There is a short botanical trail which we decide to do on our last morning before we fly to Kuching.
We see lots of plants and more variety of lizards than ever before:
Skinks:
Our trusty ATR-72 (the wings didn’t fall off in the missed approach in bad weather) and 3 hours later dinner in Basaga, which is also a popular restaurant and bar destination in Kuching.
Spider!:
Today it is time for our unguided jungle trek. Any unaccompanied walking needs to be registered with security and the guy asks lots of questions about the kids.
We intend to walk to the waterfall where you can swim and then decide whether to continue or not.
We’re on our way to Paku waterfall. Many of the plants here would do well as house plants.
Pretty dragonfly and Jane has a tiger leach:
Lots of trees like this one. A millipede:
Swimming at the Paku waterfall:
Well camouflaged frog and another house plant:
Squirrel?
Almost done. Mulu Village on the other side of the river:
Chicken at village and a small leach (that didn’t attach yet):
Some more lizards:
We complete the walk in 3.5 hours or so which is 2 hours quicker than we expected.
Large Meranti on the way to the Canopy Walk
Alex with our guide:
Every tree you see is full of parasites and other trees that take advantage of it’s elevation:
Elephant ears and the path near the cafe
Another pretty snake spotted next to the cafe:
In the afternoon we do the Deer and Lang cave walk. On the way we spot wild bananas (even the monkeys don’t eat those) and a very yellow/green grashoppery animal:
There is a little information point and snack shop near Deer and Lang cave. Deer cave is right behind us in the picture. We also spot a tiny orange baby snake on the other side of the stream:
Deer cave is enormous and has some really cool features:
Stalagtites growing sideways with the help of some light and bacteria:
Bat exodus from Deer cave:
In the middle of the night Alex wakes up because he needs to wee. I find some pretty big cockroaches in the bathroom. I forgot about them! If you want to live in SEA you need to learn to ignore them! Airco helps a lot to drown out the sound of the occasional patter of insect feet on the polished floor.