Here’s the photo I took of a herd of elephants at Danum, through the windscreen of a 4WD. The guide stopped the car and did NOT approach any closer. He knows the elephants.

…across the world’s third largest island.

Taking off from Lahad Datu, east coast of Sabah, Borneo

Mangroves, coastal protection and the nursery for so much sea life

The death of irreplaceable rainforest, the birth of monoculture oil palm and wealth and your soap

What was there before the oilpalm – rainforest and a remarkable biodiversity

 

Coming in to landing at Kota Kinabalu on the west coast

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 The mighty emergent that towers higher than the rest, the tualang, the mengaris, Kompassia exelsa, that harbours the hanging nests of the wild bees, that supports itself with buttresses taller than a man standing on the shoulders of another man.

Found in Peninsula Malaysia and in Borneo.

So huge, so smooth, no photo does it justice.

Besides, these trees support the wonderful canopy walkway of the Borneo Rainforest Lodge.

I had a load of fun over at Sia’s Blog. Although I didn’t imagine that we’d end up talking about cockroaches. Anyway, you can see the conversation in the comments section here.

And here’s a few more photos from Borneo Rainforest Lodge.

Imagine, you are hot and sweaty and have almost been wiped out by a falling branch….

And then you arrive at a place that looks like this:

Our guide, Edmundo Cafe, keeping in touch with his crew via walkie-talkie

 I suppose to out the words “pygmy” and “elephant” together (see my last post) is a bit ridiculous. But the Bornean elephant is small, hence the name. Smaller than its cousin found in Peninsular Malaysia, the Asian Elephant.

But here are some photos of something that really does deserve to be called “pygmy” : the Plain Pygmy Squirrel. Photographed on the canopy walkway of Danum Valley Rainforest Lodge, this little fella is fully 4″ (10cm) long from nose to tail tip. Which makes its body barely 2″. And boy, is he fast…

Find the Squirrel…

While I was away in Borneo, my husband was away attending a meeting in Cairo – in fact we went out to the airport together.

Internet reception was lousy at the rainforest lodge, so it wasn’t really until I came back that I realised he had been gone for five days and there was no email from him or any other form of communication –  to anyone. In fact, his email account hadn’t been opened, and usually he does keep in touch. So I started to get a little uneasy. I chatted to my daughter on Skype and she said she’d try telephoning his hotel in Cairo. While she was doing that, I continued the conversation with her partner, P.

The conversation went like this:

P: You’ve lost your husband!
Me: Yep. Saw pygmy elephants though. And orang utan. Had a fabulous time – luxury accommodation in the middle of nowhere, my own jacuzzi on the verandah…

As it turns out, husband was fine, but internet connection was beyond paying for in the hotel and he was never free to look elsewhere.

But here’s what daughter posted on Twitter later:

 When P. said ‘You lost your husband!’ my mum’s reply was ‘Yes, but I saw some pygmy elephants in the rainforest.’ My family is nuts!

On the very same project I am now working on, we were once offered free rooms in the staff quarters of a tourist site*. The only rooms available (for my two male colleagues and me) were ones no one wanted.

And no wonder no one wanted them. Shared bathroom facilities with no hot water (and we were at 5,000m asl –— oops, that should have read 5,000ft, as has been pointed out to me: 1,560m). The shower head was missing. Bathroom was basic cement in tones of grey, with no working light. No bed sheets, no curtains, no towels, no nothing…

Someone had bashed a hole in the bedroom wall. Someone – perhaps the same person – had written in lettering half a metre high above my bed: FUCK OFF. I shared the sentiment. (Mind you, the view out of the window was stunning.)

And then there’s Borneo Rainforest Lodge, where I have just spent a couple of glorious days:

View from the verandah dining area

My balcony jacuzzi…

One of the chalets

River view from my balcony

Another view from my balcony

The main lodge building overlooking the river

The Borneo gibbons woke me every morning, followed by the Rhinoceros Hornbills flying in to the trees opposite my room, on the other side of the river.

Sipping my early morning coffee, I drink it all in… Yep, it’s all worth it.

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*Not, I hasten to add, the same site as the one pictured above!

…this past week, finishing the final* (I hope) major re-write of Stormlord’s Exile, husband was off having fun on Sipadan Island, off Borneo, where the world’s best diving is to be found. Of course, he calls such perambulations work. Hmph.

Weather was stormy and after one stormy night a rather tired bird decided to take a nap on the beach…

Note his rather bedraggled appearance.

A bird with the (to a non-birder) rather unlikely name Brown Booby.
But then, don’t you think it kinda suits the bird?
All’s well that end’s well – here, with the dawn, it is on its way out to sea again .

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*hah. I should say final- until the editors get hold of it!

Just in case you wanted to know what sea cucumbers look like – live ones. (They were lifted out of the water briefly for the photo shoot).

And these things are delicacies?? They look like over-sized well-fed leeches…

About 15 cm (6″), but they can stretch themselves into a slim 30 cm too.