Borneo, we have arrived!

We have finally arrived in Borneo! Borneo island is split into four provinces - Sarawak and Sabah (part of Malaysia), Brunei (all three of which occupy the top third of the island), and the more remote and MUCH less travelled southern part (which occupies the remaining two thirds), Kalimantan, which is part of Indonesia. We landed in Kuching which is within the Sarawak Province and picked up a leaflet from the airport for an attractive looking travellers lodge in the city.

Kuching is a very pleasant city (i.e. not too dirty!) located on the banks of the Sarawak River which is meant to be the longest river in Malaysia (we are lead to believe). The locals are very friendly (lots of "Hello, welcome to Kuching" shouts). It has lots of local attractions such as street stalls selling lots of things ranging from cakes to traditional spears and carvings. It has a good set up with respect to shopping and amenities and we spent most of the time wandering around and taking all this in. One of the highlights for us was the fish market - you can see the boats travel up the river and unload the fish directly to the stalls! As fresh as it gets (apart from catchin your own of course). It was at the rougher / more local end of town which made for an interesting and more bustling atmosphere.



Local Vegetable market


An arty farty sepia pic of the waterfront.


Great sunsets!



The food was cracking and we found a place that was purely local and very busy (which are basically the best places to eat due to high turnover as there only means of keeping food fresh is with ice packs). This, as it turned out, was our favourite place to eat and we went back on our last night for some more monster prawns. (Just like the ones we caught in NZ)

Food Stall


Locals


Local Fish.


Frogs Legs!


We also got chatting to some local police whom we ended up having dinner with one night when we ventured onto the "wrong side of the river" for some food, they were very helpful and good company! They also gave us a few pointers and filled us in on some history and stuff. They were good lads.


Kuching was an intended stop gap to find our feet and find out more info on our planned destination, Kalimantan, where we could get close to Orangutans in their natural (and fastly disappearing) habitat as well as get some well needed and deserved beach action. We struggled to find any information on Kalimantan. We tried various outlets and sources - Travel agents, the internet and Information Centres. Not even other travellers at the lodge had a clue of what to do, or where to go. We only had what was in the guide book and that can be out of date pretty quickly (as we keep finding out), so it's always best to use the book as a pointer and then talk to locals or travellers in the area. We were also told that it would be an unsafe for us to travel around and that NO ONE would speak any English. So our plans as it would seem had been scuppered and our spirits became a little low. With a complete re-think in mind we did a little more research, without any success, and talked to some experienced travellers (who had also not been to kalimantan). They helped to steady our nerves a little and said that if we were just street wise and looked out for each other we aound be just fine and that we should go for it! They also asked us to report back to them and pass on information that other travellers would find helpful. If worst came to the worst, we could just jump on a plane or bus and get the hell out.

So with renewed optimism we organised a coach ticket to get us across the border. We headed off into the unknown hoping we would get to our destination safely and that we would have somewhere to rest our heads when we got there!!