We had a great first day, in this 21st if July, 2015 A.V. (After Versly). First of all, Abby turned Almost 14 today, so that was cool. On tap for her A-14th? Three water adventures surrounded by some food experiences.
We were up fairly early, given the kids didn't make it to bed until close to midnight last night. Breakfast at 9:00 downstairs, them we were off on a walk down to the waterfront. We hired a traditional Maaly boat for a relaxing hour and a half tour up and down the river.
I don't think the kids noticed, they were lost in kid-space, but the river was a nice little orientation to some of the surrounding landscape. You never got a real feel that you had left Kuching, as the city is quite sprawling, but I will never not enjoy being on a slow boat on a river.
We made it back to the jetty, so we got the kids attention... WE GOT THE KIDS ATTENTION!!! and got out to walk the rest of the waterfront trail.
We headed to India Street, in search of a place serving the Kuching special Roti Canai - a pastry-like bread that is served with curry as a dip. We eventfully found a place after getting a load of directions (getting directions in Asia is sometimes like guessing a number between 0 and 100 - is it greater than 50? No. Is it less than 25? Yes. Is it more than 12? Yes. Is it less than 17. Yes. Is it 14? YES! Congratulations, you can eat now!!!).
Lunch was fun - people are definitely getting a kick out of the 8 Gaijinzillas roaming around the streets of Kuching. We even got invited to some guy's open house party... Alas, we are not in Kuching, as we could really use some free beers (beers are $3.75 RETAIL here.... The horror of travelling within a mostly-Muslim island....).
We headed back to the hotel, and captured this cute pic proving white man can jump (just kidding... Our entire pool is just 42" deep! It was a nice cool off and a great stroke for the adult egos... We totally dominated the kids in a game of beach ball keep away.
So today was the day we were to do an evening river and jungle adventure with Joseph (our cooking class instructor from Sunday). He picked us up himself at 3:30, and Alex and I began to pick his brain right away during the 30 minute drive to the jetty. I confirmed what I had picked up from my first couple of days hear - Sarawakians are fiercely independent. They won their independence from the Sultan if Brunei in the 1800s, then they won it again in the mid 1900s from the Raj (Britain). After that, they essentially went into a bidding war with Malaysia and Indonesia for who wanted them more (and were willing to give them more concessions). Malaysia won, and had to give Sarawak a bunch of concessions - even allowing them to control immigration to protect jobs etc (it kind of reminded me of the Quebec situation in Canada). Notice no mention of Sabah, the other Malaysian state in Borneo - they are also kind of separate. The states are so separate that you get separate immigration stamps when entering, and mainland Malays needed to use a passport to visit as recently as five years ago. All that being said, we are essentially in a country with a country in Sarawak.
We got to the jetty that is on a river that separates the mainland and the Wetlands National Park. We cruised along the park side of the river, checking out the mangrove forests.
The mangrove is a cool tree - it grows roots from above and when they are mature enough, they shoot down into the water and the ground below. It's one of the only kind of tree that grows in brackish water - the water that is a mix of salt and fresh water (depending on the tide). The mangrove forest also acts as a great land retainer.
We scanned slowly along the shoreline, looking for the Probiscus Monkey or anything else but we had forgotten our Tyndall luck at home (or had we brought the Versly bad luck with us?hmmm). We turned more towards the open sea, where the river widened a bit, and that's where we spotted a mother and baby pair of Irrawaddy Dolphins. They were making small looping dives just coming out of the water, disappearing after s half dozen loops or so. They were smaller than "normal" dolphins, and much darker - almost black. These Dolphins also live and thrive in brackish water unlike their cousins.
We docked after another few minutes in the river, and got out to begin the trek part of our trip. The terrain started out easy over a worn, paved roadway. We spotted a bunch of long-tail Macaques - though they were pretty far off. The road turned to a path (?) - well, maybe it was a path by the time it got past the 2 guides and the line of 8 Gaijinzillas traipsing through. It was mainly neck high grass, and we more more focussed on watching where we were stepping and swatting off the bugs than looking around at the scenery.
Here's a pic and video of us wading through the grass after our diminutive guide....
After probably 45 minutes, we broke through the jungle onto a huge expanse of a beach, just in time to enjoy a nice sunset.
We had no schedule, just chilling on the beach as the sun slowly slid behind the horizon. It was a zen moment.
We gathered around while Joseph went ahead to the village to prepare dinner.
At dusk, we headed to a little clearing next to the beach where Joseph and his son were preparing a chicken dish to be cooked inside a large piece of bamboo. The bamboo baked in the coals as we had some appetizers, then when the chicken was ready, we served it over rice and ate quietly. Delicious.
After dinner, I snuck down to the beach. A small, 70 something fisherman was setting up two poles in the shallow water at the edge of the river. He then set up a light shining from the beach to the water. This guy came up to my naval, and he seemed pretty amused that I was sitting quietly near him, watching. Every few minutes, he would wade into the river up to his waist, throw a small net with weighters around the circumference, then gather it in. He would bring the net back to the beach and open it up to reveal 5-10 small shrimp each trip he made. Pretty soon, he'd gathered a good number of shrimp, and attracted the kids as well. I will never forget the way he chuckled every once in a while as one of us oohed and ahhed at something that was clearly just part of his everyday life.... "Eh heh heh heh.... Eh heh heh heh".
We got back in the boat, and went up and down the river in the pitch black, looking for any signs of wildlife by shining a powerful light from the lead boat, hoping for reflective eyes shining back. We saw a crocodile, though the beady red eyes quickly determined they were not hanging around too long. We stopped at one mangrove tree that was surrounded by fireflies which was really cool - they are one of those magical little things in life....
It seems like we have the opportunity to see lots of little magical sights on this adventure portion of our trip in Borneo.
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