Going Monkeys!

Perhentian Islands

 These Islands are Malaysia's bread and butter. The islands are a protected marine park, which means no fishing.  There is no power on the islands, so each hotel/hostel runs a generator to provide the electricity.  Everything is brought in, from food and water to propane and day to day supplies. It all gets brought in by boat and walked to each place that requires it. A tough feat in the heat of the sun. We stayed here for a week and enjoyed ourselves quite a bit. Our guesthouse turned the power off at 7:30 am and once the fan turned off, we woke up and got out as quick as possible. Our bungalow was on a hill side with a cute little porch from where we could sit and look out at the beautiful view. With the water and beach being the main attraction here, we spent most of our time snorkeling, laying on the beach reading and drinking iced vanilla lattes. The water here was some of the nicest we have seen in our 3 months. (Very similar to that in Koh Lipe, Thailand) Crystal clear with the prettiest shades of blue. Bedded with the softest white sand. The snorkeling was great!!! We saw so many types of fish, big beautiful coral reefs and we were even lucky enough to spot a sea turtle. A huge highlight is snorkeling with six or seven large reef sharks. Yes, that right, we said SHARKS! We never thought that we would be alone swimming with sharks that were nearly 2 feet away from us.  AMAZING!!  To top it off, that day just happened to be our 2 year anniversary! It was a pretty amazing way to celebrate!

Sunrise from our balcony.

  

2 year anniversary dinner and expensive drinks.

Buying a fresh coconut for $1.60..well worth it.  

Batu Caves

From the Perhentian's we had to venture back to Kuala Lumpur. Luckily the smoke had cleared so we were able to venture out of the city and to the famous Batu Caves. During the Thaipusam festival in late January, this cave fills with over a million Hindu pilgrims coming to show their devotion. Some doing major piercings with large hooks and carry heavy objects (via the piercings) all the way up the stairs and into the caves. It would have been something else to be there when the festival was taking place, but it might have been a bit overwhelming as well. We sweated our way up the 272 steps and into the very large caves that were full of tourists, monkeys and pigeons.

From the bottom of the stairs looking up.

At the top looking in to the cave.

Kuching

After doing some calculating of how much time we have left (which is around 8 months) and all the places we still want to see, we realized that maybe we are going a bit slower than we should. We sacrificed our hopes to see the Tioman Islands and hopped on another flight bound for Kuching, which is on the island of Borneo. We got right to it and headed to a rehabilitation center for Orangutans. They have 26 Orangutans that roam an area of 568 hectors. We took an easy hike into the park, following a park ranger. He had just finished telling us "if the big Orangutan comes near you, walk away quickly. If he continues to follow, run for you life." Although they put out a small basket of fruit, you only have an hour to sit in silence and cross your fingers to see if one actually decides to show up. We knew if we saw 1 or 2 we would be lucky! We did see 1. We heard the crashing of branches in the distance and to our pure delight he made a swinging entrance in. Taking a bit of the fruit he spent about 30 min hanging from his toes and doing cartwheels from one rope to the other. He left the same way he came, back through the highest of trees with only the noise of the branches and leaves crashing together behind him!!

Lots of food in his mouth and foot.

The next day we headed to Bako National Park in hopes to see the rare Probiscos Monkeys. (aka long nosed monkey, aka The Dutch Monkey) Which are endemic to the island of Borneo. We hiked on the trail most known to see the monkeys. But all any of us saw was a flash of Kelly's buttocks, due to her shorts getting ripped on a tree branch. It was a disappoint for all. :) On our way back though we did get a glimpse of a green snake, bearded boars, silvered langur monkeys and macaque monkeys. After lunch we decided to venture out on one more attempt to see the Proboscis Monkeys. And as luck would have it, Dean spotted one up in the trees. We hurried excitedly to get a better glimpse and we were ecstatic when we ended up watching a group of 6 or so for about an hour. They really do have large noses and big bellies. They make a noise that sounds similar to a dog barking. We watched them until our necks hurt from looking up and theirs hurt from looking down.  Another tick off our list of things we wanted to see.

Macaque Monkey

Hiking with our new friend Laura from England.

Langur Monkey.

Bearded Boar eating someones shoes.

 The snake Kelly avoided!!

Proboscis Monkey!!!

From here we are arming ourselves with our malaria medication and taking a boat and crossing parts of the South China Sea to Sibu. Then up the Rajang river to Kapit. From there we will spend 1 night and then hope to catch another boat far into the rainforest to see the lives of some indigenous people and the famous longhouses that they live in. We think and hope we will be getting off of the beaten path for a few days at least. We then will only have 2 more weeks on our Malaysian Borneo visa. Next up Indonesia!!