After
breakfast we split up into two groups, one back to where we saw the Pittas
yesterday and one, a less strenuous walk along the river. We took the easier
route and walked out with Paul, the amazing lodge bird guide, and saw several
new birds, plus some great shiny black daddy-long-legs. We returned at 11:00 to
shower, pack, and get ready to leave. We had one last wonderful buffet lunch:
coconut spinach soup, veg curry and rice for me with litchis and pineapple for a
sweet.
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| Lovely Black Daddy-Long-Legs |
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| Huge tree in the Rainforest |
Leech
count: with the dry weather and all our leech sock prep, only a couple of us
actually qualified for the “Blood Donor” certificates the lodge gives out. I
was kind of looking forward to a least a couple of leeches, but
no!
We said
goodbye to the attentive, terrific Borneo Rainforest Lodge staff and set off in
a few vans for the three hour ride back to Lahad Datu. As we left it started to
rain and rained most of the way to the airport. Having everything dry made our
visit easier, but a little rain would have made the birds livelier and washed
off all the dust. Maybe we’ll get some in the
mountains?
At the tiny
airport we did the List and checked in and watched our luggage carted to the
turbo-prop in the drizzle. We boarded and crossed the state of Sabah in an
hour, landing at 7 PM in its capital, the city of Kota Kinabalu. This city of
about half a million is situated on the coast between the well-forested Crocker
Range and the South China Sea. We picked up our luggage and were bused to the
Promenade Hotel, a nice, large city hotel. Rose Ann suggested that we order
room service for dinner which sounded great, rather than clean up and congregate
for another meal together. Bob and I settled into our room, got grilled chicken
and lamb and repacked for an early 5:30 AM exit from the hotel. The Ethernet
was excellent and I managed to send off another blog
post.
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