Once in Manila, we tried again and failed. Joe and Sandra ended up walking about 5 minutes to a money exchanger and changed some US cash for pesos. Manila is crazy though! People everywhere and drivers are nuts. No one works together, they're always fighting to get ahead of everyone else and they use their horn constantly. It's apparently used to tell someone you're passing them here. This ended up being even more annoying on the 10 hour bus ride down to Legaspi which was an overnight bus. Speaking of that, they keep the AC full blast, so you end up freezing. For the next bus ride we'll have to remember to grab our jacket and anything that can be used as a blanket. A nice girl from Missouri that's here with the Peace Corps was sitting in front of us and did lend us a blanket type thing to help us stay warm.
We arrived in Legaspi at around 6:30am where Joe bumped into a British couple that were basically in the same stage of planning as we were. They wanted to see the whale sharks but didn't have a place to stay for sure yet. The 5 of us hopped into a taxi for the hour or so ride to Donsol.
There are apparently a lot fireflies here at night, so we're doing a boat ride for that tonight. Hopefully that will be fun. We're going with the other couple tomorrow morning to hopefully see Whale Sharks. Two sharks were seen yesterday (don't know about today yet) so hopefully we're lucky even though it's the end of the season.
-Miranda
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We're currently in Kota Kinabalu but haven't been doing too much. We'll post a separate entry about that later.
Here's a video of clips of the elephants.
Elephants (click to view)
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We caught our ride to Nature Lodge Kinabatangan where we stayed for 2 nights and met up with Sandra again along the way. Not long after arriving, we headed out for an afternoon cruise on the river. They mentioned that the Borneon Pygmy Elephants were in the area, so we might be able to see them.
During our trip, we saw a Monitor Lizard and some Long Tailed Macaques, then the boat's motor died... In the end, half of our group went in one boat, Joe, Sandra, Lana (another German girl we met) and I went in a smaller boat. Our guide heard there was a sighting of the elephants, so we headed back down river to see them.
It was so fun! We got to get out of the boat and went up on a porch of a nearby building to watch the elephants. There were at least 20 or 30. They were everywhere!
The next morning, we woke up before 6am and went on a morning cruise. We ended up seeing 4 orangutans and a wild boar! We were scheduled to go on a walk in the afternoon, but because of the elephants, the guides decided it was too dangerous. They have babies, so they can be aggressive. Joe and I ended up kayaking up the river a little ways and went into a smaller creek to see if we could find anything fun. We found where the elephants crossed the stream. There were foot prints all over and poop floating. We even heard one trumpet, but it was a little ways away.
Before dinner, we did our second later afternoon river cruise. Unfortunately, we didn't get too far before it started pouring.... We did end up seeing a troop of Proboscis Monkeys, which was pretty neat. We kept going, hoping the rain would let up (most tropical rains are heavy, but short), but it didn't... We finally turned around and headed back, since we couldn't see anything anyway. We were totally and completely drenched. It was crazy. Unfortunately the rain also brought out the mosquitoes.
Tomorrow morning we have one more river cruise, then we'll be heading to Kota Kinabalu tomorrow.
-Miranda
Joe and I in front of the elephants.
Elephants!!
Baby elephants!!
Orangutan!!
Joe and I totally and completely drenched.
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Monkeesyyyyss!!!! My one and only goal for this trip has been achieved! Monkeys in the wild. And wow. wow.
We went to the Orangutan rehabilitation sanctuary, where they help orphaned orangutans make it back out into the wild. The center is not fenced or anything, a pathway just wanders into the jungle to feeding platforms that they use to continue feeding newly released orangutans. We arrived prior to the morning feeding time, were waiting patiently... Suddenly a far-off treetop in the dense jungle ruffles and shakes. Then a closer one, and closer... Saw some orange fur!... Using some huge ropes hung up suddenly a mother orangutan with a baby on her stomach comes swinging over us towards the platform. She is joined by 3 others. (One who fell off the ropes and disappeared into underbrush for a bit... got a little worried it was injured as it was silent). Slowly it climbed a tree back up 30' into the air and dropped back onto the rope.) The rangers fed the orangutans papaya, bananas and sugarcane. After a few minutes, dozens of Pig-tail and Long-tail(?) Macaque Monkeys started moving towards the platform. Much smaller but trying to get some of the food. Sneaky little guys. The rangers shooed them away until the orangutans had had enough to eat and swung back out deeper into the forest. After the smaller monkeys cleaned the left overs up, several came over to the viewing platform to show off. One was a pair with 4 youngsters. .. All sitting and hanging out on the railing we had just been leaning on... All pretty intense.
After lunch we walked to a nearby rainforest center where they had a massive canopy walk and towers that let you look out from 80 feet in the air. We didn't see much for wildlife as we didn't give it much time, but it was a great proper jungle experience.
Later that day we went back and watched another feeding where a big male orangutan came up to the viewing platform and walked on by everyone after striking a pose. The ranger was a little worried and told everyone to back up and give him room.
Cool. Borneo is one of the best remaining places on earth to see monkeys.. So we are lucky we ventured over. Tomorrow we head to a 3 day river-wildlife tour thing-a-ma-jig.. Which is supposed to be most excellent.
-Joe
Here's a compilation of monkey videos. :D
Monkeys
;)
The one coming in has a baby clinging to her. (Click on photo to enlarge.)
;)
Pig-tail Macaques grooming. (Click on photo to enlarge.)
;)
(Long-tail Macaques grooming. Click on photo to enlarge.)
;)
Second feeding time. The female away from the platform has a baby on her stomach. (Click on photo to enlarge.)
;)
The male striking a pose. (Click on photo to enlarge.)
;)
The male walking by. (Click on photo to enlarge.)
;)
A purty butterfly that kept landing on Joe's hand. (Click on photo to enlarge.)
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The 24th we spent exploring the Singapore Science museum. Very well constructed, and waaay too much content. We were there all day, and just skimmed most stuff. Highlights included a Gaseous exhibit where you could see real live radiation particle trails/traces, a huge shark exhibit, and a frequency thingy that Joe will have to fix since I don't remember what it was.
Then we had a great day yesterday the 25th. Went to the Jurong Bird Park in Singapore. World's Largest Bird Park. Amazingly well-constructed and well-cared for birds. Some of the enclosures were so large you forgot you were inside. The African bird sanctuary is the largest bird-dome in the world. Miranda saw dozens of birds she had never seen before in any similar zoo's, etc. We watched a couple of bird shows as well and left after the entire day disappeared into wandering the park.
Tired and ready for bed we decided to fly to Borneo in 24 hours, from Kuala Lumpur. This would give us plenty of time to catch a bus there, etc. At 9pm I asked Miranda to buy the plane tickets. While she clicked on the proper link in Kayak.com, AirAsia switched the flight time without her ever noticing. She ended up buying the nonrefundable $300 ticket for 7am the next morning. After running around seeing if we could change it, we decided we just would have time if we caught the last 10pm bus from Singapore to Kuala Lumpur... We rushed struggling to get the bus-ticket changed to 10pm and hopping on just as it was scheduled to leave. NICE BUS! Lazy-boy style chairs. We arrived in Kuala Lumpur at 3am.
Unfortunately, we had to take a taxi to the airport which was 40 miles a way! ($65) Worked our way through that slow airport and onto a 3 hr plane ride to the Malaysian town of Sandakan on the Island of Borneo. Here we took a taxi to town, and flopped on the bed of the first hostel we noticed. (They had private rooms with ensuite and free wifi for $20, so no dilemma there...) Now... Do we nap the day away or go see some sights... Supposedly there are WILD ORANG UTANGS here!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (This is why we flew quick) Among other adventures to be had here. Compared to Singapore's cleanliness and perfect infrastructure, everything is a little rougher, and far less english, but we are still managing pretty easily. Looks like it will be a good adventure here.
Off to find lunch!
-Joe
Nifty birds in the African Aviary. Can't remember what they're called now.
Scarlet Ibis
Purty Lories.
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