borneo

we arrived in kota kinabulu in sabah, and it seemed nice. things which seemed different- a little bit cooler (quite a relief!), lot wetter, (it always seems to be raining in malaysia) and quite a lot quieter! no jeepneys, tricycles or anything like that. all normal cars- seemed a lot calmer!

spent the night there then headed off to the nearby islands of tunku abdul national park. we wanted to camp and the guy had told us that we needed to bring all our own provisions as there were no shops or anything. so imagine our surprise when we arrived to find that there were about 400 people already there, eating and drinking, there was a shop and restaurant and everything! anyway, it was really nice there, despite the crowds, and apart from the rain! we saw huge monitor lizards that came out when everyone had gone- they look like small crocs. we did get absolutely drenched though, especially on the second day so it was good to get back to the mainland to dry off. unfortnately i discovered that i'd left my brand new bikini there in the rush to get everything packed up in the rain, so we ended up having to go back the next day- didnt find my bikini (so annoying- took me so long to find a decent one, and now i have nothing to go swimming in-no such thing in malaysia, being muslim!), but we did also do another island which was really nice and much quieter so that was good.

from kk, we took the train down to tenom. its a beautiful journey, absolutely stunning hills, and jungle and it follows the river. the train actually broke a little bit on the way-the wheels on one carriage came off the rails partly (dont think they've got the best track (boom boom!) record on that line, and we ended up doing the last part of the journey on the flat open air carriage. it was really fun and quite a novelty but i have to admit i was glad to get there! tenom was a nice quiet little place up in the hills, not much to do. we headed off ther next day to tambunan, another litle town and found a nice campground to stay at. we were beside the river, with lovely views of the hills, and beside a man-made lake wih giant fish! was really nice. the first night we were there, we went over to get our dinner at a little cafe on the island on the lake. there were some malaysians and an english guy there, and they invited us to come and join them and try the rice wine which they make there. they all were so so friendly and they ended up bringing us to their house, where they had about 14 kegs of this rice wine, and we had such a fun evening. at one stage they had brought out pickled ginger and other local dishes for us. then they brought out one which basically was pickled rotten raw catfish (1month old). it was absolutely gross and it was actually all a big trick cos it was so disgusting. they thought it was hilarious...actually the older people do still eat it but think it is definitely an acquired taste-ugh!!! so that was a great night and we met some lovely people.

we spent another couple of days there. it was really pretty. then we moved on, back to kk. we stopped off on the way to see the world's largest flower- the rafflesia. we thought we were really lucky as there was one blooming in the park, but when we went in the guide told us we couldn't go now. the rain was about to start and there would be too many leeches! and sure enough, it started raining in the next few minutes and continued to pour down for the next few hours. we had to wait for a bus which wasnt full and it ended up taking us 2 hrs! finally we got away, a nice journey through the rainforest and mist.