11-28-19 - Bako National Park
/Day 165. Kyle & Leanne joint blog.
Today we head out to Bako National Park, Malaysia’s oldest national park. We have hired a guide for the trip as the park is somewhat far away, involves hiking and is complicated to navigate. We meet the guide at the hotel and pile in the van. He introduces himself and tells us that we are very lucky because the driver is also a guide so we are getting two guides for the price of one. “Very lucky,” the driver guide concurs.
We drive about 35 minutes to the place where have to get a speed boat to take us out the part of the park we will be hiking. It’s not even a sure thing you’ll make it to and from Bako as you can only access via boat during the decent weather conditions. Today is a medium risk of extreme monsoon weather. November is the beginning of monsoon season in Malaysia so we hope the beautiful blue skies continue all day ensuring our return boat trip actually happens. Else we guess we’ll have to camp out there unexpectedly. The scouts would love that but Ashley, well not so much. Hmm?
As we wait by the boat ramp to the river, I ask the guide if there are crocodiles in the river. “Oh yes, absolutely,” he says pointing to a sign right above the kids’ heads. Sure enough, there is a sign that says “DANGER, Beware of Crocodiles” in both Malay and English with a picture of a massive crocodile. “Ummm, kids, move back from the water about a 1,000 feet,” Kyle says not wanting to take any chances.
When the boat arrives, it is not a large as Kyle had hoped; more like a large paddle boat with a motor. “It would seem that the crocodile would be much bigger than the boat, isn’t this a problem if we’re going into crocodile infested waters?” Kyle asks seriously. He then proceeds to share that there was a young local boy eaten by a crocodile too while swimming not too long ago. “Maybe we get lucky and not see crocodile today, huh?” the guide responds humorously. The driver / guide says, “yes, very lucky” in agreement. Kyle has flashbacks to the orangutans where everyone said you had to get really lucky to the see the orangutans and low and behold, we did. If our lucks holds, we will definitely run into a crocodile.
We split into two boats praying that the crocodiles have already eaten another tourist before us and thus will not be hungry enough to pursue us. We navigate out of the river into the open waters and enjoy the beautiful day. No rain or monsoons so far, nothing but beautiful sunshine. We pause to turn in and navigate huge rock formations jutting out of the sea into the sky. The guide is explaining how this rock formation looks like a giant snake, and this one looks like a turtle, and this one looks like a dolphin. As much as Kyle stretches his imagination, he still sees nothing but rocks. Granted they are cool looking, big impressive rocks, but Kyle can’t help but wonder if the guide was smoking a little of the good stuff when he says that the rocks looks like all these cool animals.
The boats pull up on a deserted beach and we scamper onto the shore. At the back of the beach is the entrance to the hiking trail and Kyle spots a huge wild boar (actual name is the Bornean Bearded Pig). As the walk back towards the path, the boar looks at us with an uninterested look and continues picking through the trash washed up on the beach looking for his next meal. We are able to walk right up to the boar to get some good close-up pictures and selfies.
As we start down the trailhead, we approach a sign that says “Beware of Wild Animals Attacks”. Our guide nonchalantly shares that they just installed those signs because a few months ago, a kid got mauled by a wild boar when he got too close to the boar in a botched feeding attempt. “Yes, be very careful,” the driver / guide adds. Geez…one would think the guides would have thought to say something when we were posing right next to the boar for pictures. I don’t know, something like “you might not want to get that close; the boars like to maul kids.”
For good measure, the guide casually mentions that we also need to watch out for bears which roam the mountain. “But, don’t worry, I’ve never seen any bears during my trekking,” he adds. “Yes, no worries,” the driver / guide adds.
Borneo lays claims to some of the world’s largest and deadliest snakes. Leanne asks him if there are venomous snakes on the trail and if anyone ever gets bitten. He responds that yes, there are definitely snakes but people usually don’t get bitten. “Usually? How often is usually?” Kyle wants to know. “No worries, you are with me today!” he responds. The guide seems to have little concern for the dangers of the Bornean jungle and is not inspiring confidence that he can keep us out of harm’s way.
We haven’t walked but 25 meters when the guide points to a plant leaf and says “watch out for this one, it is very poisonous, if you touch and rub your eye, you will go blind.” “Yes, watch out,” the driver-guide concurs. The problem is it looks like every other plant leaf in the jungle. Ashley goes into full melt-down mode as she is convinced she has already touched one, rubbed her eye and is fast on her way to blindness. Leanne is trying to calm Ashley down when Ashley wails “we just got here and already we know that a local was eaten by a crocodile, a kid was mauled by a board, we are likely to get bitten by a venomous snake or eaten by a bear and now I’m going blind! You really don’t like your kids do you!” she wailed. Have to admit she has a point.
To visit Bako National Park certainly isn’t like visiting Yosemite. At Yosemite, it’s a well-oiled machine with a daily activity schedule, cemented walking paths and open air buses taking you through the beautiful scenery. This park is refreshingly quite the opposite as long as we can stay alive. Here, we are going all-natural as we hike on a skinny dirt path over exposed tree roots that serve as our steps and other roots serve our climbing ropes. The jungle that makes us perspire fiercely as me ascend the mountain, we feel like Indiana Jones in a hot yoga class.
And, given its monsoon season, there’s not another tourist anywhere around so far— it’s like we have the whole park to ourselves today. Which can be a good thing but on the other hand if we are mauled by bears or bitten and chocked by venomous snakes, there won’t be anyone to find our bodies.
At a rest stop overlooking the beach, the guide breaks off a twig and tells us that it is ginseng, an herb to make you more manly but he warns giving it to Kyle to chew that it has a bitter taste. “Yes, very bitter,” the guide-driver concurs. By this time, we’ve ascertained that the only time the driver-guide talks is to re-confirm that whatever the actual guide is saying is “very” true. “Very lucky,” “very dangerous”, “be very careful,” “very bitter.” You get the picture. At least he wasn’t the primary guide.
On this hike, we are looking for three types of Borneo’s indigenous monkeys in the wild, including the long-nosed proboscis monkey that clearly inspired whoever actually invented the modern-day clown. But, two hours in, no luck yet. We finish our sweaty, intense morning jungle hike where we climbed up boulders, used tree roots as climbing vines and nearly slipped on a log up 25 feet from the ground without spotting any wild mammals. Either the group’s collective griping or our combined offensive sweaty scent kept the monkeys at bay. We can’t go back with only seeing a bearded pig!
As we approach the park center, we finally see our first monkeys, the infamous proboscis monkeys no less. The only issue is that these monkeys — unlike other monkey encounters we have had — play, eat and live at tree canopy level. Where they are supposed to be, of course. So you have to keep stretching your neck to avoid it locking it into an uncomfortable position. But at least we are optimistically looking up.
We stop at the park’s center for a long lunch and finally run into a handful of other tourists. Nice to know there is other potential prey for the wild animals today. A competition we hope not to win. Our guides have assessed our group isn’t “super-hike-ey” so they give us a full 1.5 hours for a lunch that takes about 20 minutes max. The boys head out to the huge empty beach that housed thousands of large sand crabs and several hermit crabs. But we see more plastic pollution unfortunately washed up by the ocean waves. We request trash bags and plastic gloves from the info desk; much to this park’s credit they encourage and enable volunteers to clean the beach. The teens go to work.
Leanne finds a shady hammock facing the beach to melt in while Kyle sneaks around the trees lining the beach in full-on monkey scouting mode. Despite having two guides assigned to us today, Kyle spots a family of silver leaf monkeys before the guides. There are about 20 monkeys so it’s either one really big family or several families co-habitating. Kyle excitedly come running back to get us.
I guess our family plus the two guides is enough to attack the monkey’s attention. After a little while, the monkeys start to descend to the lower branches. They start squawking and screeching at us as they make their way down towards where we are standing on the beach. It seems like full-blown monkey intimidation in effect and it works as we decide we’ve seen enough to not risk being attacked by pissed off monkeys.
Our afternoon jungle trek is a notably shorter trail where we see catfish living in a golden pond made golden by certain minerals in the rocks. We learn about rattan plants used for roofing, furniture and medicines, ginseng and a porcupine looking fruit. We even found the type of curled tree trunk that Tarzan used to swing on in the 1950s jungle movies - and of course we took a try at our best Jane and Tarzan.
At the end of the hike, we are still in search of the third kind of monkey, the macaque monkey. At last, as we near the end, success! We find another monkey clan who are right above us maybe 50 feet high at the canopy. Only problem is they are throwing down their tropical fruit leftovers making it feel they are hurling them at us. Plop, smack, crack. The first group of monkeys felt like an impending attack whereas this one felt like we were actually under attack. Not sure if it’s in the water, but Bako National Park appears to have some monkeys with a tourist anger management problem. Having checked off all three monkey boxes, we scoot out of there before a well-thrown coconut cracks one of our skulls.
Low and behold, we soon come across another warning sign, “Beware of Falling Coconuts”, which is apparently another tourist occupational hazard. I guess that sounds better than “Pissed-off monkeys may hurl coconuts at you most likely resulting in your untimely death”. Yes, we agree that falling sounds better if you don’t want your tourism industry to evaporate.
After finding the beach again, we speedboat back to the jetty viewing the local fishermen standing on the shallow sandbar or wading in their boats. Bamboo racks used to hold the fish nets line the sides of this inlet, a simple and sustainable way to catch fish we suppose. The sunlight basks the boat’s hull and keeps us warm but not overly so. The boat’s breeze is welcomed as we zoom along back to the jetty at breakneck pace. Who knew this boat could go so fast?
What a great day of adventure... injury-free! And no need for a sign to memorialize our day. Thank goodness. At the dock, our guide offers us freshly-made coconut water, which thrilled Corey since he literally just mentioned that a nice cool glass of coconut water “sounded great right now”.
Back at the hotel, we find John who opted to study instead today. He has a slight temperature so we offer him some medicine. Keeping seven healthy has been a challenge on the road but at least we’ve only logged one hospital visit.
Later, we head back to James Brooke Cafe and Bistro for our riverfront Thanksgiving dinner that didn’t resemble anything the Pilgrims would have enjoyed. Butter chicken, curry, pork ribs and banana fritters. Despite two concierges helping us, we failed to find a restaurant serving a turkey dinner in Kuching.
We end the day at the same restaurant that Kyle and Leanne went to for date night. Good food, outdoor tables and view of the water and light show. It does not disappoint. Several of us watch the 15-minute colorful light and water show on the river edge in front of the majestic State Parliament building. It’s a nightly show we’ve now seen three times.
When the bill comes, Kyle takes out his credit card and the waiter frowns and says cash only. Since we are leaving tomorrow, we didn’t anticipate this cash expense when we took out money earlier today. Kyle does not have enough cash but is convinced he paid with a credit card the other night. The waiter returns with the manager who speaks better English. The manager says that it’s not possible that Kyle paid with credit card because the restaurant does not even own a credit card machine. Kyle realizes that the manager can’t be wrong. Noticing our disappointed and tired faces, the restaurant manager offers to drive us to the nearest ATM, which certainly seemed beyond the call of duty. Another act of kindness we would have never expected.
After we are all paid up, Kyle and Leanne take their final stroll down the colorful lighted riverfront of Kuching. The teens bolted back to hotel well ahead of us, as getting caught too close might cramp their style here in Kuching, Malaysia.
This city is perhaps the chill-est city yet we have visited - hardly a honk heard, uncrowded, and peaceful as a lamb. There’s friendly stray cats running all over town keeping the place purring along. People seem to live in harmony despite diverse cultures and differences; in fact, multi-culturalism here is celebrated.
“I don’t want to leave!” insists Leanne on the stroll.
“Now Leanne, you say that every place we go,” reminds Kyle.
Alas, it is true. Now 29 countries into this trek and every country is somehow incredulous, unbelievable and unique. We always feel like we’ve seen it all yet yearn for more time in each location. From food to dance to nature to people to history to religion, every country we visit unveils to us their special zest and peels back one more layer of this great big world of an onion. And that’s a good thing.
Tomorrow, we are off to Singapore, it’s a little late and we must be tired if we just referred to Earth as a root vegetable. Good night.
