Garama River Cruise and the Proboscis Monkey

After the encounter with the chubby kingfisher, the boat ride was smooth and we waited quite awhile before we spotted the next wildlife.

When Miki had nothing spectacular to look at he turned to his usual self – A LITTLE MONSTER!

Miki nakal! tengok muka tu!!!!

He took off his life jacket, he walked about in the boat, we wanted to look down at the water (dangerous!!)…..

Pegang montot tu jangan kasi terjun!

He spat into the water, he wanted to touch the water!! he wanted to grab the leaves from the river side… he spoke very loudly, he ate his food and throw some in the water, he kacau-ed Opah, he even kacau-ed the fashionable tourist from Alor Setar, Nize’s pujaan chenta hati:-

The nice college girl (that I didnt get her name) with my mum sat next to each other in the boat.

These two floating buildings were once upon a time a school. They were only connected via the river with no roads at all. The school has been abandoned 10 years ago and I believed the students have gotten a better school to go to. Wonder who is studying there now… the proboscis monkeys? the alligators? or cik ponti? hehe heheheee

The guy in green is Phillip, our guide. He was very resourceful and the one responsible in telling us about the Kadazan-Dusun’s exotic diet. I think he is Kadazan-Dusun too. He said these group of people eats every living thing including iguanas, monkeys etc. I think this only applies to those who are non-Muslims only.  Anyway Phillip is kinda nice, sib baik dia makan biawak, kalau tak aku kawinkan dia dengan ko Opy! hehehe

Harem of monkeys

The proboscis monkeys are very unique animals. They have the world longest nose among all creatures, has two stomachs; which explains the large protruding belly that is thought to stick out so much due to their diet and complex digestion system.  One of the stomach contains useful bacterias for digestions. They are the only type of monkey that do not feed on banana!! They only eat leaves of the mangrove trees and if they feed on fruits, the sugars will upset them so much that they could die! Not because of fruit poisoning but due to starvation when the upset tummy make them don’t wanna eat! Tsk tsk!

This reddish fellas are very expert swimmers in fact they have webs like a duck in between their fingers. The long noses has a purpose by the way, when they swim, the nose act as a snorkel. (Ni suma Phillip cakap ekkk.. kalau salah pi belasah si Phillip!!)

Proboscis monkeys’ social system has two levels. One is the all-male groups ( they call it the bachelor group, i call it the gay group heheheh). These are made up of juveniles, adolescents and adult males. Juvenile males will leave the group they were born to at about 18 months, and join an all-male group.

The second level is made up of several groups which are led by separate males. Each male will have his own harem and several of these harems will come together to form a troop. Females may transfer from one harem to another when young, but the harems are mostly stable. Males tend to fight to head a harem. Like who wouldn’t la kann???

Chilling up high. These are two females. During our cruise we didn’t get to see any bachelor groups but we saw 2 or three family groups.

Pretty lil monkey…

Buncit giler anak dara ni! Tak reti-reti ke nak buat sit up sekali sekala! ehehehe… that only applies to people not monkeys lalalalalaa

At one part of the river, there was a bunch of water buffaloes taking a cooling deep in the river. At Semenanjung aku penah tengok kerbau berkubang kat dalam lopak je ok!!! But the baffaloes in Sabah is more adventurous they were wallowing in the deep river. Miki was really fascinated with them. Many a times he called them “cow” other times he called them “Donald Duck”. Ape kejadah??? Tak lawak Miki! Tak lawak!!

I think he couldn’t remember the word buffalo so he substitutes it to Donald Duck. Suka hati ko jer kan???

Beyonce dan Kim Kardashian sedang berkubang

Buffalo and storks

The scenery was very beautiful. For people who appreciates nature, you all just have to this once in your life. When we were going up the river back to the base camp, suddenly dozens and dozens of storks flew above our heads and landed on this tree. It was an amazing sight. We have dozens of water buffaloes slowly crossing the river to a point that the boat had to stop and make way for them. And over our heads dozens of beautiful white birds flew freely in groups. Masya Allah…

Phillip told us the name of these storks but I can’t remember… They were beautiful…

We came back to the base camp at dusk and served delicious buffet dinner. I didn’t expect the food to be that good. even the mat sallehs  ate like nobody business.

In above photo, you can see a tree on the left. After dark the plain green leafy tree turned into a Christmas tree! It was suddenly light up with twinkling lights from fireflies!  Yes fireflies!  They are so pretty but my camera couldn’t capture them. 🙁

Miki had an amazing time looking at the fireflies, one of the guides catch one and put it on his hand. So that help Miki to understand firefly easily; “Bug ada lampu, Mummy!” he said.  Before that he was busy pointing at every little twinkling light on the tree and said “Firefye! firefye! Firefyee!!” Pastu dia tunjuk ke langit at the stars pun dia kata “Tu! Tu! Tu firefye!!!” Itu bintang lah Miki! haha…

The tour ends after dinner. We were sent back to the hotel with van. Farewell beautiful Borneo sunset… Till we meet again…