Sepilok

Ted. Since my college days, I have been fascinated with primates, especially the great apes. When we decided to visit Malaysia, my first question was, could we see orangutans?

The place to go is the Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Centre in Sabah
(North Borneo). Home to 60-80 rescued orangutans, we were able to see 15 or so during our day there. They are free to wander the 10,000 acre preserve and we actually got pretty darned close to a few curious juveniles.

We also saw other critters during our days here in the rain forest; sun bears, snakes and foot long Malayan forest geckos.

So why do they need animal sanctuaries here? Two words – palm oil! Check Wikipedia for the details but, essentially, thousands of square miles of the rainforest in Borneo are being clear-cut to create palm oil plantations. This is naturally devastating to the indigenous species so the lucky few orphaned orangutans, sun bears, pygmy elephants and other species that are rescued end up in places like Sepilok.

While the sanctuaries are great, I wanted to see apes in the wild. And in Sabah, that means going down the Kinabatangan River (do I sound like Marlin Perkins now?).

No, we missed the pygmy elephants and crocodiles but our trusty guide and boatman showed us everything else on our list including snakes, monitor lizards, silvered leaf monkeys, long tailed macaques, acrobatic proboscis monkeys and three wild orangutans. One was a mother and juvenile that we watched for 10 minutes! We also saw a host of brilliant birds including herons, broadbills, hornbills and kingfishers. My photos are lousy so just google anything you are curious about.

I should add that we almost didn’t go on the river. It is important to stick to a budget when you are two retirees traveling the world and I was reluctant to spend the money. However… there are times when you just need to forget about the money and follow your heart. That is why I finally took a big gulp and agreed to spend the princely sum of $160. And boy, am I glad Judy talked me into it!