The best deal for a Borneo tour was an 8 day package with Borneo Eco Tours (http://www.borneoecotours.com/). We booked the Borneo 2000 non-climbers package for DEM 1,300 per person directly with them via e-mail. (Flights were DEM 500 extra).
The hotel prices with Meier's Weltreisen were comparatively cheap, so
we arranged some luxury hotels in advance for Kuala Lumpur and Langkawi.
In the evening we went on the Singapore Night Safari where we saw hundreds of different animals, i.e. leopards, lions, tigers, giraffes, owls, otters and huge bats amongst others. The admission fee was SGD 17.35, but it is well worth it. You get driven round on a tram and you can get out at various places to explore on foot. The restaurants there were excellent, serving Malay style food like Nasi Lemak, (you can also get burgers or steaks there). To get back to the flat we flagged down a Taxi on the Buket Timah Expressway, the driver was an absolute nutter with a crazy loud laugh. He was interested in English football, so we discussed Beckham's new (non-)hairstyle.
Alastair joined us at 18:30 and we went to the East India Restaurant
where we had a superb curry (chicken tikka masala, chicken curry, mutton
rara and aloo gobhi with biriyani rice and Tiger beer). Which was nice.
Back at the flat we booked a taxi for the following morning since we had
to get up extremely early!
In the afternoon we walked south down the Lebuh Raya Pantai Baru, past
a dilapidated wooden village on stilts built over some polluted stagnant
water. Then, left at the traffic lights and we found the large State Mosque.
Following that we proceeded to the Sabah State Museum, which had displays
about the history, culture and wildlife found in North Borneo. In the evening
we went round the night market (fruit, vegetable and fish markets next
to the sea) and ate at a corner café where we had some sweet &
sour fish with rice, and large (625 ml) bottles of Tiger beer. The beer
bottles are most sensibly sized, but also rather expensive, since the tax
on alcohol in Malaysia is quite high.
That evening we went to a food-stall restaurant in Sedco Square (on
the Julan Sapuloh) where we chose live fish and frogs from fish tanks which
they took away and cooked for us. It tasted excellent! The frogs tasted
similar to chicken. Several copy watch sellers came round and eventually
I bought one that looked reasonable for MYR 28.
We then had lunch - an excellent curry - in a small restaurant in Ranau. The guide then dropped us off at a hotel about 20 minutes walk away from Kinabalu Park Headquarters. The hotel Fairy Garden was quite basic, but with an excellent view down into the valley. The temperature here was only 20°C at a height of 1400 m. That afternoon we walked up to the park headquarters and did one of the jungle walks. We saw quite a few strange insects and kept walking into spider web strands. Flying insects were buzzing around us and we were rather paranoid about being bitten or stung by something. At park headquarters we looked at the insect museum and drank lots of beer (Anchor). Which was nice.
Back at the hotel the electricity in our room didn't work and it took
the hotel manager and his caretaker 20 minutes to fix it. We had an excellent
Chinese set meal for dinner, and then some more Anchor beer.
Lunch was back at the hotel (Chinese style). In the afternoon we saw a video about Mount Kinabalu (which I climbed last year with Alastair, http://mattw.de/kinabalu99/). In the afternoon we picked up some other people who had climbed the mountain and drove back to Kota Kinabalu passing a large mosque en route. We stayed in the Shangri-La hotel again.
In the evening Michael had some excellent prawns and I had chicken curry
in the Sri Delima restaurant (in the Ruby Hotel) on Jalan Sapuloh. We asked
for some Tiger beer and they brought us a big teapot with cups and saucers
and hinted to us that it was "American Tea" (i.e. it was beer disguised).
We then drove 2 hours to Sukau. The last hour was on a gravel dirt road leading through huge palm plantations. From the BET jetty in Sukau it was a 5 minute boat ride to the Sukau rainforest lodge. This wooden lodge built on stilts in the middle of the jungle was amazing. Joseph the large Sumo-style cook prepared the best food, it was outstanding. In the afternoon we went on a cruise up the Kinabatangan river looking into the jungle at the edge of the river for wildlife. We saw long-tail and pig-tail macaques, proboscis monkeys, otters and loads of birds. On our way back the petrol engine on the boat wouldn't restart for ages so we used the slow electric reserve engine. Eventually the main engine did start, after John had given it a good seeing to. We arrived back at the lodge in the dark, somewhat paranoid about being bitten by malaria mozzies.
In the evening, back at the lodge, we had extremely tasty tiger prawns,
lobster and fish (with plenty of Tiger beer). Brilliant.
The double rooms all had electricity and en-suite bathrooms with hot
water, so although we were in the jungle, it was really very comfortable.
Before lunch we went on a boat and minibus tour of the tiny Sukau village.
After lunch Michael and I put Wellington boots on and we set off on a jungle trek behind the lodge. We were at times almost knee deep in squelchy mud. We saw loads of insects, including huge woodlice type creatures, armored millipedes, stick insects and spiders (but no big hairy ones). It was extremely hot and we got drenched in sweat, but it was definitely worth doing the roundtrip walk, which starts behind the lodge. One of the guides found a baby crocodile near the lodge which we photographed and took back to the river.
In the late afternoon we cruised up a tributary where we saw loads of
Macaques, Proboscis monkeys and a black snake with dark blue stripes in
a tree (which John our guide spotted).
In the evening, after another superb meal, John the guide held a slide
show, where he explained more about the wildlife and history of the region.
We then arrived at the luxury Renaissance hotel in Sandakan after 1.5 hour's drive for lunch. In the afternoon John took us on a city tour of Sandakan where we saw the fish market, a local stilt village over water and the huge Puu Gih Jih Chinese temple .
In the evening Alan and Jill (I think those were their names) flew back
to Kota Kinabalu and we stayed in the Renaissance hotel. We checked out
a local food hall, but then decide to have Nasi Lemak and Goreng (or something
similar) in the hotel, which was not bad.
In the evening after an excellent buffet dinner, we were led to the
beach by one of the park rangers to quietly watch a gigantic green turtle
lay 120 eggs in the sand. The turtle shell length was 110 cm diameter!
Later we helped release some hatchlings into the sea.
That was the end of our guided Borneo Eco Tours package and we flew back to BKI where we got a flight to Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA). We arrived at about 18:00 and then got on the express bus from the main bus station at KLIA into town. For MYR 25 we got driven directly to our hotel by a connecting minibus.
Our hotel was the New World Renaissance, which we had booked beforehand for only DEM 78 per night (for a luxury double room) with Meiers Weltreisen. The hotel was extremely posh and the bar prices extremely high. We had an amazing view of the Petronas Twin Towers from our hotel room on he 21st floor. The swimming pool was also pretty fancy.
In the evening we walked down the Julan Sultan Ismail and were asked
by several pimps "you want some young girl" or similar. Which was quite
funny. We walked to Julan Alor, a street full of food-stall restaurants.
We chose a sea-food one, Michael had a huge slab of tuna fish and I had
some squid (obviously with several big Tiger beers).
We then continued towards Chinatown where I bought some fake T-shirts at the market stalls. Then we checked out the crazy Pudu Raya central bus station. There were loads of small booths which all seemed to sell the same types of ticket. It wasn't clear what bus went from where and the whole place was hot, crowded and cloudy with diesel fumes. Excellent, it was just like I had imagined a busy bus station in SE Asia should be like.
Round the corner was Central Market, which is where tourists can find a huge selection of souvenirs. Round the corner over the bridge we looked at the world’s tallest flagpole at Merdeka Square opposite the magnificent colonial style Sultan Abdul Samad building. We sat down next to a fountain near a large cricket pitch and this local guy came over who gave us loads of tourist maps and ideas where to go in Kuala Lumpur and the rest of Malaysia, he said he was homeless, so we gave him some money to say thanks for the maps.
In the evening we went to an Indian curry food stall market, and had
a nice selection of dishes. After restocking our hotel minibar with our own beer
we went to the Emporium Grand Café night club until early in the morning,
which was extremely full and had a live Australian band playing.
We then went on a long walk as recommended by the freelance tour guide we had met the previous day. We checked out the ASEAN Sculpture Garden, National Monument, the Butterfly Park, the Orchid Garden, the Bird Park and the National Museum. Then we tried to get to the King’s Palace, and faced the problem that crossing roads was extremely difficult and that pavements were non-existent. One can only get to the Palace via car! But somehow we made it by illegally running across 4 lane highways and walking on several grass verges.
In the evening we went to the posh Suria KLCC shopping center underneath
the Petronas Twin Towers, where we ate some superb tempura and sushi with
Kirin beer at an excellent Japanese restaurant. Which was nice, and only
half the price of what an identical meal in Düsseldorf would have
cost. Later we went to a cocktail bar and sat outside with loads of people
near the night club we had gone to the previous night (on the junction of
Julan Sultan Ismail and the Julan Raja Chulan).
We took the same bus back, it stops more-or-less where it let us off, about 100m from the caves. There was no bus stop sign, so we hoped for the best and luckily the bus stopped and we got back to KL center.
We had a posh cocktail in the Coliseum Café/Hotel on the Julan Tuanku Abdul Rahman. The food there is also outstanding and has a huge selection including huge sizzling steaks. Then we went to Chow Kit market, where I bought some Durion!!!! Michael smelt it and that was enough for him. I ate 1 small piece and it tasted very intense like a sweet onion with a hint of banana. Anyway it and I smelt of rotting rubbish after eating it for 24 hours.
We lazed around in the luxury hotel pool for the rest of the afternoon
and had the most expensive beer that we had during the holiday (MYR 18
for a small glass of beer). In the evening we had some extremely hot Thai
food at the Suria KLCC, it was hotter than (UK) vindaloo strength.
We got to the bus station in Tanah Rata and first bought our tickets for our onward journey to Penang. A 10 minute walk up the hill got us to the Heritage Hotel. We booked this by phoning up 2 days beforehand. It was MYR 150 per night for a good double room. You can get much cheaper (grottier) places in the middle of the town, but we wanted luxury! We later went for a longer than expected walk (number 9) down to the Robinson power station past a waterfall and then back past tea plantations.
In the evening we had a steam boat - a local speciality which involves
throwing raw fish, meat and vegetables into a soup and letting them cook
in it (i.e. like a fondue). It was really good and rather filling.
After a quick drink in the village we took a taxi to the Sungai Palace Boh Tea estate which was closed on Mondays. So we decided to walk to the top of the 2000m Gunung Brinchang hill. We had no water with us and there was nowhere within 10 km to buy any from, so we were slightly worried about dehydrating. We reached the top and it was cloudy and about 20°C. There was a fenced off Malaysia Telecom transmission station at the top. We spent ages looking for the jungle path number 1. It was about ¾ of the way round the perimeter fence next to a stone marker which said ¼ or something like that on it. Anyway, the path was very steep and required a lot of holding onto trees to get down it. Eventually it got a bit easier and we got back to Brinchang rather worn out 1.5 hours later. We reanimated ourselves with 100Plus (isotonic drinks), bought loads of Tiger beer and took a taxi back to the Heritage hotel in Tanah Rata.
In the evening we had a superb Indian meal served on a banana leaf with
loads of sauces and different types of vegetables.
The flight was in a high tech Malaysian Airlines Boeing 737 - 200. We had feared it might be a dodgy propeller plane, since the flight was only 20 minutes. We then got a taxi to our luxury (yes again, we spoilt ourselves) Pelangi Beach Resort Hotel, which was amazing. Loads of small wooden chalets, with splendid large double rooms, a huge bathroom and a nice balcony with pond and sea view.
A few minutes walk south we founds many different places to eat. We
chose squid and fish, Thai style, not bad at all!
Then we hung out at one of the nice swimming pools. I was reading "Looking for Trouble" by General Sir Peter de la Billiere, and Michael was reading American Psycho which he found rather gruesome. We also had a cocktail at the poolside bar and spent quite some time talking to the staff.
In the evening we had an Indian curry in a place with no beer, so I
got a bit flustered. To make up for it we had several cocktails in the
hotel bar later on during live music! Wow! (errr not really wow).
In the afternoon we hung out at the pool again. For evening food we
had some superb fish and I had squid with some outstanding smokey style
vegetables. Brilliant.
We headed back to the flat and then took a taxi to the airport at 20:00. There were no aisle seats left on the 747-400 KLM jumbo allegedly, since they had all been filled with people continuing their flight from Jakarta. (Really, we believe that don't we? No.) The films on board were The
Talented Mr. Rippley and Anna and the King. The food was worse
than on the way out.
We arrived on time in Düsseldorf and were met by Michael's father. We then queued for another 10 minutes at the Aviation Handling Services counter to report our missing luggage, since our big rucksacks did not manage to get on our connecting flight at Schipol.
Anyway, Michael picked his car up at my flat and drove back in convoy
with his father. It was 29°C today i.e. extremely good re-acclimatization
weather!
My rucksack arrived at 18:00, delivered by an airport courier. Michael's rucksack arrived at his parents' house the following afternoon.
That's it. We had a great time and can highly recommend visiting Malaysia and Singapore! What a brilliant holiday. The total cost, including everything and what we bought was approximately DEM 5,000.
The following year (in NOV 2001) I continued my Malaysia Expedition to SARAWAK 
e-mail:
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Back to the my main page Updated 18 JAN 2002