Sandakan - Borneo - Malaysia

April 28th - May 1st, 2016

Arriving in Sandakan airport mid afternoon we took our bags to a bus stop just outside of the airport and hoped a No.7 would turn up at some point. There were no timetables to be found and just the word of a guidebook that there actually was a bus that would take us into town 11km away. The 'bus' when it turned up 10 minutes later turned out to be more like the collectivo's we encountered in South America, a minibus that runs a specific route, picking up and dropping off passengers at no apparent designated spots. Coming into Sandakan we were relieved to find it slightly less humid than Kuching, mainly due to the fact it sits right against the sea front which yielded a lovely breeze as we drove along. The town, although very small is bright and colourful and definitely has a more touristy feeling about it with cafe's and restaurants lining the waterfront and many tour shops located near the large shopping mall. Our hostel we found to be situated just opposite the Central Market which is open every day from early morning until mid afternoon and is set in what feels like a multi storey car park over 3 levels, with the most produce, fish, veges etc on the ground floor, then textiles and some food stalls on the second and even more eateries on the top floor where the views matched the cooling breezes for their splendour.

On the other side of the block from our hostel was a street market that seemed to be there all day and night and mostly sold second hand clothes(none of which were appropriate for the weather being mainly denim and woollens!) and a few stalls selling iced drinks and snacks. The most interesting thing about this market was that at night a karaoke stall was set up, so as you wandered along you could listen to the truly appalling sounds of the locals trying to sing their favourite songs...I don't know if there was a competition for who could sing the worst but I couldn't have picked the winner!

Now the main reason people come to Sandakan is for the local abundance of wildlife and so in the morning we got up early to take the minibus/collectivo to the Sepilok Orang-utan Rehabilitation Centre about 45 minutes away. This was much, much more commercialised than the one in Semengoh with prices to match being about 3 x as much and charging a 'camera fee'! After putting our bags away in the lockers provided we headed on via a board walk to the only feeding area, unlike at Semengoh where there were three giving the orang-utans a chance to spread out if they wished. It was soon packed with at least 60 people who, despite the 'silence' signs all over the place, were as noisy as a bus of school children. So it was with some wonder that the first orang-utan showed up, followed eventually by a few others, all about the same size and age having gone through the rehab program together it seems. I can't say I was particularly impressed that they were being fed cabbage and bread...not exactly jungle food, but they seemed content enough. As they wandered off the majority of the crowd left with them to our relief and the few of us who stayed were rewarded by a group of macaque's coming down to enjoy the many left overs. I have to say these were more entertaining than the orang-utans who all seemed a little too tame to me, as well as the couple of squirrels who also came along for a feast.

A little disappointed with what felt like a 'show' instead of wild, free-willed animals, we decided to head across the road to the Bornean Sun Bear Conservation Centre in the hopes of something different. After reading some of the boards and watching the video however we realised this was a rescue centre first and foremost and that any rehabilitated animals would have been released elsewhere. But what a rescue centre...the enclosures are enormous and are literally just a part of the jungle with a fencing, probably more to keep the humans out than anything else as Sun Bears are avid tree climbers and I'm sure if one took it in its head to escape it wouldn't have too much difficulty. There are two viewing platforms, recently finished, from which you may be lucky enough to observe some of the Sun Bears of which there are 26 in total. The few we saw, apart from being adorably cute, looked very relaxed in their surroundings and after talking to the founder/owner of the centre, we realised how far they must have come to achieve this happy state. Almost all of the bears here were rescued from cages, their small size (about that of a Golden Retriever and being the smallest bear in the world) and playful nature mean that many people want them as pets, not caring that this is totally illegal and that the Bornean Sun Bear is more critically endangered than either the Orang-utan or the Pygmy elephant! Thankfully, due to the efforts of the rescue centre, their plight has been heard and many have been seized from their owners through tip offs and are brought to the centre to be rehabilitated. A few are eventually released back into the wild, but many have been in captivity too long and wouldn't survive and so are permanent residents of the centre and great ambassadors for their kind.

We finished our day off with another trip to the orang-utan feeding station to catch the afternoon session which was markedly different to the morning in that for a start they put out proper food...bananas, papayas, mangos etc and secondly by the number of orang-utans that showed up. There must have been at least a dozen or so hanging around and it seems that these were mostly rehab youngsters in the 'outdoor arena' stage, whereby they no longer stay inside enclosures but are encouraged to stay out overnight and roam the local forest area, getting practise at finding some of their own food and building nests, interacting with some of the older orang-utans who can teach them more than the trainers ever can. So again, there was a large number of people, but they weren't quite as noisy as the first lot and watching the youngsters was great fun though we definitely still preferred our experience at Semengoh overall.

The following day saw us up early again, trying, and failing, to beat the heat as we caught another collectivo (I'm sure they have a different name over her, that's just what I'm used to calling them) just to the edge of the town to see the 'stilt village'. This is originally what the town grew up around and is a fascinating look at how people can build houses in the most unlikely places. Around 40 bridges jutting out into the water are flanked either side with houses on stilts, meaning that their address begins with their bridge number, followed by their house name or number! There were various interconnecting bridges also and we spent an hour or so ambling along the narrow walkways, marvelling at how pretty yet surreal it was, people rode their bikes along the unguarded planks, kept chickens in cages hanging over the water, went fishing from their front door and there were so many plants and flowers adorning the balconies and sills. The thing that really let it down however was the disgusting amount of rubbish floating in the water and on the shore. Its not just like a bin day has been missed and its over flowing onto the surrounding area, this has been the accumulation of years, a boat left dry by the tide going out still looked like it was floating due to the detritus surrounding it. Why go to the effort of making your house look pretty with new paint and flowers if you're just going to live surrounded by filth? It was upsetting to see, but unfortunately seems to be the norm here, the river in Kuching was hideous and the streets in both towns always have litter along the gutters as well as having a pungent smell in some areas too. It's such a shame!