Tarzan never had it this good (Jan. 8/09 - Kota Kinabalu, Borneo, Malaysia)

Most of the life in a rainforest happens up in the canopy, 100 feet or more above the ground. We were able to get right up there where all the action happens by way of Mulu's canopy skywalk, which is a 480m long series of suspension bridges (the longest in the world, in fact!) that traces a path through the canopy. To get there, it was a lovely 2km walk through the rainforest, where we spotted pygmy squirrels, chameleons, and transparent dragonflies. As we were walking along, our guide suddenly jumped and then took a few quick steps backwards - never a good sign! Then we saw the 7 foot green racer snake slithering its way along the boardwalk railing. It certainly didn't look innocent, but we were assured that it is 'generall' not aggressive and "only mildly poisonous". Great. We passed by slowly and got just close enough to take a picture. A while later, I had to do a double take when I could've sworn I saw a lizard fly across the trail in front of me. Turns out, that's exactly what it was! Once it had landed on a tree trunk, it looked like a normal black lizard, but mid-air it had a set of bright red parachute-like wings that fanned out and let him glide from one tree to another.

We walked slowly through the canopy, across shaky cable bridges surrounded by birds and butterflies of all different colours. The sun was bright up there, unlike on the forest floor, where very little sunlight gets through (only about 5% apparently). Info boards posted at each tree platform explained the various components of the rainforest canopy, naming the species and how they depend on eachother for survival. The setting was beautiful, with the cool river flowing below us and the towering limestone cliffs above.

Our flight to Kota Kinabalu left mid afternoon, so we bid adieu to the quiet paradise of Mulu and headed back to civilization. We skirted the coast of Brunei en route to KK, as the locals call it, watching the immense oil palm plantations pass beneath us. The next stage of our trip involved getting ourselves over to Semporna, on the east coast of Borneo, so we could do some scuba diving at Pulau Sipadan, which is one of the world's best dive sites! Option #1 was to fly there if a flight was leaving in the next 6 hours or so, since we were already at the airport. As expected though, the next flight wasn't until tomorrow, so we opted to check out the bus schedule and go from there. Our timing was perfect to catch the evening bus to Semporna, which meant an overnight bus ride that might be uncomfortable, but it was way cheaper than flying and would save us a night's accommodation elsewhere. Rush hour traffic made the drive to the bus terminal on the other side of town rather long, but little did we know that the trip to Semporna would seem infinitely longer!