Happy new year

We went along to the celebrations in Kota Kinabalu and I got my photo taken with some of the glamorous dancers.
The main square was packed and they had  entertainment and fireworks, so we had a lovely time.
We went to bed not long after midnight as we had to be up early to catch a ferry to a little island called Labuan.
We nipped into the Tourist Information Office to find out more about the local sights and it turned out that today is the start of a big advertising campaign.
The friendly lady gave us both big bags of freebies including lots of little cakes and some big crisp like things that said 'fish' on the packet. We were just about to open them as it was round about lunch time, when she came running out of the shop after us. She just wanted to make sure we knew that you had to deep fry them first before eating them.
Unfortunately our room does have a kettle, but not frying facilities, so we can only look at them for the moment.
There is a nice square in the centre of town, but even with Daz and a goodie bag in the picture, I am struggling to make it look interesting.

Yet more snorkeling

Such a good day yesterday that we decided to go back for more of the same today.
We arrived early again and were dropped off at the jetty, which was just about deserted.
We had a lovely morning snorkeling around and I was surrounded twice by huge shoals of colourful fish. They are really inquisitive and come very close, but I am a little bit wary, as I forgot to tell you that yesterday something tried to take a chunk out of my leg!
It made me jump and I span around quickly, but didn't get to see what did it. My leg was bleeding when I got out of the water and now I have a little mouth shaped cut to prove it.
I also didn't tell you about the giant monitor lizards that were marching around the barbecue pit area once lunch had been cooked. Pretty scary don't you think?
Finally, our boatman came to collect us early to bring us back to the mainland today as a storm was brewing.
The wind was blowing strongly and the water was rough as we shot along at top speed. Fortunately we sat at the back near the driver as we sat at the front yesterday and although it was great fun, each time we took off and then landed again felt as if we were hitting a concrete block.
This time it was really extreme and two Russian tourists bounced along the whole journey.  When we were nearly home our driver, who was very cheerful and a bit of a joker, drove the boat at full speed towards the shore. At the last second he turned the boat so that we were tipping up at a 45 degree angle before stopping dead just in front of a concrete wall. He did laugh when the Russian lady screamed!

Mamutic and Sapi Islands

Good weather forecast for today so we went on a speedboat trip to Mamutic and Sapi Islands, which are just off the coast of Kota Kinabalu.
We got lucky and caught one of the first, and fastest boats. The beach was almost deserted and Darren was just about the first person into the sea.
Within an hour or two it had filled up with tourists, mainly Malaysian and Chinese, I think. It was very entertaining watching them as although the sea was very calm and the beach gently sloping, they nearly all wore life jackets, and often arm bands and rubber rings too.
Someone took the emergency lifebelts from the beach and they floated around for the day, just to be ready for any emergency.
Once in the water, most of the tourists stood about waist deep and made no attempt to swim.
Most of them wore snorkels and masks, but rarely put their face underwater. I was sitting in the shade under a tree when one couple strolled past wearing the full kit, trying to have a conversation through their snorkel mouthpieces.
After lunch we sat next to a young couple who decided to go for a swim. The guy wore a life jacket, snorkel and mask and I watched them wade in. About five minutes later I heard a commotion and shouting. Suddenly a life guard shot across the sand, into a canoe and paddled out to someone in trouble. The person clung on to the side of the canoe and was brought back to the shore.
Of course, it was our neighbour and he looked very sheepish when he eventually returned. His girlfriend told me that suddenly a lot of water had poured into his mask and then his life jacket stopped working.

Mount Kinabalu

Got up early to try to see the top of Mount Kinabalu, which is over 4,000 metres high.
We arrived here two days ago, but the mountain has always been completely covered in cloud, so we did not even realise it was just behind our guesthouse.
Every morning just after dawn the sky is clear, but clouds quickly  gather, so there is a very short time where it is light enough to see the mountain.
We just about made it, but 15 minutes later it was gone for the day.
We are quite high up ourselves at 1500 metres, and you can see lower clouds in the second shot, with the tops of hills showing through.
We saw loads of beautiful flowers, particularly wild orchids in the undergrowth.
We got lucky today as we had to catch a bus from Mount Kinabalu back down to Kota Kinabalu. We did not know what time the bus would arrive, so we were prepared for a long wait and we did not even know where, or if a bus would stop.
We had just arrived in the right general area when four Indonesian boys turned up with their luggage.
They went and spoke to a mini bus driver and the six of us, plus two German backpackers that we had met a couple of days ago, all crammed in to his van.
We had a very speedy run down to sea level, a quick group photo with the friendly Indonesians, and less than two hours later we were at our hotel in KK.

Leech attack - a day of dramas

We started the day walking back down the track to the main road, accompanied by another guest, who stranded his hire car in a ditch in the rain last night and had had to have it towed out.
Suddenly I stepped on a large leaf that slipped under me and I slammed sideways onto the concrete road.  My shoulder and elbow took the brunt of the fall, and I felt very light headed, but after a little sit down we continued with our trip.
We decided to walk a trail in the National Park and set off up a dark and muddy track. We had been walking for a while and were bemoaning the fact that we never see any birds on our walks. Sitting silently around the next corner was the first other person we saw on the trail, a friendly, young Canadian ornithologist.
She pointed out some birds to us, including the Bornean Treepie, which is endemic to Borneo. She leant us her binoculars to get a better look, and it was a really great chance encounter.
After leaving her the track got wetter and trickier with very high tree roots and puddles to negotiate.
On one particularly difficult bit, Darren's trouser leg rolled up a little and I noticed that he had two leeches attached just above his ankle. He tapped them but they were latched on, and he told me not to lift my trouser legs in case I had any too.
He was calm, I was panicked and everywhere was so wet and dark we couldn't stand still to try to remove them. We set off to try to get to a road and I was practically running while Daz was being slightly more careful.
Eventually we got to the road and I was sooooo relieved to not find any on me.
I had to kneel on the floor when Darren lifted his trouser leg as I thought I might faint. Fortunately, one had gone but the other was still there and only about an inch long. As we were racing to the road I was thinking that there might be two enormous monsters, so it was a huge relief.
I sprayed it with insect repellent (which is probably not a great plan) but it fell off immediately, although Darren's leg started bleeding.
Ps, he is fine now and I am a bit put out that his drama trumped mine.

Sandakan to Kota Kinabalu National Park

Today we left the heat, the bright blue sky, the sea and our luxurious hotel room, and caught a long distance bus to KK National Park.
It took about six hours to cover 230k and we are now over 1,500 metres above sea level. We had to walk the final 2k to our guesthouse and we could see a cloud ahead of us on the road. Suddenly we were in the middle of it and could only see a few metres in any direction.  We had to follow a very narrow, steep and slippery single track road into the jungle as our guesthouse is in the middle of nowhere.
We are planning on getting back to nature for a couple of days and seem to be achieving it. We only have hot water between five and eight pm, our room is made of wood - it has a garden shed look about it - and there is no telly.
The temperature has dipped from the mid 30's to about 15 degrees so it is a bit of a shock to the system.