the longest i'vre not been on the internet since we got it at home! :o )
A quick update from the jungle for you. I'm in Lahad Datu atm (closest town to project site - a couple of hours in 4x4 and a 3 hour trek...) because we've just come back from our trek, whih was absolutely awesome!!!!! All you need to is put Maliau Basin or maliau Falls into google and it will tell you how indescribably beautiful it is - well, that's where we've just done our week long trek - time out from the actually project.
It was quite a trek to get there - well over 12 hours in 4x4s, but largely because of the state of the 'roads'. The first 5 hours were decent, but there after you go onto logging roads, which are absolutely massive, but muddy and full of holes and ditches from the massive trucks that drive along them. Infact, the trek aside, the drive in was a real eye-opener. For anyone that's not familar with the geography of Borneo (...) the Maliau Basin is an uninhabited area of primary rainforest, that, as yet, has not been logged because it has huge ridges that the trucks cannot really get over- if you look at a satallite image, you'll see what i mean. But atm, they are logging right up to the very edge of the basin. You can look at pictures of logging and deforestation of the rainforest in textbooks or in the news all you like, but until you drive through it for hour after hour (literally) you just can't even begin to understad the complete devastation it causes. It's absolutely colossal what they're doing, and completely heart breaking. And this is just compounded by the fact that the remainder of our drive (and, infact, the drive into project as well) was spent driving through hours of palm oil plantations - all of which is planted on deforested land - and it's all you can see as far as the eye can see. It's just so sad, what they're doing/have don to their country.
Anywayz, rant over - i'm sure i'll fill you all in at great length when i get back - i could go on about it for hours, it's just so awful.
Back to the rainforest. As i said, just come back off trek, and it was the most awesome week so far! The first day, with all our bags and food, was sooooo hard and entirely uphill all the way - to the extent that we had to pull ourselves up ropes for a bit of it... but the first campsite was brilliant and had a beautiful river to wash/play in. It also didn't have mud - you have noooooo idea how happy that made me. More about mud later. That evening we saw a civet, watching us - although, it could, possibly have been a killer bunny rabbit - who knows? We also had a days food stolen by either a monkey, or a wild boar, or maye a bear - we're not sure. But my vote goes with beart since it broke a full size caribeener (sp?) and ripped the rucksack handle off the hammock...
Second day was basically 'scrambling' and thus was extremely fun. The last hill (the route, once agaoin beoing unceasingly uphill) nearly killed me, ad there were some ladders at the top that must have been built by giants, i almost couldn't reach the next rungs, but it was sooooooooooo worth it, as it leadd to what has to be one of the best view points in the entirew world!!! How many people can say that they've stood on top of a peak surounded 360* as far as the eye can see by primary rainforest?? Best.View.Ever.
Next day we went to maliau falls which is a huuuuge 7 tiered waterfall, and i must say that although there are bigger waterfalls in the world - they lack the location :D
The rest of the trek was very cool, but with few sites - although we did see a 'squirral' the size of a good sized dog.... scary....
But enough with the trek - what else have i done? hmm...
Well, after last email i went and met up with the group - all of whom are v cool - it's a lovely gropup and we all get on really well. Then we had a couple of days in a youth hostel, with the nicest olypic style semi-open-air swimming pool ever, ad had lessons on foirst aid abd kit etc. The a couple of days at Kiulu adventure centre and as few more in the jungle across the river soing such exciting things as river crossings, fire lighting, shelter building and jungle navigation (i ca now proficiently orientier in jungle where there's only 10m visability :D ) I also have a very sharp machete, after hours of work at it, so hink very carefully before you argue with me ;o) Don't know how i ever lived without a machete, v useful tool. hmm...
After that we headed for our project site in Tabin - a v pretty conservation area, with monkeys, and, bizarrely, giant tortoises... and elephants too, but i've yet to see an actually living one, only the evidence that they've been there... ;o)
The project is really cool. We're basically putting in the infrastructure for an orang-utan release and research site - it's like a non-tourist version of Sepilok, if any of you have heard about the centre there.
And we'll get to visit there at the end of our trip, which is ace, because i didn't think i'd be able to fit it in and it would seem silly to come all this way and not go. Also - did any of you watch, or know about, Survivor - where they dumped people on that tropical island - well, that's where we're having our finally party at the end of project :D :D :D hehe.... it's gona be sooooooo cool.
However, only bad thing about the prject is that we've been having freak weather and when we foirst got here it didn't stop rain for a week - literally... and i'll have none of this - 'but you're in the "rain"forest' rubbish, because it;s NOT supposed to rain that much (*there's been floods and evacuatios etc in thew surrounding areas) and as a result our camp is currently almost knee deep in mud - lovely - and half the team has trench fooot - which is actually not as bad as you might think, but it's a bit weird watching your foot start to disintergrate! I managed to get it on our first day of trek, and now have had sufficient dry weather to get rid of it (the weather in Maliau wasd ace!), only to return to the muddy wallow and make my feet all wet again... hohum... apparently it;'s dried out a lot in the last week and we'rte making a platform area for our admin site, so a;ll is good.
Must go now, time is short, must get back to the jungle!!!!
11 years ago
