Semporna To Mabul Island, Borneo

Semporna To Mabul Island, Borneo, Malaysia 

I took a minivan back to Lahad Datu and spent the day searching for another minivan to take me to Semporna the following day. I was told to be ready to go at 7 am at the mini bus station. I got there and had to wait for 10 other people to show up to fill the mini bus seats. We left at 9am and drove for three hours to Semporna. I booked a room for the night and made transport arrangements with Scuba Junkie to catch a ride to Mabul Island where I was recommended to go to Scuba Jeff’s Home Stay. It worked like clockwork.

 I arrived and was pointed towards Scuba Jeff’s. It’s a homestay over the water with it’s own boats and meals are included. I managed to snorkel on my own the first day and get four dives in 2 days.

There are many highlights and most of them were 14 and 24 meters of clear warm water. There had been a storm that had kicked up a lot of sediment the night before I got there so I snorkeled the first day and that was a good choice. By the next morning the visibility had returned to 10 to 15 meters and then more.

The instructor staff was mostly locals with two yanks from Ohio leading the dives and having just arrived themselves still excited about the dive experience. Most of it was still new to them and they are both confident and well trained. They made it fun and so did the locals.

 Every night was live music and a chorus of Malay songs and some western, one French woman in particular, played guitar and had a beautiful voice singing both Malay and western songs. There’s four or five guitars in use at night and of course it gets really fun when they ad the local rum or whiskey for 10 ringgit/bottle. Some mix, some don’t but everybody is smiling by the end of the second bottle and someone is on the run for more. It’s not my flavor of choice but I did manage to find some places on the beach with really COLD beer.

There are a few man made reefs where many species have claimed as home or a few shipwrecks. Every dive was enjoyable and the staff at Jeff’s bent over backwards to help everyone achieve their diving goals and never the same dive twice.

Storms blow in with a stiff gust that persists for about three hours accompanied by torrential rains and lightening. Then it lightens up and the visibility returns and scuba diving is back on the menu.

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Danum Valley, Borneo

Danum Valley, Borneo.

When I caught the van to Danum Valley I luckily chatted with one of the research assistance who informed me of some recent photo trapping that had uncovered a wild Rhinoceros. A few months later the Rhinoceros was caught and being thoroughly tested and hopefully breading stock with females in captivity. The idea is find a female that doesn’t have ovarian cysts which seems to run in captive Rhinos. One way or the other this boy is going to breed. The idea is to let the female back into the wild with this male and hope they raise a kid together. There is already a Rhino enclosure that is 5 square kilometers and will house the rhino, his girl, and the baby to come.

The next thing I hear about is night-photographers out searching for ‘flying frogs’ and glowing mushrooms. I pull into the hostel, which is cheap in comparison to the options and I go out to have a bottle of water on the porch. Across the street before me is a young female Orangutan. She’s sitting looking at me before she moves on down the street to some of her ripening fruit or flowering fruit trees. I’m staying with travelling scientists and research assistants on grounds at a hostel style curtained bunk blocks. I had one by myself. I followed ‘Bongo’ down the hill and took a few pictures of her eating fruit and blossoms.

I started out pretty slow by just doing the nature walks and trails. The middle of the days is stiflingly hot and humid. But under the canopy out of the sun it’s considerably cooler. The river has a small beach for the locals to cool off as long as the rains don’t raise the river by a meter and make it quite dangerous. The mornings and the evenings are the best time to see animal activity. I was getting up at 6 am to catch up on the World Cup in Brazil and got to watch the US play against Ghana. Good win for the boys. Good luck against Portugal.

I took a night jeep out down the road one night and we saw a Leopard Cat and a Civet cat sitting on a tree trunk and didn’t seem to worried about our spot lights but photos were lame.

The following day I wandered out to a tree platform that is about 100 feet up a ladder. It’s not an easy climb but totally worth it. The view of the canopy and above is spectacular. When I returned there was a bearded pig on the hostel lawn eating grass, Macaques crossing the road, and Hornbills flying overhead. It was another amazing scene before sunset.

 Found some deer on education centers front lawn. They were rather skittish so I couldn't get to close.

Bearded Pig

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