Kinabatangan River - "Let's Get Out of Here!"

The Kinabatangan is the curvy river we saw in “Landing in Borneo”. It winds its way for 500 km from the mountains of southwest Sabah to Sandakan and the sea. Its path winds its way through a patchwork of protected areas, settled areas, and palm oil plantations. It supports rich ecosystems of wildlife and was the attraction of our second stop in Borneo, at the Hornbill Lodge near Bilit, Sabah.

We didn’t know what to expect at the Hornbill. It sounded quite nice, but it is also Borneo, where there is quite a range of accommodation. It turned out to be quite lux by our standards. Our cabin at the lodge struck me as an upscale Wisconsin lake house, up above the water and the dock below. However, don’t go in the water, because - crocodiles. And don’t go for a hike alone, because - orangutans. This seemed like our first real step into Borneo. It was pretty exciting.

The stay was organized around boat “cruises” on the river to see wildlife and generally explore the region. Our guide was terrific. He could spot wildlife invisible to rest of us - and, as I told him - played that boat like a Stradivarius, especially in narrow areas.

Our first trip out we saw lots of monkeys - long tail and short tail macaques and proboscis monkeys, an occasional crocodile, and lots of egrets, eagles, and other birds.

These photos were taken with my phone, many zoomed way in. So, sorry for the bluring is some cases.

Long tail macaques.

Probiscus Monkeys.

Macaques?

Little crocodile.

We went on a night hike and saw some amphibians. The highlight was a viper! Ok, it was a small one and non-venomous but a viper! Check.

On one of our last cruises, we were treated to a primate mating ritual of the homo sapiens. A Dutch couple in our group were engaged on our boat. They stood on the prow of the boat as the male proposed. It was very touching and it felt special to be witness to this moment, of course. The man’s proposal was involved and he declined to translate for us - saying it was hard enough in Dutch.

By our second day we were hearing about wild elephants in the area. Our guide to us out in the boat to search the area where they had been seen. We looked sharply at the banks for what we imagined to be a small group of pigmy elephants, but we didn't find any. The next day he was resolved that we should find them. So out we went. After a long ride through narrowing streams, he tied up our boat and went off on foot to scout. He found them, so off we went to see them. Unfortunately they were on private property - on one of the palm oil plantations in the patchwork of land management farther away from the Kinabatangan. So, we were met by security guards on motorbikes and had to leave. We were there though long enough to get a pretty good glimpse of a large herd (~200?) large Asian elephants. It was impressive. Photos are grainy - blown up from a distance. One of our group had a camera with a telephoto lens and got some great pictures. We're hoping she will send us some but she hasn't yet.

Our very last cruise was a night cruise, before our departure the next day. I had arranged to go out in the forest recording with one of the guides, so missed the cruise. But Teresa went out on the boat and saw one of the most amazing sites in our stay there - a crocodile about as long and as girthed as the boat, traveling at the speed of the boat in parallel. It arroused a strong conflicted mix of emotions - “this is one of the most amazing things I’ve ever seen” and “let’s get out of here!”.. You learn to trust these guides. They casually exhibit all kinds of competence and familiarity with the environment there, and for Teresa, that trust won out.

While Teresa was on the night cruise, I was out in the forest with Marlan Mardan, part of the management at Hornbill and an experienced guide. He took me to a clearing which seemed like a good place to set up and this began what I had so looked forward to on this trip - recording forests in Borneo. We had a pretty good stretch before boat motors started arriving in the distance. It wasn’t a long stretch but it was a start and I felt like we were now underway in this Borneo recording trip. It felt great.

And of course, trees.

And it's always beautiful on the river.

"Get me out of here"? We hated to leave. But Danum Valley, the prime destination of our Borneo trip was up next.