Ko Samui

We had quite the adventure getting to the island of Ko Samui. At first we wanted to goto Khao Sok National parkk, which is located inland. Two days and many hours on local buses later we found that the road leading there had been damaged by the monsoon rains! Our little bus tour around the peninsula was pretty draining, although we did find a delicious and cheap lcoal restaurant in the one of the junction towns. The town later was flooded by the rains and we had to wade knee deep through flood water to get to the bus station.

Takua Pa Bus Station after a night of hard rain

So we cut our losses and headed over to the islands off the Guld Coast. Our first stop: Ko Samui. This is a very touristy island with many beaches and many high-end resorts. We struggled to find cheaper accomodation, and after a night in a grungy and roach infested bungalow we looked harder and found a comfortable room a little further from the beach of Lamai.

Thw town of Lamai is known for it's tawdry nightlife, and at night, various bars are filled with Thai women looking and dancing awkwardly. There were also a number of White male and Thai female couples, normally with a large age difference. Pretty disturbing.

We rented a motorbike to explore the local area and beaches and saw the sight seeing spots. Lamai itself is home to two famous rocks. They are named Grandfather and Grandmother rocks, and their peculiar formation leads to many giggling tourists.

Rash at the Grandfather rock

We also stopped by a temple famous for a monk who refused to decomposed. His mummified body sits enshrined at the temple as a symbol of perseverance. A bunch of children at the temple played with us and helped Rash ring the gong that had the strange question "Can you make me cry?"



We stopped by a Safari park with a waterfall view just before the monsoon rains poured down. There we saw some elephants and their caretakers, as well as yelping tourists flying through the treeline on zip-lines.

Rai Leh

We've spent the last 3 days in Rai Leh and had a blast. Rai Leh is a coastal area isolated from the mainland by limestone mountains. This means there are beautiful beaches, caves, and cliffs to explore. Rai Leh is only reachable by boat so we took a 30 minute ride on one of the ubiquitous longtail boats.


A longtail boat plying the waters of Krabi town
It's monsoon season on this side of Thailand which translates to low season. This was actually a blessing, as Rai Leh felt much quieter and the beaches were not crowded at all. THe only problem was the occasional tropical shower. The water on the beach was some of the warmest we've ever felt, and the beaches are surrounded by beautiful limestone cliffs. On arrival we jumped to the beach on the west side (there are a total of 4 beaches in Rai Leh) and enjoyed the warm waters. I did get my first Jellyfish sting though which was quite nasty. One moment I'm enjoying the water and eyeing the storm clouds, and then I felt something stringy across my hand. As I flick my hadn to brush it off I feel a stinging pain all around my hand! It swelled up a little bit but has almost returned to normal now, with just light marks where I was stung.


Rashmi on Phra Nang beach


My hand after the jellyfish attack
The limestone cliffs of Rai Leh also make it one of the premiere climbing destinations of Thailand and SEA! Knowing this I had to get out there and try it out. There were numerous climbing shops offering both guides and equipment rental, so we were able to rent all the gear we needed and head out to a local wall. The climbing was great and the views at the top were very rewarding. It was interesting climbing in a foreign country and seeing the contributions of local and foreign climbers to the scene. They use the French grading system and we climbed a few 5's, 6a's, a 6a+ (5.10b) that was a spicy lead, and a 6b(~5.10c). Not bad for not climbing for a few months!

Rash pulling on the Diamond Wall North Face

Cranking on a stalactite
The best thing about climbing in this area is the surrounding scenery! There are climbs right by the side of the beach of varying difficulties. A lot of them are pretty overhung with good holds and pockets. Who wants to go on a climbing trip to Thailand?

There's a top rope anchor on there somewhere...
Besides climbing there are numerous caves to explore. We spent an afternoon wandering around and looking at the different caves. There were great formations inside and out, and the aura in the area was almost that of a cathedral.




Inside the Diamond cave
A local legend of the island is that an Indian princess was shipwrecked on this peninsula on her way to be married. She died of a broken heart and now inhabits one of the local caves. Fishermen leave offerings of carved linggas to her for good luck and increased fertility. We found quite the collection lying about in the cave!

A local woman contemplating in the cave
One of the last things we did in Rai Leh was go to a viewpoint that overlooks the bay. This involved scrambling up the backside of a cliff which was pretty hard given that it had been pouring off and on through the day. We arrived at the view right when the sun was shining and Rash said something to the effect of "This is the most beautiful view I've ever seen ever." It was pretty impressive to see the area from above.

Scrambling to the viewpoint

Made it to the viewpoint!
We've headed back to Krabi town as the rain has started to hit in full force now, we'll look into hitting up some national parks nearby and then eventually head to the Gulf Coast of Thailand.

Krabi, Thailand

We are in Thailand now! We flew into Krabi a couple days ago and have just begun exploring the area. Yesterday we had a failed attempt at visiting Khao Phanom Bencha National Park, which are supposed have some pretty waterfalls. We rented a motorbike and started our 20 km journey with the sun shining brightly in the sky. We were about 10 km along on the road when we realized that we were riding into a rainstorm. There were grey clouds above us and everything was misty in the distance. Then, without much warning it started pouring down on us full force! The drops were so big and hard that they stung my face and I had to close my eyes. Luckily, Leslie was wearing sunglasses, so he was still able to keep his eyes open as he drove! We pulled over under a small shelter on the side of the highway, where other motor bikers were also seeking protection from the downpour. We were hoping to wait it out, but the rain just wouldn't stop. Finally, after a last brave attempt at driving through the rain, we reluctantly turned around and drove back to Krabi.

Just before we leave for the tour


Today we got a lot luckier with the weather. It was beautiful and sunny all day long. We took a tour of some of the islands surrounding Krabi, including Bamboo Island and Ko Phi Phi. The tour was fun, but a little rushed and very touristy. We were packed into a small motor boat with 36 other tourists and shuttled around from one location to the next. At each spot, there were about 10 other tour companies doing the exact same thing, so you can imagine the masses of humanity that were all hoping to see what we wanted to see. And I don't blame them, because it definitely was beautiful! The islands are huge limestone formations jutting out of the water in all different shapes and sizes. The limestone is partially covered with lush vegetation, creating a breath-taking contrast between the beige rock and vibrant green plants. The beaches themselves have some of the whitest, softest sand that I have ever experienced and the surrounding water is turquoise and crystal clear.


An old bird nest collecting site. The nests are prized for swallow nest soup

One of our stops was Maya Beach, the famous beach that was used in the movie The Beach. It would have been quite picturesque, had it not been crawling with half-naked tourists. It was also sad to see that people had been littering trash into the water. It really angers me that some people don't respect such rare natural beauty. Even one of the staff members from our tour threw his cigarette butt in the water!

The view from Maya Beach

The last stop was the middle of the ocean, where we got to do some snorkeling. This was actually my favorite part because the coral that we saw was really neat. I have never seen so many different species of coral...there was coral that looked like large smooth mountains, flat red coral that spiraled upward, coral that was tipped with blue edges, brain coral, and much more. Besides the usual tropical fish, there were also a lot of different-colored giant clams. Leslie and I had a lot of fun playing with them, because they would shut there shells whenever you stuck you hand too close.

Diving at Sipadan

We finished our 4 day diving trip at Sipadan exhausted and overwhelmed with the amount of sea life we saw. Sipadan is a world famous diving site located on the eastern end of Sabah, Borneo. A number of islands are great for diving, although Sipadan Island itself has the main draw: Green Turtles, White Tipped and Grey Reef Sharks, and schools of Chevron Barracuda. Demand is so high to dive at Sipadan that the Malaysian government limits the number of divers with a permit system.

We were able to secure some permits for 2 days of diving with the dive resort Seaventures located just off island of Mabul. The neat thing about Seaventures is that it is housed on a converted oil rig, with a house reef just below. In fact when you're not doing your day dives at the nearby islands, you have unlimited diving (free air) in the House Rig Reef. Included with the package are gourmet meals which which we took perhaps too much advantage of.


The great thing about the nearby dive sites is the variety each one has to offer, so going to a new site promises different species to spot and observe. The House reef had a number of Moray Eels, Alligator Fish, Lion Fish, a GIANT clam, and so many other lifeforms that we've only begun to learn the names of.


Rash sporting her hot new dive hood!

Our first dive at the Island of Mabul netted us our first turtle spotting! Although by the end of the trip we saw so many turtles we couldn't keep count, it never got old watching them glide around gracefully. Turtles would swim right past us or let you approach them as they lay in their coral bed.

Our 2 days at Sipadan were great, although by that time we began to feel the effects of another food related sickness. We spotted plenty of sharks swimming below and above us, or sometimes just resting on the sand, loads of turtles, schools of bumphead fish (very large fish with a bump on their head), schools of jack fish, and an enormous swarm of barracuda. The schools would swim around us and swirl over and under. Unfortunately we don't have and underwater camera so we can't share too many pictures of all the fish we saw. We did however get some footage of us swimming with turtles and barracuda and sharks on another divers camera and perhaps we can borrow some pics as well when we put together a slideshow.

A bit of drama did occur on the Seaventure rig though. We got dropped off at Mabul island which is about 800 m away from the rig while some other divers went for a sunset dive. We waited and waited at the designated pick up spot and watched the sunset without a boat coming to pick us up. Then in the distance we see the dive boat going back to the rig, without us! We had no way of contacting the rig but were luckily able to ask a local boatman to give us a ride to the rig. Upon our return, the boatman and guide were very unprofessional and unapologetic about the fact that they left us on the island. We were a little miffed by that, but didn't let it ruin our experience.



On our final day of diving we were able to find a Frog Fish, which is a fish that crawls along very slowly and looks like a piece of coral so it can be very hard to spot. It can only be described as ugly, or maybe pretty in an ugly way.


Here's an example frog fish for those of you wondering. Source: Wikipedia
We had a great time diving at Sipadan, only now it feels like we've seen it all! Or maybe we're just pretty dived out after 10 dives in 4 days.

Uncle Tan's Rain Forest Camping

We went camping in the tropical rain forest located along the Kinabatangan River in Sabah, Borneo with a tour company called Uncle Tan's. Unfortunately, most of the rain forest has been destroyed and replaced with plantations, so there are only small pockets of forest left. These pockets are connected by thin corridors along the river. This forces the wildlife to live close to the river, making it relatively easy to spot.

We camped for 3 days and 2 nights. The first night we went on a night ride down the river. The guide had a big torch light that he used to light up the animals so we could see them. It was really impressive how well the guide moving at 20 miles per hour and was able to spot animals as far as 200 meters away. Even when they were hiding behind the bushes and trees. That night we saw long-tailed macaques (a type of monkey), a crowned owl, stork billed king fishers (which are really cool-looking birds that are bright and colorful with huge heads), a creepy crocodile, civets (a small mammal that is part of the cat family), and proboscis monkey (famous for their large noses).

Sleeping in the rain forest is an adventure within itself. We slept in stilted, 3-walled huts with two other couples. The only thing protecting us from the creatures of the jungle was a mosquito net. Leslie and I were quite squeamish that first night as we kept imagining all the different creepy crawlies that could sneak onto our bed while we sleeping. The noises of the forest kept me awake for a while. All night long you hear an orchestra of chirping, squawking, grunting, humming, and clicking. It may even be noisier in the forest at night than during the day!

At 6am the next morning we went for a morning boat ride. Animals are the most active at this time of the day because it is still relatively cool. We saw orangutans, horn bills (birds with big horns on their beaks), egrets, a Brahminy kite, a white-billed fish eagle, and a monitor lizard swimming in the water. But the coolest part of the ride was when we spotted a whole group of river otters frolicking at the edge of the riverbank. They were scurrying along the shore and diving in and out of the water.


Can you spot the simian in this photo?

After breakfast we went on the morning trek. It was hot and muddy, but still really fun! We saw a lot of strange insects including really fat millipedes that rolled into a ball like a rolly poly (they were over an inch wide!), spiders, lots of colorful butterflies and moths, and other critters that we didn't know the name of. We also spotted a pygmy squirrel, which is the size of a small mouse. It was really cute as it bounced around in the tree branches. My favorite animal of the hike was the tractor millipede. It is about three inches long and smells like marzipan when you scratch its back! I wonder if it tastes like marzipan...Apparently, the millipede secretes the marzipan odor for protection because most animals don't like the smell. Oh yeah, there were also small glow-in-the-dark mushrooms growing along the side of the trail every so often.

We had some down time in the afternoon because there are not too many animals out during the hottest part of the day. Leslie and I spent part of the time relaxing in hammocks, looking up at the canopy. It is amazing all the life you can see when you lie still. All around us were insects, lizards (with a really bright yellow neck), and squirrels. It was so relaxing we both ended up falling asleep.

In the late afternoon it started raining (as can be expected in a rain forest), so we rushed into the boats for our evening boat ride. As Leslie and I huddled under our umbrella, we watched proboscis monkeys and macaques jump through the trees and chase each other along the river bank. We also spotted silver leaf monkeys and all the other birds mentioned before. By far the coolest thing we saw that ride were the hundreds of flying foxes (a type of large bat with a face that looks like a fox) soaring through the sky.

We made it back just as it started pouring and got to enjoy a nice warm dinner.All the meals at Uncle Tan's are really good. It was buffet style with seven to ten different stir fries over white rice. And they go heavy on the veggies which was really nice. The meal always ends with cut up watermelon, which is a perfect dessert in the hot, humid tropics. As you can imagine, Leslie took full advantage of this buffet! One British dude even commented on the massive amounts of food Leslie ate, saying, "For a small guy, Leslie can sure eat a lot!".

Our last outing was the night hike. It was really fun because we all had flashlights, so we could all participate in finding wildlife. We saw 2 different types of frogs, another kind of civet (whose eyes flashed red), the poisonous wolf spider (which is about 5 inches big and has a really cool pattern on its back), and, of course, a lot of other insects. Our guide also found a sleeping ashy-tailor bird. It was an adorable small fluff ball that cannot see in the dark, so we were able to get as close to it as we wanted. Right at the end of the hike, Leslie spotted a huge (8 inches long!) centipede. It was feasting on a worm when Leslie first saw it, but quickly ran away when we shined our lights on it to get a closer look. Our guide told us that centipedes are poisonous and can leave some nasty bites. It took a lot of will power to crawl into bed that night!



Overall our rain forest camping experience was really cool and exciting. But we were definitely grateful at the end of three days when we got back to the luxuries and comforts of civilization.

Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Center

What a flurry of updates! Don't miss the Kinabulu post just below!

Before we left for our Rainforest camping experience we stopped by the nearby Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Center, one of 3 such centers in the world. The goal is to slowly rehabilitate injured or sick orangutans and reintroduce them to the wild.

The center is located at the edge of the rain forest, and a wooden boardwalk extends out to their feeding time platform. This gives visitors a chance to see orangutans up close. During the actual feeding time, a worker sits on a platform 10 m away with a bucket of bananas and hands them over to the orangutans that come. Macaques scurry around trying to snatch half eaten bananas. The better thieves make off with a whole bunch. Two orangutans showed up for the feeding, although other travelers have told us that up to 5 have shown up at a time.

We stuck around on the boardwalk after most of the tourist left and watched the macaques claiming the scraps and scampering around. As we began to leave, an orangutan appeared on the walkway and started walking towards us with a gentle, lumbering grace. It passed in front of Rashmi by about 1 ft!



Afterwards we wanted to head out to a short 2 km jungle trail. As we walked along the boardwalk, we saw an approaching band of macaques chasing 2 panicked tourist towards us. We faced off the monkeys a little bit and they quietly would pass us or sit down and have a grooming session. As I filmed a grooming couple a passing macaque jumped on my backpack and held on!


The Troublemakers

He seemed to be clinging on in curiosity and not aggression although I still did not want a monkey on my back. I swung around a few times and was able to shake him off, but after that we quickly made our way to the trail. The trail itself was muddy and overgrown. As we pushed through we saw small black worms perched on leaves reaching and extending towards us. It was our first leech encounter!


We carefully picked our way through and saw numerous butterflies and crawling insects. A group in front of us pointed out a walking stick insect on the ground! We were very excited to see it as it can be very hard to spot.



As we hiked back I realized my toe was bleeding, but I hasn't felt it get cut! It just kept bleeding and bleeding and I realized a leech must have bitten me and put in some anticoagulant. When we returned to the center, I sat down and did a leech check and found one squirming in my belt buckle! I'm glad the leech didn't bite me anywhere in that region! Overall we definitely got had a fun experience and got up close with some creatures we wouldn't have otherwise.

Kinabulu National Park

We arrived on June 24th via minibus to Kinabulu National Park. The 2 hr ride up into the mountains was in a packed van with no AC. Along the way way made some detours such as picking up store room supplies from a local KFC!

Kinabulu National Park is a World Heritage site and contains the highest mountain between the Himalayasa and Papua New Guinea. At the center sits Mt. Kinabulu (4095 m) which towers over the park. Instead of a sharp distinct peak, the top has a number of peaks and bulges similar to beaten meringue. Many visitors come to the park for the grueling 2 day hike up to the top for a glorious or foggy sunrise. Fog is the more likely outcome as most days the mountain top was covered in fog. One tourist was even shocked to see the mountain after 2 days of staying nearby! We decided to explore the trails of the park on our own instead of paying the permit, guide, and mountain hostel fees just to hike up to the top in the dark.





A caterpillar? It would drop down on a strand of silk/web

Most of the trails were part of a forest that gets a large amount of moisture from the fog clous that constantly rolls through. We didn't see too many animals, although we spotted a woodpecker in action. We did see many colorful butterflies which Kinabulu is known for.

Quick pop quiz! What is the scientific name of this butterfly? It was quite large, with a wingspan of about 5 inches

The park also has a large amount of endemic species. In particular are 3 different species of carnivorous pitcher plants. Since we didn't shoot for the summit, we missed out on seeing the other flora that occupy the higher alpine ecosystems.

A pitcher plant endemic to the area. Source: Wikipedia

Overall, the park was great, with good trail markers and facilities. Prices to stay in hostels have been enormously inflated as they prepare themselves for a more international crowd, however lodging just 800 m from the entrance is reasonable. The park also contains a small botanical garden that gathered the carious flowering and more interesting plants, although, it must not have been in season when we went to see it.