Kuala Lumpur
After Malaysia and before I flew home I spent two days in Kuala Lumpur where I met James Brown, who I haven't seen for 11 years!! We had a great dinner and catch-up in a restaurant below these towers (not my pic!!)
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| Me and James Brown ... |
Orangutans
Then it was off to Sumatra and Bukit Lawang to go trekking in the hope that we might spot orangutans. Rickie Parker (my cousin) and Mel, his wife, flew over and met me there.
But first before we go any further let's make a slight comparison:
Richie Parker Vs Orangutan Immature Male
For some obscure reason Rich decided to trek and to visit the feeding centre in Orangutan orange (Dutch orange no longer). On our trek we had come across Mina, an ex-captive Orang who had been in the wild now for a good number of years, even raising three young. She is renown as a feisty mother of about 36yrs. When we spotted her in the forest she went into an aggressive stance and her eyes became evil.
What did we do? you ask. We ran - fast and uphill, panting!! But thought nothing of it.
Next time we came across Mina it was out last morning at the feeding centre which is operated by National Parks. Once again Richie had chosen Orang orange. Mina approached the feeding platform from behind the crowd that had gathered to watch the banana bonanza, 'move back, everybody move back' one ranger shouted - Richie fumbled with his backpack and his insect spray repellant (true Brit tourist) ...
Suddenly Mina split the crowd and headed straight for Richie, she first grabbed his wrist and while he slipped and grasped at his backpack in fright, grasping Mel with his spare hand (she had bleeding claw marks from her won husband!) Mina transferred her grip to his ankle and Richie got wheel-spin as he tried to escape on one leg, the crowd watching, Mel pulling, me staying well back, and Mina - well it appeared that Mina was not being aggressive at all. She seemed merely to be using Richie as a pawn in her game for bananas. 'Hand me the bananas and I'll let go of the hostage' she seemed to telepathize to the ranger. He handed her the bananas, Richie escaped, panting hard.
Mel thanked her lucky stars that Mina had not dragged her husband off into the forest - after all he was pretty attractive - to an orangutan!!
The river, the scenery, the tubing, the orangs, the people were glorious - book your next holiday guys ...
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| worthwhile reading!!! |
(It's very hard to take pics of the orangutans in the forest so excuse some of the picture qualities)
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| Camille and Shayne ..... |
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| The view from our guesthouse - 'Back to Nature' |
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| These guys would carry the tubes for two hours so as we could tube down for 15 mins!! |
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| Spot our guesthouse - surfers right at the far bend upriver? |
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| White handed gibbon |
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| Thomas Leaf Monkey |
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| Peacock |
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| Our tracker, Ipol and our guide, Jakob (who couldn't answer half of my questions sadly) |
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| Mina when she made her first aggressive stance at us |
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| Dinner the night we camped - in the pouring rain. Next day the river was too high for us to safely reach the waterfall |
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| Breakfast, the morning after our uncomfortable night camping |
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| Spot the orangutan? |
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| Jungle Bitings! |
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| With the river high - it was especially hard to cross with the tubes |
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| And now can you spot the Orangutan? |
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| Got the exposure on this photo wrong but had to put it in. We watched this mother and baby climb over this fallen tree across a gorge from less than ten metres away .... absolutely incredible! |
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| King Orang |
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| Our sleeping quarters on the camping night |
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| Brown! Tubing down the Bohorok River |
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| It took an hour for us to walk to our guesthouse from the village - and involved going across two chair swings |
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