Day 8: Cave and River

Giant millipede

Wow what a very long, very exciting day we've had.  The best day so far!

So, this was a day trip that I booked from the UK.  To go to Gomantong Cave (which David Attenborough has been to) and Kinabatangan River from which we had a boat trip to try to see some animals.

Huge moth

It all started at 9.00 when we were picked up from our apartment complex dead on time (a good sign).  We then went to Sepilok to drop someone up before going to a supermarket to pick up some face masks (apparently the smell at Gomantong Cave is really bad) and then a 2.5 hour drive to the Cave.  It wasn't the most thrilling of drives, the road was lined with Palm Oil plantations, so it is the same vegetation you see mile after mile after mile.  However, as soon as you turn off the road, you are deposited straight into rain forest.  This we did and suddenly the bus came to a halt - our guide Elod, very excited, as he had spotted some gibbons.  We all shot out of the van (there were 7 of us) me in a state of undress (I was wearing zip off trousers and was just putting the legs on, I had one leg on and one leg off!)  They weren't close enough to photograph, but we saw them - 5 of them larking in the trees, wow they really do fly through the air, a delight to see them swinging and falling through the trees.  Our guide was really excited because he said that was the first time he had ever seen a gibbon.

Horseshoe bats inside the cave

Once they had gone we carried on to the cave. There was a boardwalk down to it and we walked slowly down, hoping to see some wildlife, but other than some orang-utan nests (orang-utans build a new nest every day to sleep in - as they don't have a tail they need a nest to be safe at night) and some rather wonderful centipedes and millipedes, we didn't see anything. We could pretty much smell the cave before we saw it, our guide was right, it did smell strongly of ammonia.  Tom was glad of his mask.  

Red leaf monkey

So the cave was ENORMOUS, it was the white cave.  This is the place where the birds' nests for birds nest soup are harvested (4 times a year).  The nests are made by the spit of Swiftlets - small birds who live in the cave and are harvested by men using quite primitive equipment in the dark - rather them than me, they get paid about £4,000 a month to do it (the ones up the ladder - £1,000 for those at the bottom of the ladder) .  The cave is also the haunt of the Horseshoe Bat, and there were 1,000s of them.  All of their droppings were on the floor, making the stench.  Elod said that if we were to walk on the floor, we would be up to over our knees in bat droppings!  Some of the bats were awake and circling around above us.  Mainly though the cave was home to lots of horrible creepy crawlies: billions of cockroaches who were keen to feast on any bat or bird who dropped to the floor, spiders and a long legged centipede which would slowly paralyse you if it were to be bitten by it. Nice!

We had a good look around, Elod, spotting things as we went - he had a powerful torch and green laser light to help us see things.  We came out and he found us a lime tree, pulled some leaves off and let us sniff them to get rid of the stench of the cave.  We then all washed our boots - as they were covered in bat droppings.  We then walked back to the bus.  This time, the trees by the boardwalk were teaming with monkeys.  First we found a group of red leaf monkeys.  They were brilliant, near enough to photo (just) and a big group.  They were fascinating to watch.  As we were watching them we heard some drips come through the leaves, yep, one of them was doing a wee and it landed on our guide Elod, who was very very unhappy about it - unfortunately for him it was really funny and we fell about laughing.

Young proboscis monkey

As we carried on we left the red leaf monkeys behind and came across a group of short tailed macaques.  Once again there were loads of them and they were running through the trees, jumping here and there.  Wow, we came out of the forest very very happy, our guide said that he could hear something big and was sure that there was an orang-utan around, but it didn't come near enough to us to see (the jungle is so so dense that any animal less than a metre away is impossible to spot!)

Black hornbill - amazing looking creatures

We got back to the bus and headed towards the lodge for lunch.  We didn't know what to expect.  We got off the bus and were deposited by the river where a boat came along.  Oh, we were getting a boat to the lodge.  It was a long speed boat and a fun way to arrive for lunch.  The lodge was lovely, all made from wood and open to the air and elements.  We took our footwear off and headed into the seating area where we were treated to a buffet lunch: rice, tandoori chicken, fish flavoured with coconut and wrapped in leaves, Japanese cucumbers (still not sure what this was) and some sort of pak choi which is the 'green vegetable' of choice around here, finished off with pineapple and watermelon.  All very tasty.  We then had some down time which was very welcome as it had been a very hot morning at the cave.

River Kinabatangan

Also at the lodge was a large group of Brits also travelling with children (an Explore/Exodus group - I saw the baggage!).  Tom made friends with some of the boys and played volley football.  Get this - as he was getting to know them they were asking each other where they were from, the boy, Lewis was from Nottingham, but he knew the Yorkshire Dales because he had been camping in a place called Meadow Falls!  A coincidence or to be expected when we travel because we always find something in common with the people we meet!  Anyway, Tom played for about an hour and came back to us dripping in sweat and very red in the face.  We dipped his head in cold water and got him an ice lolly to try to cool him down.  At 3.30 we had a briefing about the 10 primates we might spot on the river cruise and at 4.00 we headed off on our speed boats, looking for them.  The cruise takes place in the late afternoon because that is when the animals come out and get ready for bed.

Bilit Adventure Lodge

At 3.30 as the briefing began suddenly there was a wind!  Literally one minute it was still and very very hot and humid and then it was windy!  At 4.00 the rain came.  So we all put our raincoats on and went barefoot into the boats to go speeding down the river.  Tom and I had the best seats at the front of the boat.  At first we didn't see anything except for an Egret, and were beginning to wonder if we would see anything, but then we headed down a tributary.  The first thing we saw were some rope bridges across the river - these have been put up by the government to help the non swimming primates to cross the river (orang-utans can't swim, macaques can) and then Elod stopped the boat, he had found a tree full of Proboscis monkeys.  Wow!  They were a bachelor group and most of them small, but there were loads of them, the trees were literally dripping in monkeys.   We sat there watching them for ages, it really is mesmerising watching them going through their day to day antics. 

Long tailed macaque

Next we found a tree full of long tailed macaques.  Once again there were loads of them.  One of the males was low down by the river and we managed to get really really close to him.  So close that if he wanted he could have jumped into the boat.  (We were told that macaques are quite vicious and to not look them in the eye).  Luckily he stayed there and was very still meaning we could get really good photos of him.  We eventually tore ourselves away from that bunch and found a tree with some silver leaf monkeys in it.  As soon as they heard the boat they ran away, but still we saw them.  The rest of the trip was spent spotting more and more monkeys.  Mostly long tailed macaques.  Tom was completely enthralled by being in a speed boat and seeing all the wildlife, he even asked questions of Elod completely unprompted and good questions too. 

As dusk descended we saw more birds, mainly hornbills - those weird birds with the huge horny tusk on the top of their beak.  There were loads of them, and they are so elegant when in the sky. 

After what felt like 10 minutes in the boat, our 2 hours were up and we turned around and went back towards the lodge.  One more stop to see a mangrove snake curled up in a tree - how anyone spotted that is beyond me.  We then went under the rope bridges and found to our delight that there were lots of long tailed macaques using them to get from one side to the other.  We stopped to watch, but it was getting darker and darker so we had to break and go back to the lodge. 

Macaques crossing the river

Then a short loo break and back across the river to our bus and back to our apartment in Sandakan, which took a good 2.5 hours.  Tom unsurprisingly fell asleep on my shoulder, even though the road was very bumpy.  We got home at 8.45pm.  We were hungry!  Matt drove over to Cafe Classico to get some take away burgers and chips, whilst I got Tom showered and changed and started unpacking the wet dirty clothes from the day.  Matt wasn't long, the owner wouldn't let him pay for our tea as we are now his friends.  Wow!  A fantastic end to a great day.  Think we will need to take it easy tomorrow.

A round of up of animals we saw yesterday:

+ Gibbons

+ Short Tailed Macaques

+ Red Leaf Monkeys

+ Horseshoe Bats

+ Pigmy Squirrel

+ Black Nest Swiftlets

+ Long Tailed Macaques

+ Proboscis Monkeys

+ Silver Leaf Monkey

+ Hornbills: Black, Oriental & Wrinkle

+ Egrets

+ Kingfisher

+ Purple Heron

+ Mangrove Snake

+ Water Monitor Lizard

+ Millipedes

+ Centipedes

+ Cockroaches

+ Sun Skin Lizard

+ Huge Butterflies