3rd August - Kinabatangan River to Lahad Datu - catch-up 28/7 to 3/8

Monday 28^th July

sunset

Hari Raya – the end of Ramadan and the Muslim world goes crazy!  Fireworks, food, drinks all day – they are so happy!

We got up very early and went on a Barefoot Lodge ecotour, on a little boat, up one of the side streams of the Kinabatnagan. 

sunrise

It was lovely, out in the early morning COOL air.  Everyone else, on these tours, has seen fabulously colourful birds, orangutans, and elephants.  Some people we spoke to had seen a herd of twenty or more, bathing the river, and strolling along the muddy banks.   But it was not to be, today.  We saw lots of monkeys – macaques, and proboscis, and some egrets.

macaques

I got some fabulous monkey photos, mind you…

more macaques

Including this close-up portrait shot of the Leader of the Pack…

Proud alpha male, always at the ready...

We sat with a very nice gang of four from Adelaide – Des, Di, Kerry, Dave.

They are having an adventure packed two weeks in Borneo, and are very cheerful about everything they see and do.  Including their sleepless nights in the Barefoot Lodge… The resident pack of dogs has been squabbling, barking and fighting on the little verandah right outside their door.  As well as this, whenever the dogs stop, their ears are assaulted by the very loud Call To Prayers from the mosque very close by.  To add insult to injury, in the morning Des’s shoes had vanished, both of them… they have probably been used as part of a gigantic tug-of-war between the dogs…

Back in Sandakan, I did a big load of washing in the shower block.  Janice and Mick (SV Zoa) gave me a ride back to 2XS in their dinghy, and Mick accidentally kicked the bucket (literally not figuratively.)  They found one lone item and brought it over yesterday…

We went for a walk in the village in the morning and were invited to Hari Raya celebrations up and down the street.  I (fortunately) had some small clip-on koalas to give the small (non-clip-on) children.

And…a few balls to make them happy…

The boys immediately did some nifty footie moves, to impress the crowd.

Later at the jetty we met some beautifully dressed girls.

One of them was VERY keen to chat, to practise her English, and...to model for us!

Didi

So how is our health and temper?  Well poor Catherine has a dreadful coughy snotty cold.  She is being very brave but it is just ghastly, feeling ill and having a cold in such a hot climate.  John has the beginnings of a cold too.  Pete has a badly stubbed toe which is black and blue.  And I have a bright red eye… last night in the Barefoot Lodge restaurant a flying insect dive-bombed my eye.  I wept and swept it out but it is very unpleasant, not to say unsightly.  Other than that we are ticketyboo!

Tuesday 29^th July

We are now anchored in Dewhurst Bay, out of the Kinabtangan River.  We are on a bit of shallow mud, waiting for the tide to go out because…Pete and John are hoping to be able to remove the propeller to fix a bit of a problem with a big bit of rope tightly wound around it…

O5 degrees 35.742N

118 degrees 35.171E

This morning we took the dinghy (with cups of tea) up one of the side streams of the river, hoping to see orangutans and elephants.  No luck with the larger animals but we did see large packs of monkeys, being as entertaining as ever, and some fabulous birds.

This one is unromantically known as the Short-Billed Kingfisher…I think it should have a MUCH more colourful name!

And this one is a Buffy Fish Owl (I do approve of this name…)

The Team made a valiant effort to free the rope this morning but…it was all too hard.  In the afternoon we went up onto the mud and Pete waded around for hours in the dark whittling away at the offending rope until it was free.  At midnight we managed to get off the mudbank and out into deeper water.

Saturday 2^nd August

Co-ordinates

05 degrees 00.898N

118 degrees 19.834S

Depth 5.9m

Can’t tell anything much about this anchorage; it is dark and there are bewildering lights around.  Lots of very big fishing boats in our way to the anchorage, none of them with any lights at all.  Stress!

Imagine this thwacking great thing with NO lights, in the dark dark night...

It is 8pm and feels like the middle of the night… We have arrived in Lahad Datu after leaving our anchorage at Evans Island at 5.30am…Catherine has left 2XS; she is flying back to Brisbane early tomorrow morning.

One of her last tasks on the boat was to sneak around behind Captain Pete to replace our poor tattered and torn flag.  The red ensign has been up for a few weeks now – Pete isn’t entirely sure about it; the redness is all WRONG, to him.  But our other small blue flag was so tattered and torn it made us all sad to see it.  I really like this photo; John and Catherine are pleased and proud and Pete has no idea that things have changed, behind his back…

We will miss her!

I am so tired I can barely lift my fingers to the keyboard but there seems to be internet connection here, if faint…

It is so very slow I am not sure if I will get anything up on the net but…as usual, I will try.

So… Happy birthday Jeff! Just to prove how much I love and trust my son-in-law: he is the very one I have asked to be in charge of administering my living will, carefully concocted between the two of us, with many shrieks of laughter.  (Of course I trust all of three of them but Jeff is the one, poor thing, carefully selected for the task…)  Jeff continues to win hearts and minds in his professional life as well as in his personal life.  We all love him and are inordinately proud of his achievements.