Kota Kinabalu

Day 24, Friday 20 January 2012, Kota Kinabalu

I had an ok sleep, for the first time in a few nights the room was quite, no snorers and no squeaky beds. It seems Lucy is quite a grump ! and the ‘free’ breakfast is restricted to 1 cup of instant coffee, 2 bananas and 4 slices of toast. While I don’t normally eat 4 slices of toast I do like more than 1 cup of coffee of a morning ! Also discovered wifi is not available till 8.00 am and the showers are not only cold (not unusual, and i can live with it), but they are just not nice showers. The hostel has the potential to be awesome, I like the decor, but frankly she is a bit bitchy ! Plus it was full of some very unsociable northern Europeans ! J and I got our money back and moved out.

We ended up down the road at the Akinabalu youth hostel which was also recommended to me by Lizzie and Dave, should had listened to them in the first place, Akinabalu is waaaaaaay better. Much nicer atmosphere and i hadn’t even walked in the door when I ran into my first kiwi since I left home, chat city in this place, so different to Lucy!

J and I have decided we are going to head down to Semporna tomorrow on a 9 hour bus ride and try and get some diving in.

I am so glad we moved out of Lucys, while I liked the physical space, the atmosphere was just all wrong and after the relaxed and comfortable feel to the hostel in Miri I was having some doubts as to whether I could carry on if this was a ‘typical’ hostel environment. I am not sure what I am expecting from hostels, I guess a lot of people travelling are not travelling to meet people and share experiences, but I need those experiences to guide me on my travels as real information is hard to get. Anyway…….

Spent a fairly unproductive day in Kota Kinabalu, J and I went for a walk around town for a while and then settled for a hugely expensive (by local standards) Italian restaurant for lunch – lasagne, ice cream, chocolate – pig out for $20. Much needed respite from noodles and rice, and for me, meat that was not chicken and fish. KK was pretty much totally destroyed by the Allies (twice) and the Japanese during the war so it is quite a modern town and i guess lacking in some sort of character that has made things interesting in Borneo. It has the same highlights as other towns, like markets and boats, but very little to make it stand out. It is a fish town though

The Atkinson Tower from 1905 is one of the few strutures to survive the allied bombing during WWII.

I went back to the hostel for a lie down and an enjoyable Skype session with a friend in Auckland. I have decided that after Borneo in a couple of weeks time I am going to take some time out on a beach for a few days and recharge – take a holiday from holidaying.

With little else to do  I wandered down to the night market in the  very early evening, got soaked in a downpour and went back to the hostel to internet and suck down a whisky or two. 

Not too many, up at 6.00 tomorrow for the bus trip !

Tonights post is bought to your courtesy of Grants Whisky and Therapy? from the awesomely good 1994 album Troublegum, Nowhere. Somedays this is how I feel.