Top to Bottom:

Live band karaoke on the oil rig: frida and caroline
the rig
boat ride to the rig
enormous buffets on the mountain climbs and the biggest and best at the bottom
coming down the mountain (the 2nd time)
the mountain's shadow
team sweden and the colorado kid at the top...for the 2nd time in 10 hours
sunrise from the top and using my socks as gloves
still hot and warm from the climb up
night photo break
the sunset climb up the mountain
all alone on the summit after breaking the rules and climbing the fence to summit alone
views and sunset over the ocean
views going up the mountain to reach sunset
Reaching Laban Rata resthouse
Team Sweden at lunch
View of Kinabalu from the base and beginning of hike
Muddy at the mud volcano on Pulau Tiga
Gorgeous water and sunset at Pulau Tiga
Ashlin and Caitlin at night safari and singapore zoo
"Bali Hai" view of Tioman
Sunset on Tioman
across island hike with dormmates on tioman

Underwater Eden and living it up on an oil rig

6/23 So Frida, Caroline and I took the taxi to the bus station to catch the overnight bus.

6/24 We got dropped off in semporna around 4am and just decided to sleep at the bus stop until our dive operator picked us up at 8:30. I was wary of rats though as we know what has happened sleeping at bus stops before. Except this place was much cleaner and less sketchy. After getting picked up we took the boat out towards Mabul island. It was a cool boat ride going by several islands and hundreds of houses and buildings just sitting on stilts in the middle of the ocean. Turns out it's pretty shallow there and lots and lots of the fishermen have houses just built out of the ocean. As we approached Pulau Mabul we could see this giant orange structure rising above the water, towering over it. That was where we would be spending the next 3 days. Run by seaventures (recommended by Chris back in the perhentians), it is an old converted oil rig. How unique is that? Sleeping and diving from a giant oil rig. The boat arrived at the bottom of the rig and we hopped on this external winch elevator and were pulled up and welcomed with drinks. We quickly realized that we were the only whiteys on the rig. There were about 20 total divers on the rig. Looking at the dive schedule was quite hilarious. It was full of Li Xi, Qin Ming, Xing Zao, Hong Me...etc...etc. until you got to boring Travis Guy, Frida Albertssons, and Caroline Burman. We all had a good laugh with that. The rig was all malaysian workers, chinese divers, and 1 coloradoan and 2 swedes. We checked into our rooms which were quite nice considering we were on a rig. The rig was actually quite cool. Had great views of the ocean and mabul island. Game rooms, a huge dining deck, and a really big sundeck. We did a checkout dive at the reef under the rig. It was cool. It's famous for "muck" diving where you see some unsual creatures. We saw crocodile fish, frogfish, lots of scorpion fish, lion fish, and tons of these long thing needle fish. After the checkout we had an amazingly tasty and amazingly huge buffet lunch. Our crazy indulging eating habits from the hike up kinabalu would continue here at sipadan where there was buffets, tea time snacks, and oreos to be had round the clock. After the check-out dive and lunch caroline and I went for another dive under the rig. One of the beauties of diving with this company is that you get your 3 dives at sipadan, 3 dives at mabul/kapalai and then unlimited diving in the house reef. I can thank my lucky stars that I met caroline and frida b/c not only did it give me a dive buddy and cheaper transport by boat, but it gave me, in caroline, and amazing dive buddy. She's an excellent diver and has advanced open water like me, so there wasn't ever a problem with depth or if there was a strong current or running out of air or anything. And also, caroline is a go getter like me. So we made sure we dove as much as was possible according to dive limits with surface intervals and all that. The 2nd dive under the rig was quite cool for me b/c it was the first time I had gone diving with no dive master, and we did it with an insane "hurricane" current. So it was just us finding our way around and deciding where we would go. After the 2nd house reef dive, we went to Mabul Island for a dusk dive. This was another great muck dive. Saw some mandarin fish (the most beautiful fish in my opinion), some cuttlefish, some sort of eel I'd never seen before, several unique crabs and prawns, and even some turtles overhead.
That night after an amazing meal (of course) some of the divemasters and staff started playing music. I, of course with my new found love of karaoke from the philippines and somehow courage (it helps in these countries when you're the only native english speaker so they can't really tell how bad a singer you are) got up to sing a few songs while the band played the music. Of course I had my backup girls of caroline and frida. So we spent the night singing, dancing, and of course crazy dancing. It was really just the three of us and this one chinese guy, Lie Yi, who I really liked and spoke pretty good english for chinese. We eventually headed off to bed, me full of excitement for the day ahead as tomorrow would be sipadan

6/25 We left at 6am for the 45 minute boat ride to sipadan, full of expectation as this is listed as a top 5 dive spot in the world. The boat ride was bumpy and you could see a malaysian destroyer battle ship off in the distance. We got to the tiny island (similar size to the Estes Park Highschool building I would say). Beautiful island of course with a white sand beach, palm trees, and aqua water. The reef is highgly protected (a great thing) so you have to get off the boat, sign in, and show the permit (they only let like 100 divers a day go). A funny thing that you notice right away is a building near the beach, with barbed wire fences it, sand-bag hideouts and trench things built with millitary guys behind holding huge machine guns. You may think that this is to protect the reef from illegal fishing, but you'd be wrong. C'mon, this is asia, they would never protect a natural thing that much. They're there to protect the island as malaysia's. See one of the amazing things about this dive site is that it has amazing wall dives b/c from the reef, the wall drops down 1500 feet. What this means, is that the island is not really part of a major land mass such as borneo, so it went unclaimed for a while. Then malaysia figured out the tourist potential and claimed it. Since then the philippines and indonesia have attacked it on a regular basis to try and lay claim to it. The last major issue and the reason for the millitary presence now was that a couple of years ago a philippine group attacked the island, overan the few police on it and kidnapped about 20 tourists. So it was quite the funny contrast of beautiful coral and millitary base. We did three dives there. All three AMAZING! Great wall dives with gorgeous corals and so much fish. Then dives with monstrous schools of barracuda and jacks and other schooling fish. Whitetip reef sharks everywhere. Green and hawksbill turtles everywhere. You'd get out of breath you were so excited. Look right shark, left turtle, up barracuda. It was crazy. We checked out the opening of this giant cave. It goes in like 70m and apparently there are lots of turtle skeletons b/c sometimes they go in to sleep and then get lost and drown. For the same reason, we didn't enter (but actually more like the extra 150 ringitt charge). But all three dives were just amazing, seeing so much. Frida was only snorkelling, but she saw everything and turtles and sharks too. In between each dive we'd go on shore for our surface interval and eat and eat (of course). After dive 3, we headed back to the our home, the rig. Caroline and I of course headed right down for another dive on the house reef where we explored some more. After that, considering it's not too good to push the dive limits, we decided to not do a late afternoon dive and wait for the night dive. Instead we swam from the oil rig to mabul island for some snorkelling. They said it was 1km to the island, but I'd say more like 600 meters, but maybe fins make it that much easier. The workers on the rig, were all like, don't go, don't go the current is too strong, you'll be swept out to sea. But I wasn't too worried as we'd been diving in the current, and I knew I was strong enough to swim it and plus they'd all be watching us and would send the boat after us if we did get pushed far out. Caroline seemed comfortable with it as well, so we headed out. Cake. didn't take too long. I went a bit slower to make sure caroline would be ok as I didn't know how good of a swimmer she was, but she kept up quite well, which is mainly props to her, but also my saddening state of swimming strength on this trip. We got to the island and snorkelled a bit. Saw a couple turtles and even found the mandarin fish again. We were going to get a lift back from the boat there that had divers, but the swim wasn't bad, so we swam back. They were all quite impressed with our swimming when we got back to the rig. We had found out earlier in the day that they had 2 more permits open up for sipadan so we could go again if we wanted. This is very lucky b/c it's hard enough to get one permit. So we had the difficult (but good kind of difficult) decision to make as to whether to go back to sipadan with all the big stuff or do the dives at mabul witht the macro stuff. We decided on sipadan as it is world class and hard to get. That night we went to the huge sundeck and brought some mats and fell asleep on the deck watching the stars and enjoying the breeze. Sometime in the middle of the night it started to rain and we were forced back to our cabins

6/26 Got up early again for another 3 dives in sipadan. Again AMAZING! I think even more sharks and turtles this time. The great thing here is that either the sharks and turtles are so used to people or haven't been hunted, but they are quite friendly. You can get really close to the sleeping sharks before they swim off and the ones swimming about will swim up pretty close. And the turtles will just swim up really close and when they're resting you can get really close to them and could touch them if you wanted (though this is bad b/c the oil on your hands can allow things to grow on their shells). One of the dives we did we just came upon shark after shark after shark. It was unbelievable. And of course turtles left and right and a few napolean wrasse's as well. Besides all the great fish, sharks, and turtles, I alway got a good laugh out of Lie yi and his wife (she told us to call her daisy, and I don't remember her chinese name). Daisy never swam independantly and Lie yi would just pull her along everywhere by her hand. Never separated. And they weren't the best divers, so at times they'd go in a spin or just be kind of out of control. One of the highlights of the day was this octopus. I'd only very briefly seen an octopus before as they quickly go for a whole the second they see you. But this one wasn't too scared. When we first saw it, it was greyish yellow, just sitting on a coral. Then when we got closer it swam to a different coral. In mid swim it was jet black, and then it turned to a whitish color on it's new coral. We watched it for a while and it wouldn't swim away. I put my fin down near it and the octopus shimmered a bit and turned a bit blue as if deciding if it should turn to blue like my fin. After the three dives, we headed back for the giant orange oil rig. We packed up and enjoyed one last great lunch. I had wanted to jump from the rig, which is a pretty decent height, so after lunch I did it. Caroline had said she would but she had gotten all showered and dressed before, so she said she wouldn't do it. I jumped in, but when I looked up, she had change and was getting ready to jump as well. I kind of wish I had jumped earlier there b/c it was fun and I would have liked to jump more and even perhaps go from the very top, but it was time for our ride back to Semporna.
Back at semporna we ate dinner and I said goodbye to my newest swedish friends as they got on the night bus back to KK. I was definitely a bit sad as they were great travel buddies and were becoming good friends. I really really liked them as they were fun, adventurous, active, not afraid to dance, and very similar to me in traveling and activities. They're the kind of travellers that stay busy all the time and don't ever just sit around. Aside from the one and only stringbean, they have been the most active travellers I've been with But Caroline had to get back to med-school and frida to finishing up her thesis and getting a real job. But who knows, maybe I'll see them again. Colorado is definitely a hotspot vacation spot for people like them and I now have quite a list of swedish friends (including peter forsberg =) so maybe I'll head back there sometime, or as we are all travellers, on the road again.
But it's time to get on the road again and meet some other cool people. Tomorrow I think I'll be heading to Lahad Datu to see what I can do about getting into Danum Valley Research Field Centre.

Notes on Singapore

Just wanted to make a few random notes on singapore, b/c I mainly just talked about my time with the Carlisles. I didn't experience "true" singapore much, at least not the true singapore that backpackers are supposed to see according to guide books. But then again, I think I saw a very true part of singapore, b/c a lot of singapore is indeed expats working there.
It's a very, very clean city, unlike any other asian city I have been to. It's very modern and laid out nice with big streets, sidewalks, open space, and excellent commuter transportation. It's no longer true that you can't chew gum, but it is true that you can't buy gum there. They have trash police that are on the look out for litterers. It's also an extremely overprotective place and have warning signs for absolutely everything. Every body of water has signs that mention drowning. The mtn bike trail had signs warning for every little obstacle and even telling you to walk your bike on steep ups and downs (yea right!). There just seems to be a warning sign for everything.
One thing I found interesting was the expat sort of community. I have always been in love with East Africa and have read lots of books on it, almost all from westerners that live there (out of africa, born free, the green hills of africa, the man-eaters of tsavo), and I alway found that highclass western society living in africa quite interesting and amusing. Well, here in singapore it often felt sort of similar, except obviously much more modern and of course I was disappointed that the majority of the expats seemed to drive toyota SUVS or bmw's instead of land rovers...haha. But all the same, I still found that to be quiet interesting.

Today Caroline and Frida and I went to Tunku Abdul Rahman National Park. It's a np made up of 5 beautiful islands. We went to Pulau Mamutik, which was tiny and very beautiful. Snorkelled around a bit and I swam around the island as well. There were several other people I recognized from the mountain relaxing there too. And you could always tell who they were b/c they would be walking funny and having trouble on the stairs. Tonight we are taking the night bus to semporna b/c we have decided to do the diving at Mabul and Sipadan

Top of SE Asia...back to my element

Luckily met a nice man where I booked my accomadation for the trek up Mt. Kinabalu and he was able to get me a van ride with 4 other people on packaged tours even though I wasn't on one so that my transport was cheap and quick and also group me with two other people so that I could share guide fees with them. He said, "there is a couple who say they are from canada, but they speak french, so I think they're french, and you know how they are, and then there are two swedish girls and young, who do you want to go with?" As much as I would have liked to go with the french posing as canadians...or more likely just french canadians from quebec, I chose the two swedish girls. We all met up at the travel agency and the french/canadian couple was indeed from montreal and very nice and they had done the trek up gunung tahan and described it as "miserable" They were much more scared of the bees than us and hid in their tents and when they had to go out had full clothing and even socks on their hands (as opposed to us in our underwear). As it turns out, I made the right choice to go with the swedes as they were my age, not too bad looking, but most importantly quite cool and in great shape so I didn't have to go painstakingly slow and boringly up the mountain.
We got dropped off at the base, which is at about 1585m (5.200ft) and met our guide, Fendly, and did all the paperwork. You are required to have a guide in another prime example of asian over-protectiveness. The trail was easy to follow and by far easier than any of the major mountains I"ve climbed in Rocky Mtn outside of hallet and flattop. You then take a bus up to the timphon gate 1866m (6,157ft) where you must show your guide and permit and this badge they give you to wear around your neck along with your permit number to get through the gate. (the badge had the date, and as you really have no idea of dates and days of the week while travelling I amusedly noted that it said june 21, the longest day of the year) Everyone was wearing these neck badges the whole time and it was quite amusing to me. I sure as heck wasn't going to climb a mountain wearing some number (at albertson college of idaho, they told me I am not a number!), so I stuffed it into my pack. The hike to the resthouse where you sleep is only 6km and then from there another 2.8km to the peak. These are very short distances, but don't be fooled, it takes longer than you think b/c it's straight up. in the 8.8km (5.5 miles), you go up 2229m (7355ft)! In comparison, longs peak you go up roughly 5000ft from the 9,200 ft of the trailhead to 14,200ft summit in a little over 8 miles, and longs is steep as i'm sure mom can attest. We started late, the last ones in fact b/c we had an issue with my permit as I had booked last minute and the sytem had been down that day. We started around 11am (they say to start no later than 10am). Just a few meters into the trail we went by a nice waterfall, but after that it was basically up up and more up on crazy stairs. The cool thing from a biologists point of view is that during th hike you go through like 14 vegetation zones. Quickly I realized that the swedes (Caroline and Frida) were in shape. I let them lead and they took up a burning pace. We stopped for lunch around the elevation of Estes Park, and I was a little embarassed at how hard I was breathing at that elevation, even if I had the fact I had been at sea level for the past 6 months as an excuse with little cardio exercise. After lunch we continued the quick pace passing people left and right until we were actually nearly the first people up there. It took us 3 hours, and the estimated time is 4-6. The resthouse was a large dorm at a place caled laban rata (3270m, 10791ft) with some amazing views of the giant granite mountain through the mist and at about treel line. This is where you are supposed to acclimatize for the summit push in the morning as lots of people do suffer quite badly from altitude sickness. We rested for a bit drinking sabah tea and relishing the cool weather which reminded us all of june in Estes/Sweden. As we were feeling good and we knew the trail was good, we decided to go for the summit that afternoon to see if we could see the sunset. If would be iffy if we'd see anything as the clouds were moving in and out with some rain, but the main problem is that you have to be on the trail with a guide at all times and our guide said we couldn't go up in the afternoon (didn't actually say it, but implied it with body language), only in the morning like normal. Well...that didn't really stop us. We said we were going off for a nap and instead walked to where the trail started. There was a huge fence and gate blocking the way, which did little to stop us, and soon we were on our way. Got caught in a rainstorm for a little bit, but after that we had some amazing views of the massif. The whole mountain is just this huge granite monster. Giant slabs of granite and whole peaks of granite. After 30 mintues or so, you leave the trail and are just following the "white rope" along granite slabs the whole way. I was much relieved by this point to find that my body had remembered that it was from the rocky mountain state and had no problems breathing anymore. That little bit of estes blood will never leave. We had fun climbing and looking at the amazing scenery, taking photos, and the videos with the camcorder they brought. We made it to the summit by about 5:45pm after climbing for 2 hours. It was amazing. We had this whole place to ourself. It was massive in expanse and incredibly quiet too. The setting sun was casting beautiful shadows and the misty clouds added to the effect. We relished the cold as we sat there and also the fact that there we were all alone on top of thie beautiful and famous mountain, and in a few hours there would be no room on the summit as the 150 or so climbers with permits woud be up here. It was a trully magical moment for me and one of my highlights in asia so far. It was cold, which was so nice and I noticed goosebumps (what are those?), the first I'd had in over 6 months. A chilly nose and numb hands were also lovely feelings. I was back in my element , at a high elevation on a mountain peak(4095m, 13513ft), sitting in the cold, looking out over massive granite mountains, feeling exhillerated after a touch climb...but with a touch of asia, looking far down at jungle and the ocean and sharing mango slices with the swedish gals. We were just loving watching the beauty. We wanted to watch the sunset and we had brought flashlights for going down, but unfortunately the buffet dinner was from 5:30 to 7:30 and we were all quite hungry and the sun was taking forever to set. It sets much later when you're 13,000ft high looking over the ocean than when on a beach! I then noted that it was the longest day of the year, repeating what I had said earlier, and we all got quite the laugh out of that. We could see the sun heading for the ocean, but we decided it best to go. We moved fast following our tummies to get to the food. In fact we ran down the granite slabs as they were fairly smooth, just really steep. We made it back by 7:15, just in time to get a huge and tasty buffet dinner.
We all went to bed early as you have to get up early to go for the summit in time for sunrise. Most of the people would be leaving between 1:30am an 2:30am to reach the summit, but as team sweden and the colorado kid were pretty fast we were going to sleep and leave at 3:30am. Of course once the rest of the 60 person dorm (separated into small rooms of 2 bunks) woke up at 1am and started moving about with their big boots, there was no sleeping. It was chilly up at that elevation, which was perfect for me to sleep. I woke up around 11 to pee b/c I had heard the guy below me leave and I thought this was a good time b/c I wouldn't wake him when I got up. He was in the hall in full ski jacket, gloves, and ski hat and just shaking. He asked if I knew where extra blankets were. I felt sorry for him, but the scene was quite hilarious b/c there he was shaking in full january ski gear and there I was wearing only my underwear and feeling quite warm. I gave him my wool blanket and other blanket which seemed to help him out.
The Swedes and I went down for early breakfast at about 3am and were the only ones there as everyone else was hiking. We left around 3:30, the last ones to leave, and made it to the summit by 4:45. I was really feeling good with the altitude during that climb, almost normal I would say. Hiking up was quite interesting, b/c obviously it's in the dark and there is a huge string of headlamps from the 150 or so climbers and their guides. Also, although it is quite cold, when you're working hard, I get quite hot. So I was in shorts and t-shirt (and still sweating) and the swedes also in tanktops, while everyone else we climbed were fully geared out. Most of the westerners were wearing ski coats and hats and gloves and the asians (mostly chinese, malay, singaporeans,) were in full down jackets and hats and gloves and looked ready to ski a -20 day at winter park. So they always gave us surprised looks as we motored past. We passed everyone but about 5 or 10 people by the time we got to the summit at 4:45. We then had to wait until the sun started to rise at about 5:30am. This was when it would get cold. So I took off my sweaty clothes and put on a fleece, long pants and my rain gear pants and shell and used some socks as gloves, and then of course the best trick of all, the boiling water bottle I had brought from below to stuff in my jacket. It was definitely cold at the top, sitting in the dark, with the wind and the temperature at about freezing. None of the puddles were frozen today, but they say they often do. Sadly the last glacier on Kinabalu melted in the 1970's. The sunrise was indeed beautiful, but not as magical as 10 hours previous during the sunset b/c we were sharing it with lots of people...noisy, flash happy, etc. We had a good laugh though about how this was our 2nd time up in 10 hours and how we figured there had probably been few if any who had ever done that. About 30 minutes after we had made the summit, our guide finally caught up! Once down at the bottom (8am) we had another huge buffet breakfast and then chilled on the deck with sabah tea and enjoyed the warm rays of the sun, but the cold air around us. We waited around until 10 before heading back down b/c the lunch buffet down there was between 12 and 4, but we wanted to get down early so we could go back to kk and enquire about diving before shops closed. We got down to base just a few minutes past noon. The buffet people said the buffet wasn't open yet b/c it opened at noon. We said it was 12:07, and they said, "oh, the buffet is now open" So they had it all prepared, but I think were surprised b/c the next climbers didn't make it down til after 1. We were glad we had come early as it started to poor. We ended up not leaving for kk until about 3 b/c the buffet was so nice and we sat outside and enjoyed the cool breeze and the feeling of holding tea mugs to warm your hands...some things we definitely missed about home.
I have been looking for some people to share diving with me b/c all dive packages in borneo are twin sharing, which means as a single person you have to pay double. Turns out that caroline is a diver and she was interested in the diving rig I had picked out. Unfortunately Frida isn't a diver, but a snorkeller, but she may be interested as well. We talked to the dive shop in KK tonight caroline definitely seemed interested and so I think we're going to do it. There are open permit dates for Sipadan on the 27th, so we might do it then. Sipadan is a top 5 dive site in the world and they only allow 100 divers per day there, so you have to get a special permit.
It also turns out I have a little bit of a crush on caroline, but they leave for home around the end of june anyways, and i'm too shy, and they probably have boyfriends as that's usually how the cool girls are. But both girls are very cool, extremely fit, outdoorsy, quite adventurous (I mean they put to shame every other guy on the mountain), caroline is in med school, so I assume she's pretty smart, and they are doing the same sort of travelling I am doing, the more adventure and activity oriented as opposed to the often beer and beach travelling that most backpackers do (which is why I think those climbing kinabalu struggled so much)
Tomorrow we're going to decide for sure on the diving, book it, then maybe hang out on the islands here at KK and then head to semporna where the diving is.

Borneo

Arrived a few days by plane into Kota Kinabalu Borneo in the state of Sabah. Just the name Borneo often gives people visions of towering mountains above dense jungle filled with strange creatures. Borneo is home to the fabled head hunters as well as the most unique rainforests in the world. It has more endemic species (species found nowhere else) than anywhere else in the world. The orangutan, the proboscis monkey, flying snakes, flying squirrels, flying frogs, flying foxes, just to name a few of the unique species. pygmy elephants, pygmy rhinos. It's the least unexplored terrestrial area on earth outside of antarctica. A recent expedition into an area only recently explored found over 100 new species in just 1 week! It has the tallest mountain in SE asia in the huge granite mass of kinabalu. It also has white sandy beaches and one of the top 3 dive spots in the world. When I first planned a post college trip I had only wanted to go to Borneo and Indonesia, but then when my parents gave me the lonely planet on a shoestring guide I decided to go for longer and see some other places. But this is the place I really wanted to go. The place I have been dreaming of forever and especially after Mr. Adams showed us a video on bornean geology and nature when I had his geology class in 8th grade. It also though has the worst logging rate in the world so it won't be around for long which is why I wanted to make SE asia my first destination

But with all its unique wonders and great possibilities, it has mainly been frustrating to me so far.
Arrived in late at night and shared a cab with a couple of people as the busses were done. I ended up just staying at the hostel where those people had booked, which was a nice place. My guidebook had send that independant travel here is more difficult than in the rest of malaysia and I quickly found that out. Everything seems to be run by these private resorts and companies, so you have to book directly or through tour agencies, of which there are hundreds around town. This makes prices really high b/c you have to book packages which include transport, food, lodging, etc, so it makes everything much more expensive b/c you can't take the cheap bus or eat the local food or what not. I spent my first day in borneo, walking around KK all day trying to find good deals, looking at tourist agencies, going to the local tourist agencies, etc. And I found it to be true, that it was going to be much more expensive here. And I also had some bad timing. One of the things I wanted to do was climb mt. kinabalu. 2 years ago it cost about 50 bucks for the guide and fee and then 15 bucks for the dorm halfway up and then you brought your own food. Well, now one company has a monopoly and they are including food. The guide and permit is the same at 50 bucks, but a room in a crappy mountain house that is just one big room with 60 beds is an outrageous 120 bucks for one night. For that money you could spend a week on a gorgeous all inclusive thai beach resort. The other bad luck thing was I wanted to go to pulau tiga which has a fancy resort, but also a local government run dorm. HOwever, they are building a new jetty, so the dorms are being used by the workers. I was quite frustrated. And then the tours to the untouched jungle areas are upwards of a 1000 bucks for 5 days (our 7 day trek in taman negara was about 100 bucks). And then it makes it even worse as a single traveller b/c all the prices are listed for twin sharing, so I have to pay an extra 50-100% if I'm by myself. I'm looking for other travellers, but most people here are in a couple or a group. The only good thing of that day was I met up with Jenny (the swiss german from the hide in Taman Negara) for dinner as she had just come back from the mountain.
The next day, after getting some advice and figuring out how to do it independantly and believing with the help of local people (as they've been so helpful) it was possible, I set off for pulau tiga (famous for its sea snakes and mud volcanoes). I got to the bus station a little before 7am, as I'd been told by several that's when the first bus leaves and you need to be in kuala penyu to catch the boat before 10:30. Well at the bus station, no one had any idea where the bus was to kuala penyu and wanted me to hire a taxi. They sent me to another bus station across town, which no one knew either. They sent me to a 3rd, which did have a bus that had left at 6:30am and the next was at 10:30am. This, I had been told would be too late to catch the ferry (in the end there was no ferry at all!). So I took what was called a shared taxi that is basically a 7 seater SUV that waits until its full before it goes. It was pretty expensive, but promised to get me there by 10 (it didn't, not that it mattered in the end). It dropped me off at a jct 10kms from town where they had all told me busses come by every 10 minutes to town. After waiting over an hour, I was definitely wondering about this. A guy drove by and gave me a lift to town and said there were no busses and you just have to take cars. So I finally made it to the jetty around noon. The place where you hire a boat was closed until 2:30 for lunch. It was run by pulau tiga resort, the only resort on the island (there was another one, but it was closed). But people told my it was 500RM to take their boat (equals about 150 bucks!). That was outrageous to me as the island is only 15km's away and fuel for that should be less than 5 bucks. Of course if I had the group of 10 they said could fit in the boat, it would only be 50 a person. But I was obviously the only white guy in the town and one of the only ones they'd seen as most people come quickly through here on a package tour. I spent a couple hours going around asking locals and fisherman how much it would cost to take me to the island. They all pretty much said 350 ringitt (100bucks) for one way. I was about to give up on going to the island (and wondering where I would stay as there were no more busses and no place to stay here either) as well as on capitalism in general. I couldn't believe someone wouldn't at least lower the price a bit. I mean think about how much money they'd make considering it would take them 30 minutes there and 30 minutes back and just cost a little bit in petrol. In the philippines, they'd do anything to make just a small buck. You could always bargain it down to just above the price of the petrol and they'd gladly do it b/c they'd rather drive their boat and make some beer and karaoke money, than just sit there and twiddle their thumbs (most fishing is done at night or early morning). I even contemplated swimming (that's how close it was). I could have made it in a couple hours by kayak if there had been any around. And what also baffled me was wondering if the people using sabah parks area, like I was, really paid over 200 dollars for a return trip and then only paid 9 dollars for the dorm or 1.50 for the camping. Finally after walking a couple km's in the hot equatorial and humid sun I reached the end of the land and the last fishing boat. They offered 200 ringitt b/c they said that one of the fisherman there wanted to go anyways (their big mistake to say that, or actually not really) But now I knew they were going and could for sure bargain. I ended up getting it for 100 ringitt (30 bucks), which was still a steal for them considering there were already going. But they were a fun group and I won't easily forget the stench of their hardly flating vessel. They told me the boat would leave at 3. So I went to buy food (pb and j and ramen noodles) for my meals while there. Well when I got there at 3 they had an engine problem so we didn't leave until 5. When we got to the island (it's also called survivor island b/c apparently it was where the first american surivor was filmed way back when). I asked the sabah parks guy, faisal, if I could stay in the dorm. He said it was all full, which I knew. So I asked him about camping. I said I didn't have a tent and would need to rent one. Well, the tent was going to cost more than the dorm and 2 nights of rental would cost more than I saw the tent cost to buy new in KK. So I told him I couldn't pay that much and would just sleep on the beach or on the dock. He was a really nice guy though and told me that I could sleep on the deck of the chalet they had. The chalet was actaully a really nice place and would be a decent price if you had 4 or more people to share it with. But the deck was good too, complete with lights and an electrical outlet. Fiasal lent me a bowl and a hotwater heater (I was going to just eat the noodles raw style) so I even got to have hot noodles. I set up my little mosquito net and hung my food and then watched the glorious sunset. The island was pretty and the campground area was very nice and well kept.
The next day I took the resorts much more reasonable tour to snake island and then to another sand spit island for snorkelling. The snake island was a main reason I wanted to come b/c it apparently has sea snakes on it by the 100's who come to shore for breeding and sleeping. The island is tiny, so they're supposed to be easy to find and they're not dangerous b/c they have small mouths and their teeth are in the back of their mouth, so even though they are 3 times more poisonous than a king cobra, the only place on a human they can pierce skin is the part of the ear where the earlobe connects and the skin between your fingers. Well, along with the jetty they are building on pulau tiga (which means in a few years cheap ferries will go direct from KK...wouldn't that be nice), for some reason, I guess to show off the snakes, they are building a huge jetty on snake island. Well the length of the jetty is easily longer than the circumphrence of the island, if that tells you how small the island is. So why build a jetty anyways? Well the result of all the building is that most of the snakes have been scared away and left. So now you don't always see one, let alone the hundreds, but they have their fancy jetty. We were lucky and saw two, and the guide even caught 1 so we could touch it.
The next island sand spit we went to was gorgeous and had nice snorkelling.
In the afternoon I took some of the trails through the rainforest to go around the island and see some of the beaches and also two of the mud volcanoes for which the island is famous. The mud volcanoes for those who have been to yellowstone are more like bubbling mud, though although these are bubbling, they are not thermal. On the walk around the island there were thousands of hermit crabs everywhere! On the beach it was like a highway of them, and they were even inland in the jungle. The island is actually crawling with creepy crawlies (which is a bit unnerving when camping): giant monitor lizards, sea snakes, hermit crabs, ghost crabs, a smaller cuter looking rat, small lizards, geckos, just to name a few. There are even several groups of monkeys running around. After going around the island, I walked back to the first mudvolcano to go for a dip.
Swimming in the mud volcano was by far the best thing of being in borneo so far. It was so cool and felt so amazing. The pool of mud was about 4 feet deep if you stood, but it was really hard to touch the bottom b/c you floated so well. It was great! I think it must be how it feels to be weightless and float in space. So much different than floating in water. I mean it water, you still have to try a bit to stay afloat, especially your limbs. But in this, you just bobbed right on top, yet it was different than being on solid ground like a mattress, b/c you couldn't really feel anything pushing up on you. It was really just the most amazing feeling. I had some fun just floating (and wishing my bed was made out of that stuff, and of course here I was just sleeping on the boards of the deck) and also swimming in it. It just felt so weird and cool.
B/c I was camping and b/c of the jetty workers around, they advise you to keep all your stuff of any value with you at all times (which I usually do anyways). So I had all my stuff up at the volcano, on a bench they have there. Well, I had taken out my camera to take a picture of the mud volcano and just left it on the bench. Who knows if there was a tremor or it just slipped or what, but the camera fell off the bench. Never a good thing for a camera to fall from a bench, but into wet mud...Luckily it's still working right now as I tried my best to clean it later, but dust and dirt can take a while to work it's way in. You have to walk the 1.5km from the mud volcano back to the ocean to clean off. On the way back my sandal broke (that's number 5 for the trip). I eventually made it back to clean off in the ocean. One of the jetty workers that was staying in the dorms that I always waved to, was very nice and invited me in for dinner and drinks (the hospitality that I knew would happen once I got here, b/c that's how malays are). He also gave me some mosquito coils and a lighter for sitting on my deck and gave me some que tips to help clean off my camera. That night I cleaned my camera and then worked on untying the nasty know on my swim suit. That morning before the tour I had gone into the bathroom to pee and I couldn't undo my knot. I tried and tried and it wouldn't budge. This amazes me b/c I have an anklet that I tie on that always comes lose no matter what knot I use, but here a simple shoelace knot becomes impossibly stuck. I had no scissors or kife to cut it, nor did I want to ruin my swimsuit, so I just kept it knotted the whole day and when I had to pee, just went into the ocean like you do if you're diving anyways. Of course that night I had to do more than pee. Luckily, I was able to use the file thing on my nail clippers to finally get the knot out. The other thing of concern was that faisal, who was so very nice and helpful had had to run back to the mainland for an unexpected reason. He had told me I could take that boat he had taken in the morning to go for free back to the mainland instead of using the resort boat. But now he was gone and so was the boat. Well, the nice man who gave me dinner, although he spoke little english, told me some of the workers were going in the morning back to kuala penyu, and they would take me.
Woke up early today and the nice man, gave me breakfast and coffee before sending me off in the boat. Caught the bus to KK (actually caught a BUS which was nice) and got here at a decent time. Found out that my small pocket on my backpack had been open and my sunglass case had fallen out, but luckily I had my sunglasses on, so it was easy enough to replace the case in KK. Looked for some sandals, which as always is difficult with my big feet in asia, and also spent the afternoon looking at some other tour agencies and emailing agencies (this is the one place it would be nice to have the cell phone that all the flashpackers have as pay phones don't work so well here and there is no number to leave to call back). Still the same frustration of the prices of packaged tours. It's just so sad, b/c there is so much to see here. The prices probably aren't really that bad, but once you've been on the asian indepenant budget, it seems outrageous, and if I did everything I want to, I'd run out of money in a month and have to come home (not that I don't miss it). Prices are probably similar or even less than the same thing in the amazon, or gorilla trekking in africa, or a wildlife safari in alaska. Actually talked to an agency today that hires out the guides that national geographic, discovery, and animal planet stations use. Now that would be cool! But it comes out to about 200-400 per day. And one other further frustration, which hurt me even more. One of the good reserves I wanted to go to, which hadn't reached national park status yet, well I found out is no more as it has completely been clear cut and oil palms planted. So it's destroyed.

Checked into a different hostel today, the one jenny had stayed at before b/c it was cheaper. The one thing here is that the hostels are very nice. They give free water and coffee, include breakfast, have big common rooms with TV's and have free internet and very friendly staff.
I also went and booked my night at laban rata to do the climb. It was difficult for me to do, so I did what any good American would do, and paid with plastic as it seems to hurt less (especially when the internet is too slow here to open up my chase account so I can't even see how much I owe). I was trying to decided to climb it or not. Part of me said no, b/c it's too expensive and for the money of one night in a crappy hostel I could spend several days at a fancy beach resort somehwere else and also b/c of the principle of supporting a monopoly that is completely overpriced. If I do it, a cheap budget backpacker, than it is certain everyone will, and they'll just keep the price high. But the other part of me wanted to do it b/c I was already this far down and it's only money and who knows if I'll ever be back, and also b/c I'm a mountain boy, and I love mountains and they're in my blood, and anyone who knows me, knows I'd rather spend 2 days climbing up a mountain than sitting in a chair on a beach. And who knows, maybe I'll do one of the other things b/c borneo is trully one of the last frontiers left on earth. One of the reserves here has only been 20% explored. That's crazy! And they're always finding new things.
So, tomorrow this time I'll hopefully be fast asleep as I'll be waking up at 3am to make it to the top for sunrise as that's the only time, if you're lucky, you'll get a good view before the clouds come in.