Miri

Yay – 3 weeks done, shopping time!

Day 21, Tuesday 17 January 2012 – Miri

Today I have been travelling for my minimum time of 3 weeks !

When I arrived back in town I planned on spending one night in Miri and then heading to Brunei, however I heard yesterday that the pre-festival to Chinese NY starts tonight in Miri with Lion and Dragon dancing etc so I decided to stay another night, I also wanted to do some shopping and send some stuff home.

After finding the day pack that came with the back pack was useless for anything but a short day out I decided to buy another day bag, especially one with the capability to carry 1.5 litre water bottles on the outside. Yesterday I also discovered that light weight tan shorts show sweat really really badly – luckily I wore my grey ones up the pinnacles or the others may have thought I was really scared on the climb ! so I wanted to get a couple of pairs of shorts as well. I managed to get everything in a local department store that was having its CNY sales – bargain ! As you may see in some later photos the shorts are not normal Phil shorts and will clash badly with some of my shirts, travelling is so good.

Now I had a new large day bag I decided to also ditch the messenger bag I had been using for day to day so I chucked a pair of (not so clean) shorts, my really smelly macpac daybag, my nice headphones (too large) into the messenger bag, wrapped it in brown paper from the hostel and posted it all too mum ! Cost – $12… Mum – can you please wash the shorts and the day bag ?

I spent the afternoon, literally chilling in the airconned hostel, drank gallons of water to get my hydration back up to a reasonable level and caught up on some emails and facebook. I also spent a frustrating couple of hours trying to decipher information from Lonely Planet plus various internet forums and web sites to try and organise some diving in Sabah and then plan the next week around it. I pretty much got nowhere, but did fire off a couple of emails to some dive places. I have decided to wait until I get to Kota Kinabalu (KK) and see if I can get info from other travellers. I want to dive at Sipidan, which is one of the worlds top dive sites. It is controlled by the Malaysian Government and only 120 people can dive there a day. All the dive operators have an allocation of heads and can therefore charge what they like. Most will only allow a Sipidan dive if it is wrapped up in a multi day package deal that includes dives at other sites. This suits me Ok, I just don’t want to have to pay $1700 NZD for the privilege, which was the first quote I got back, though this was from a resort, so at the higher end.

My French friend, J came back from a day trip and we decided to go check out the festival opening and get some food in the market. The market was bustling and full of the normal Chinese tat (toys, shoes, plastic crap) as well as tons of food. We had noodles and chicken and I had a bright purple yam drink, which must have contained a kilo of sugar.

Purple yam drink, it may have been the ice !

Snake oil salesman…

yum

The festival was very crowded, lots of small people singing horrendously to piped music, very testing on the ears, after using his French-English phrase book, J described it as shrill – very apt. The lion and dragon dances were great, we had a good spot for the lion dance, but very hard to photograph, we were too far away for the dragon. Sorry photos a bit wobbly….

As we started to walk back I had sudden urge to take a VERY fast walk back to the hostel with a very unhappy bowel – just made it, and felt fine after, whew !

Back to Miri

Day 20, Monday 16 January 2012 – Mulu / Miri

I forgot to mention that when I got back the national park hostel I discovered it was almost full with another group of Australian World Challenge teenagers and this time they were mainly boys. Awful awful, so loud !

After breakfast of egg on toast with a guy I met at camp 5 I decided I would have an easy morning to let the legs recover before getting the bus to the airport for the 2.55 flight back to Miri. I wanted to find Skylar and Alexandra so I could get a copy of their photos and do a backup to memory stick for them. However it appeared they were not in the main hostel so I expected I would find them at the airport later.

I took the walk to the Moon milk cave as this could be done without a guide and was an easy walk. At the start I ran into the teachers with the teenagers who said they were also doing it, this gave me an additional burst of energy and I power walked the 2 or so kms to the start of the steps. Steps, what steps, my legs cannot do steps ! Just under 400 steps (yes I counted them) later, drenched in sweat and barely able to move I reached the cave – to find the lights were not working ! I had my torch (thanks Aiden) so was able to see but I was hoping to spend thirty minutes with the camera and tripod taking photos in peace before the horrible hoard arrived. The cave was just too dark to do that sadly. Nice cave though.

I left the cave area when the hoard showed up and took a leisurely walk back to the camp, taking some photos of butterflies on the way. The butterflies are large, colourful and of such a wide variety here. excuse the crap photo, but they would not keep still.

Also found this amazingly spiky palm tree, those thorns are very sharp and very strong.

I packed up my stuff and went to find the bus to the airport, where I finally caught up with S and A. As we had such little time and they had so many photos we had a mad session trying to copy photos from the Pinnacles to my laptop and then all their photos to their memory sticks. Sadly we just ran out of time, even though we were copying as the bags went through x-ray, walking to the plane and until we HAD to shut the laptop down as we taxied. So I got what I could and the girls have said they will email me some when they get home.

We had a bouncy flight back to Miri where the girls and I said our farewells as they flew on to Kota Kinabalu. I went back to the Dillenia Hostel and booked myself into a dorm room, time to get into the cheaper method of travelling! There were three of us in the dorm and I got “talking” to a French guy named J, his English was significantly better then my French, but we were not able to have major conversations. There were a few others at the hostel, mainly couples and all unsociable, possibly due to language, who knows, some didn’t even say hello.

As the sun set I went out for a walk and headed down to the river front to try and get a sunset photo.

I then wandered back into the centre of town to grab a light meal from Ming Cafe as I had eaten there before, I ran into J so we ate together and hung for a bit. Back at the hostel I blogged and emailed and went to bed. In a very squeaky bunk, I pitied my roomies.

I love this T-shirt, it has two probable meanings, as i did not do one of them I had no need for the second 🙂

A slow day in Miri

Day 16 – Thursday 12 Jan 2012 – Miri.

Firstly, thanks for the emails, Facebook messages and comments and likes on the blog, I love them, so please keep them coming 🙂 Though replies maybe slow over the next few days.

Final day in Miri ! Lizzie and Dave thought their flight to Bario was tomorrow, but they found out this morning they were wrong and then had to make a quick dash to the airport. I enjoyed their company and wish them well for the rest of their travels. If we manage to catch up in Myanmar it would be great. Lizzie left half a bar of chocolate in the fridge, it didn’t make it through the night…

This morning the hostel had the pleasure of greeting a dozen or so Australian school girls and their guardians who arrived for the night as part of a month long cultural trip. When I wasn’t out I pretty much stayed in my room as they, and their guardians, will drive me insane ! (I have music playing (Jakob), the door closed and I can still hear them.)

I had a good chat with Aiden and mum on the phone before heading out, good to hear their voices, and hopefully chatting with family will be a regular thing (Meliesha, Dom – you can message me you know !)

I went for a walk through town again with the vague idea of doing some shopping and maybe picking up a t-shirt and a small souvenir. I stopped for a very nice ais kacang (shaved ice, red beans and coconut milk in this case) and got talking to a charming English anthropology Phd student, Rachael. She has spent a year living with the Penan people in the Kelabit Highlands and has another six months to go. It was a fascinating conversation and I learnt a lot over the two or so hours we chatted.

Me and my ais kacang, starting to look tanned.

That pretty much used all my available time so I went back to the hostel with a couple of cans of Carlsberg and mooched for a couple of hours before packing for Mulu and an early night. I know drinking beer on your own is not a good sign, is drinking beer alone in bed worse ?, but I was writing this:)

I leave here at 7.00 Am in a taxi to the airport with the two Swiss guys from the other night. I am catching a thirty minute flight with MASwings to Mulu National Park, which I am really looking forward to, the park, not the flight !

I have four days in Mulu, there is limited internet access so I may be off line for a few days before I return for a final night at the Dillenia and then on to Brunei. I have had a good time in this hostel – till the big group arrived anyway! It comes recommended to other travellers. I have taken the brave step of booking a dorm when I return as well !

I have been keeping a lost and tossed list, so after just over two weeks…

Lost

Power plug adapter, left in first hotel.
Sunglasses bag, somewhere in Miri

Tossed

Mirror, smashed on the flight to Singapore.
Camping washing line with pegs, hopeless ! got some string from Alex.
Portable water bottle (sorry sis), water comes in bottles !
Book I bought in Auckland airport with all the NZ coins I had – left in hostel library today.
New razor blades I bought in Kuching, by mistake in Kapit about $30NZ worth.
Old NZ razor as I could not get blades for it here, bought a new one and the above blades.

My bag is lighter already !

I amazed at the amount of reflexology clinics there are in town, those oil rig workers must spend an awful amount of time on their feet. Like this one in the downtown bar area. It must pay very well as a Hilux like this would cost upward of of $50kNZD here.

Laughed at this sign yesterday..

Day 14 – Tuesday 10 2012 – Miri

Another fairly late night with loud karaoke bars nearby (as I found out later, one was actually downstairs), they love their karaoke bars here. I was then awoken at 4:50 by the call for prayer from the local mosque. Oh well, sleep is over-rated and think I am going to have to get used to that !

I was up early for coffees and breakie with the other guests, most who are moving on today, it was nice to eat fresh fruit and toast for a change.

I had planned a day in Miri, so left the hostel after 9.00 to get out for a walk before the worst of the heat of the early afternoon. It was still hot and humid though ! Miri is a fairly new town compared to some of the others I have visited, so the old town areas were not that interesting, and there was not a whole lot else to look at really. I wandered around for a couple of hours and then went to a local food court for lunch.

After lunch I wandered up to the Petroleum Museum, the museum is about a 2km walk up a hill and it was pretty tough in the heat, lots of people driving past in cars gave me funny looks as they drove on by. If this had been Auckland I would have run up there in minutes, but this was a bit of a mission.

I think Vicki is the only person I know who would have appreciated the museum for its sake, I enjoyed it for the air conditioning and the view of the town was OK.

For Vicki !

One of the walking tour highlights 🙂

I arrived back in the hostel in the early afternoon to cool down and chill for the rest of the day. It was a quiet hour on my own before the new round of travellers arrived. I soon get chatting to an English guy and girl travelling together and an American guy living in Japan. The poms were planning on visiting Niah Caves tomorrow which is what I want to do as well so we will all go together in a car organised by Mrs Lee who runs the hostel. This will be cheaper and easier than us all using the bus, assuming one actually runs.

I hung around the hostel for the rest of the afternoon catching up on some emails and blog reading while the others had a late lunch. When they came back we sat around and chatted over a beer with a couple of Swiss guys who had just arrived. The six of us went of dinner to Mings Seafood Cafe and I ate the most food since new year – fantastic, BBQ’d fish, calamari, okra, native ferns and bamboo clams ( a long thin shellfish). It was a good night, moderately expensive as beer is a horrendous price in Miri. We bought another big bottle of beer each and went back to the hostel to chat till quite late. It was a good night.

I regret not taking my camera (or even my phone) for dinner as the food porn was great!

Miri is the border town with Brunei, Brunei being completely alcohol free, everyone comes to Miri to drink – and they know how to make a buck here The beer in Kapit was half the price and Kapit was 200km up a river.

8 hours on a bus, Sibu – Miri

Day 13 – Monday 09 Jan 2012 – Sibu / Miri

I am going to attempt to start a post and maybe edit yesterdays photos while having my spine pounded and my body shaken as we travel on the Pan-Borneo Highway, typing is very slow !

Last night was the worst of the trip so far, I would have expected Sunday night to be reasonably quiet in Sibu, but there was at least two karaoke bars and a nightclub within hearing distance of my hotel room, it took a while to isolate the sounds over the noise of another heavy downpour and the noise finally stopped about 1:30am. At 5:30 the cafes over the road opened up and a large generator kicked in as well. As I was planning on leaving the hotel at 7.00, there was no point in attempting more sleep so I gave up and went to see if I could breakfast at 6.15. I could ! more eggs on toast.

I got a cab from the hotel to the bus terminal which was a good 10km away. When i arrived at the terminal I was surrounded by touts flogging their bus company but had elected to stick to the main ones and got the 7.30 Bus Asia to Miri. The price is fixed at 40 ringit for all companies so the choice was made on the state of the bus, I must say the “VIP” buses all looked fine. The ride is supposed to take 7 half hours. There were only three passengers so I took the pack on with me.

The first thirty minutes were fairly smooth on good roads, but once we had passed the far outskirts of Sibu the ride got very rough. After about three hours on the road we stopped to pick up a load of passengers from a competitors broken down bus and all of a sudden we were full. My decision to take the pack on with me backfired as I now had it under my legs for an hour until Bintulu. My neighbour was a nice young Malay man names Faz Wan, who spoke Ok English, so we chatted in a rather stunted fashion for the remainder of his journey to Bintulu where he works.

We lost most of the new passengers at Bintulu and I got my double seat back which was a relief to my legs. The low lands area we are driving through has been largely deforested, though there is a bit of secondary growth. It was not till after Bintulu that we started passing large palm oil plantations, these were massive, strecthing for tens of kilometres.

Miri is an ‘oil’ town, near the Brunei border and has a population of around 270,000. We arrived in town just after 4.00 and I got a taxi to a randomly selected hostel, which appeared to be closed. I then tried my second choice, The Dillenia Guest House, which is a bit further out from the centre of town then I wanted as I will be here for four nights. I planned on booking for one night and checking it out first before committing to the full four, but it had a single room available and such a good vibe I took the full four. Hopefully that vibe was the right one !

Once I checked in I went an introduced myself to some of the other guests, it is a small hostel so only a few people and most appear to be checking out tomorrow, and most going up to Brunei and onto Kota Kinabalu like I am. I went out and had dinner and a beer with a Canadian girl, Jessica, she reminds me a lot of Meliesha and had been staying in NZ since Feb and now returning home. Nice evening, enjoyed having company again.

As an aside, photo editing is fairly basic, I am just running a few basic steps in Lightroom, contrast, sharpening, noise reduction. I am shooting GF1 and I cannot be bothered converting them first.