Too little time, too much to do!!

We haven't had time to update our blog - and the hand-written journal has ground to a halt, too!

So here's a brief update & one of these days, we might get around to filling out all the details - in Scotland, in March 2008?


After Borneo:
We then headed on to Singapore where we had a very enjoyable 3 days, before catching a flight to Sydney for our 6 week tour of Australia. After 6 days in Sydney, (which we loved - highlights : a performance of Rachmaninov in the Opera House conducted by Vladimir Ashkenazi; a walk across the Harbour Bridge; a trip to Manley on one of the many ferries; a train journey up to the Blue Mountains where we trekked along a cliff path to see the famed & spectacular "Three Sisters"; visits to 2 synagogues) we then picked up our "Wicked" camper van & have been relentlessly touring ever since, with hardly time to breathe, never mind update the blog! It's a hell of a big country.

We drove to Melbourne where we spent a few days (loved it too!), then took a ferry to Tasmania where we spent a week (really, really loved Tassie! - highlights : Wineglass Bay & the Fresinet National Park; Cradle Mountain; the Henty Dunes; Hobart). Then we drove along the Great Ocean Road, along the southern coast of Victoria, before travelling north again via Canberra & Nelson's Bay to meet up with Laura (Howard's daughter, who is currently weeding lettuces in a place called Stanthorpe in the Great Dividing Range in Queensland.)

We spent a lovely weekend with her in the idyllic Byron Bay on the eastern coast of New South Wales before saying our farewells in Brisbane leaving Laura to continue with her agricultural labours while we slogged up through Queensland to Hervey Bay where we took off to the world's largest sand island (127 km long) - Fraser Island. There are no roads - only beaches & sand tracks through the interior - so only 4 wheel drives can travel there. We had to leave our camper van behind to enjoy the delights of bumping about the island for 3 days chauffeured by a more experienced sand driver. It was wonderful - lots of swimming, not in the sea, where sharks, jelly fish & strong rip tides all abound, but in beautiful lakes - & enjoying the delights of the 6 different ecological systems - swamp, rain forest, dunes & another 3 which we can't remember at this precise moment!

Now we're in Airlie Beach, further north still, about to embark on 3 days sailing on a tall ship round the Whitsunday Islands & the Great Barrier Reef. Then we'll press on to Cairns, Port Douglas & Cape Tribulation where the fun will have to stop - well in Australia anyway! We have been surpisingly cold at times (particularly in Victoria & Tasmania, having to wear most of our clothes to keep anywhere near warm at night) & now we are baking as the temperatures rise steadily the further north we go. The weather has generally been fabulously sunny & cold, dark Scotland seems a world away - oh, it is!! We've driven 8000 kms so far in 4 weeks - you must be oozing sympathy, we know, at how arduous things are for us.

Next stop New Zealand, which is shaping up to be another whistle stop tour with little time to pause. Only 4 weeks & so much that we want to see.

We have been taking 1000s of photos, of course, & we hope you'll get to see a selection at some time soon.

PS Happy Channukah & other suitable seasonal greetings!!

Kuching, Sarawak, Borneo, Malaysia

Kuching is on the banks of the Sarawak River on the island of Borneo. It's got an interesting history. Sarawak was a part of the Sultanate of Brunei 200 years ago but as a reward for help in putting down a rebellion, it was ceded to the British adventurer James Brooke, who ruled it as his personal kingdom. Kuching was made his capital and headquarters. The Brooke Administration was given the status of Protectorate under Rajah Charles Brooke's rule and was placed behind the Indian Rajs and Princes. The Brooke family ruled Sarawak until the Japanese occupation in1941& Sarawak was part of the Japanese Imperial Empire for over three years. At the end of WWII the last rajah, Sir Charles Vyner Brooke ceded Sarawak to the British Crown, which gave Sarawak independence in 1963 and it became part of Malaysia later that year.

Kuching is the 4th largest city in Malaysia with a population made up largely of Chinese, Malays, Ibans & Indians. It's supposed to be one of the world's healthiest cities! It was certainly very clean & very pleasant. We stayed in a lovely little"art" hotel where we bagged the honeymoon suite! (The only difference to any of the other rooms seemed to be that it had a 4 poster bed, but still ........) We ate delicious Chinese food, wandered by the banks of the river & visited the charming museum to learn a little about the native culture, ahead of our stay with the Iban people. The Iban were among the former head-hunting tribes of the region, but we were relieved to have it confirmed that such practices died out in the early years of the 20th C. There was also an interesting section of the museum sponsored by Shell which started its oil drilling & refining activities in Borneo in 1898 under the direction of Marcus Samuel, a subsequent Lord Mayor of London. Shell obviously holds sway in Borneo still, from what we could see.

Rehab almost complete

Hazy photos taken from afar at Semengoh - we weren't able to get any closer, which is the whole aim of the rehabilitation process, of course.

He wears it well

A







"Bearcat" is another name for a binturong, the sloth-like mammal from Southeast Asia which seemed strangely attracted to Howard, whichever angle you look at it?!

Malaysia - Kuching & surrounds, Sarawak, Borneo

Following on from our zoo experience, we made our way back to Kuala Lumpur for a flight across the South China Sea to Malaysian Borneo. We spent a few days in the city of Kuching, in the state of Sarawak, with time for a little sightseeing & visits to 2 wildlife centres before we headed off to live in the rain forest for a week.

The plan was to let us see the full spectrum of ways in which orang utans survive in Malaysia from zoo conditions right through to the ideal of roaming free in the rain forest.

The Matang Wildlife Centre is situated at the western corner of the Kubah National Park, about 30 kms from Kuching City. It consists of about 179 hectares of lowland forest. At this centre, the animals live in huge enclosures surrounded by their natural habitats. It's a centre for education, research & conservation. Endangered animal species which have been confiscated from the public, such as orang utans & sun bears, are rehabilitated & efforts are made to promote awareness in the general public about the importance of the conservation of these species. Visitors can also come just to enjoy the rock pools, waterfalls, picnic sights & nature trails. Our zoologist (as well as ex-Buddhist monk & club bouncer, amongst a startling variety of other careers) guide Leo Biddle works at this centre alongside the head keeper Keith Lloyd (who has worked with primates alongside Gerald Durrell & John Aspinall, as well as at London's Regent's Park Zoo - we get to meet some very interesting people!) The team at Matang were responsible for the world's first cataract operation on an adult orangutan, carried out by 2 S African surgeons. For more info about all the fantastic work - & how you could volunteer!! - check out http://www.orangutanproject.com/index.php?

Semengoh Wildlife Rehabilitation Centre was established in 1975 for the rehabilitation of confiscated and surrendered wild animals. It is located about 20 km south of Kuching and is situated within Semengoh Nature Reserve. It is a temporary home for various endangered wildlife of Sarawak, especially orang utans, rescued from captivity, and hornbills. Orang Utans are Totally Protected Animals under Sarawak's Wild Life Protection Ordinance 1998. They have been given special protection because they are most severely threatened. With each passing year there are fewer & fewer orang utans in the forests. The main aim of this centre is to rehabilitate confiscated wildlife that have been incapacitated or handicapped due to prolonged captivity by humans - with the objective of releasing them to the forests eventually. Research is conducted, both on wildlife & captive breeding, & there is a wildlife conservation education programme. Most mornings, young orang utans are let out of their enclosures for training & exercise at various locations in the forest. Sometimes the animals may stay out in the forest for the whole day & some may even stay out overnight. In most cases, however, the young animals will be called back to their enclosure by their trainers in the early afternoon. During unfavourable weather conditions, the young animals may not be let out of their enclosures or be called back earlier. The older semi-wild orang utans who have become more independent and can look for their own food in the forest reserve rarely come back to rest at the Rehabilitation Centre. However, between March to September when local fruits are scarce, they may wander back to the Centre for extra food.

So we got close to orang utans again - but how close would we get to them out in their natural habitat?

Penang - Batu Ferengi

Penang - Botanic Gardens

Penang - Fort Cornwallis

Penang - Cheong Fatt Tze Mansion

Penang - Georgetown

Malaysia - Penang - where we was robbed!

It's not a case of work & no play for us during our time in Malaysia - we had a long weekend off, mainly due to local celebrations for the end of the month of Ramadan (Aidil Fitri). We set off for the island of Pulau Penang on a Friday morning & returned to Taiping on a Monday evening. We stayed in the main town of Georgetown & found plenty to do.

Our 1st visit was to the Cheong Fatt Tze mansion, built in the 19th C by a Chinese merchant who was originally from Guandong & known as the Rockefeller of the East. It has 38 rooms, 5 courtyards, 7 staircases & 220 windows. It's truly a work of art & a fine example of Straits Settlement architecture, incorporating features of European & Chinese style such as Art Nouveau stained glass, Chinese cut-and paste porcelain, Stoke on Trent floor tiles & cast iron work manufactured by MacFarlanes of Glasgow. The serene & elegant atmosphere was no small testament to the success of the principles of Fen Shui which had been applied at every stage of its construction.

During the rest of our weekend, we managed to visit Little India, the Botanic Gardens (where a water treatment works had been established in 1804 by some far-sighted British engineer), the beach town of Batu Ferengi, the State Museum, Fort Cornwallis (begun in 1786 by Francis Light, the 1st British settler whose son went on to found Adelaide) & the Eastern & Oriental Hotel (built by the Sarkie brothers who were responsible for Raffles Hotel in Singapore which we hope to patronise in a couple of weeks time).

We travelled along Scotland Street, MacAllister Street, downing Street & Farquar Street, witnessed a Chinese lantern parade & ate at a fantastic vegetarian restaurant in Dickens Street where our plates were piled high with a fantastic selection of fresh food for the amazing sum of a pound each.

Penang is well known for its cosmopolitan ethnic mix of residents & we were impressed with the harmony that seemed to exist between the races - Indians, Chinese & Malays are the majority cultures but there have been historical communities, Achinese, Arabs, Armenians, Buginese, Burmese, Japanese, Javanese, Minangkabaus, Siamese, Singhalese, Europeans, Eurasians & also Jews. There is no longer a functioning synagogue but there is a Jewish cemetery & Jewish plots in other cemeteries. Most of the Jewish community was evacuated to Singapore at the time of the Japanese invasion of Malaysia in WWII & the few Jews that still live in Pulau Penang have to travel to Singapore nowadays for all their festival & life event celebrations.

We really loved Penang, enjoying our few days there immensely but we did experience 1 or 2 problems! Due to the public holidays, our attempts to get to the top of Penang Hill aboard its historical funicular railway, were thwarted by the huge crowds. We didn't fancy waiting 4 hours. Another major problem was being robbed!! Howard's rucksack was snatched from his lap by a passing motor cyclist while we travelled on a trishaw. We lost some jewellery, our IPod (& all its precious store of music which took so many hours to download......), Fiona's spare glasses, our Lonely Planet Guide, Fiona's hat & much, much more! The items lost which caused the most immediate problem were the keys to our apartment in Taiping. All in all, it was a complete pain compounded by the 2 hours which we had to spend in a police station. Just another taste of local culture, we suppose!

Caution - Workers At Large!

Taiping Zoo - Cool Cats

Taiping Zoo - Hanging Out