Sabah Adventure, Borneo: The land below the wind and a must-travel destination of 2014

Borneo conjures up images of adventurous honeymoons and great orange Orang-Utans swinging through the wild forests but beyond that, I have to admit, I didn't know a lot about the place before I booked my ticket.

Most vitally, I didn't know 'Borneo' doesn't really exist as a country, but rather is an 'island formerly known as...' that's now split between several countries. It consists of Malay states Sabah (formerly known as North Borneo) and Sarawak, Kalimantan (Indonesian) Borneo and Brunei.

What I did know was that political geography aside, Borneo ticked a lot of holiday boxes. I had two weeks off and my criteria were long: beach and sea life, cool animals, sporty activities, meeting locals and a dose of history and culture. It was one of the few countires that could oblige all of these. Impressive, huh?

Sabah is the northern-most state in East Malaysia and has everything I could have wanted, from Organ-Utans to mountain climbing.

And though as a former backpacker and something of a travel purist I was dubious about joining a group with a pre-organised itinerary, with so many things to pack into such a short amount of time, I finally decided it really was the best option and booked my place with Intrepid Travel.

Sabah Adventure

I took the plunge and itinerary set, travel insurance (to cover high altitude trekking and jungle jaunts) bought, I was ready to meet some very distant relatives. But though Borneo is the land of the Orang-Utans, it turned out to be so much more than that.

We started gently in Kota Kinabalu, a port town with easy-to-reach beaches and an awesome night market where we sampled some of the delicious local seafood (chosen by the tried and tested point-and-hope method). The first night was a chance to meet the group and leader and prepare for the next 12 days of activities.

Newly acquainted, the next day we pack ourselves off to a homestay in the foothills of the Croker mountain range (where we’re headed later) where we pound rice, swim in the river, eat traditional food and get taught to dance by an excitable gaggle of school children, who later pull up their chairs and ask us to ‘have a conversation’ to practise their (already exceptional) English.

Mount Kinabalu

But what we’ve been looking forward to is just round the corner. Mount Kinabalu is the largest mountain in the Malay Archipelago and the 20th biggest in the world. With the peak 4,095m above sea level, climbing it is a feat not to be taken lightly. But hitting the summit was certainly a truly stand out moment of the trip, with breathtaking sunrise views and a sense of achievement that bowls you over (unless that was the thin high altitude air and sleep deprivation talking).

The climb is split over two days. The first is a slow-paced upwards slog to the Laban Rata camp, three-quarters of the way up the mountain. Here climbers spend the night (read: a few hours of the evening) and fuel up ready for the 2.30am jaunt to the summit on the following day.

It’s vital to take it easy on the way up to reduce the risk of altitude sickness, which can and does prevent climbers making it to the top. Our group, under the leadership of 56-year-old mountain guide Sopenghi (known as Soppi), made steady progress, arriving at the dorms mid afternoon, exhausted but greatly buoyed by what I remember as the greatest tasting hot chocolate ever made by the hands of man.

An early dinner is followed by an equally early night in the dorm rooms. Lights were out by 7pm and shattered, most of us collapsed into an unnaturally early sleep, with alarms set for 2am, ready to roll into first breakfast, turn on our head torches and make a break for the top in time for sunrise.

As it turned out, things didn’t go according to plan and our baffled body clocks meant we were actually delighted to get up when the alarm sounded in the wee hours of the morning for breakfast, after hours of lying all-too-awake in the darkness.

Three hours of night climbing with the help of head torches and rope sections followed and we finally saw Lowe’s Peak – our aim – in the faintly emerging daylight.

The sky was turning Rothko orange as we stood by the altitude sign for a picture to prove we had hit the peak, before we all sat on the rocks around in stunned silence as the sun rose over the land below the wind.

My untrained legs meant I walked like a duck for the next five days, but it was so, so worth it.

Into the rainforest

Our group leader Richard then took us to the Kinabatangan River for our jungle camp, explaining that now we’ve made it through the mountain, he’s excited to take us east towards where he grew up and show us some of the wildlife Borneo is so famous for.

We’re hoping, like every other visitor, to see a wild Organg-Utan. I have realistic (i.e. low) expectations of this rare event actually happening to me, so am ridiculously excited just to hear the howls of a dominant male across the river in the evening.

Proboscis monkeys and Long-tailed Macaques flood the riverbanks and hop around in the trees above our forest huts, making spending the night in the rainforest quite the adventure.  And we’re up with dawn to head out on a morning boat trip to spy more of the incredible creatures.

Turtle Island

For me, this was the most incredible part of the trip. Turtle Island is a stunning white sand island where the great reptiles arrive every night of the year to lay their eggs. We snorkel and sunbathe in the daytime and prepare ourselves for a long wait until the first mother turtle arrives.

But a cry of ‘turtle time’ goes off early - just after dinner - and we rush to the beach we were lying on just hours ago, to witness an enormous green turtle on the sand laying her eggs.

It’s an unexpectedly emotional experience. Pitch black with only the faintest red lights to make sure she isn’t disturbed; we stare on as mum turtle lays over a hundred eggs.

When she’s finished, the rangers light up dim torches so we can see her in all her magnificence and she pants in exhaustion, sand puffing up around her face. I reluctantly dragged myself away from her, the last of the whole group, and followed the rest to the nursery where rangers showed us what happens to the eggs next.

After this we helped a batch of newly hatched baby turtles make their way to the sea. They look like moving Early Learning Centre toy animals.

It's quite incredible.

Orang-Utans

The island's biggest story is, of course, its great ape - the breathtaking Orang-Utan. So close to man (we share more than 96 per cent of our DNA with these orange giants), watching them is a sight like no other.

We spend a day at Sepilok Orang-Utan Rehabilitation Centre and go to the viewing platform at the two feeding times to be treated to an incredibly close experience with both wild and rehabilitating apes, one of whom cuddles a tiny baby close to her the entire time.

It’s spellbinding and we have to be ushered out of the deserted viewing platform by staff when feeding time is long over.

Richard (who we've discovered knows EVERYTHING it's possible to know about his homeland) tells us about how many of the Organ-Utans end up at Sepilok and of their attempts to let them back into the wild. It does an incredible job and as there are no boarders with the wild forest around, many of the animals head off into the wild without a backwards glance.

Bye to Borneo

We fly back to Kota Kinabalu for our last night, swap emails and say reluctant farewells. Though the trip itself has been just 12 days it feels as if we’ve been away for at least a month – we’ve done so much, seen so much and feel so refreshed by the immersion into a place so different to home.

Perhaps because of that, the overnight flight back to the UK with a four-hour stop in Hong Kong doesn’t take too much of a toll and when Monday morning rolls around again, I feel like I’ve had a genuine break and a truly memorable experience.

We make friends with Richard on Facebook so we can keep up with his Borneo adventures, and promise to return when Sepilok opens a new Sun Bear sanctuary next to its Orang-Utans (due to open in Spring 2014).

Travel tips:
Be prepared: Read through the travel literature you're given and plan accordingly. You will absolutely, whatever the weather, need thick gloves and a head torch for the mountain climb, for example. Speaking of the mountain, it's not easy, so you need to be fit and healthy. If you're not, this might not be the trip for you.
Be realistic: We'd all love to see pygmy elephants and Orang-Utans in the wild but they are just that - wild creatures - so don't be upset if you don't glimpse everything you've seen on TV.
Be a good traveller: One of the main benefits to a trip like this is that you're given a whole bunch of travel pals to enjoy experiences with and spend evenings whiling away the hours until your night walks, so be a good sport, don't just head straight to bed with a book at 8pm.
Be a responsible traveller: Learn about your destination before you arrive, take notice of local customs, treat the people with respect, learn tipping practises and take care of leaving any litter around. For example, don't point at anyone with your index finger in Sabah, it's rude. Instead, use your thumb.
Enjoy it: It's so hard not to.

Kim travelled with Intrepid Travel on its 12-day Sabah Adventure tour, which costs from £1,435pp for accommodation, local transport, some meals and activities, and a local tour leader.  Intrepid can also arrange international flights. 

Responsibletravel.com can put you in touch with a wide range of tour operators that support local communities and conservation.

British Airways regularly flies to Hong Kong, Singapore and Bangkok, all of which offer an excellent base to transfer to Kota Kinabalu in Sabah. Several low cost airlines can take you on your onward journey to Kota Kinabalu.

For more pictures, See Kim's Flickr set from Borneo.