Ulu Temburong National Park March 23

I started this amazing day at the Bandar Jetty.

This was my water taxi for the 45 minuet trip to the small town of Bangar on the banks of the Sungai Temburong river. It is the only town in the eastern side of Brunei.

My guide met me at the Bangar jetty to begin the road portion of the journey which would take us to another jetty at Batu Duri.

But first we walked across the street and had pancakes for breakfast. These pancakes were thin like crepes and came with a spicy red dipping sauce. It was good. They do eat odd things for breakfast here.

The trip to the next jetty was just over half an hour on a good road. Along the way the guide pointed out this longhouse. He called it five star because it is nice. It houses several families living individually in each unit and communally in the common area in back.

The guide was raised in this community and he showed me his home along the road. He and his family are descendants of the tribal headhunters that were still active as recently as WWII.

The river is the only way to travel to the National Forrest Reserve and there were many beautiful views along the way.

Here I am in the longboat with the driver behind me. It takes skill to pick a safe course through that rocky river.

Here we are landed to sign in at the park entry. It is connected to a high end hotel where the rooms are around $250 US. Across the river is a heli-pad which they use for visiting dignitaries and emergencies.

Strangely, the park is privately owned. They do have strict regulations for protecting it though.

This is the national flower, a Simpur.

Soon we arrived at the trail which leads to the forest canopy walkway. They told me a 500 meter walk but didn't mention it was uphill all the way in the mud.

Surprisingly, they provided me with nifty rubber shoes which had great grip and allowed me to leave my sneakers safe in the car.

When we got to the canopy towers they were quite high and you accessed them by climbing a series of steps inside a wire cage. I was still feeling wrecked from climbing the hill in the heat and I am not fond of ladders so I cheated and asked my guide to go up and take some pictures.

This is the walkway.

Here is a view of the surrounding country with the top of one of the other towers.

He took my picture from the canopy bridge but I am sure he had used the full zoom to get me this close.

Here is the heli-pad that is across from the park entry.

This is my guide on the muddy part of the climb.

After the canopy walk they took me to a waterfall. We walked in about five minutes through this little rocky stream.

The rubber shoes were great here too.

Here I am back out at the river, after seeing the falls, getting ready to get into the boat. This was just before I fell in. It was a refreshing dip and I managed to save my camera too.

The last stop was at a rustic camp operated by my guide for overnight treks. It was a beautiful location. They pulled out a cooler and we had rice, chicken curry, fried cabbage and sweet and sour fish (surprisingly delicious) for lunch. It was home made and so good.

A couple of shots of the camp:

It made me want to stay and camp there.

To get back we reversed the process taken this morning, long boat to van to speedy water taxi. The water taxi ride was a little hair raising occasionally. They use twin 20 hp motors flat out on a narrow curving river so on the curve you were either looking at sky or water.

From Bandar jetty it was an easy walk to my hotel, of course taking photos along the way.

There was one canal in the city where you could hire a boat ride but I don't think there was much to see.

There are thousands of mosques in Brunei as the population is 75% Muslim, and a smattering of other places of worship. Here is a Chinese temple.

I wasn't really planning on speeding through Borneo rain forests on a crazy high-speed water taxi but I thoroughly enjoyed the day.

Tomorrow I have an early flight to KL and continuing on to Penang Island in Malaysia.

Bandar Seri Begawan or Bandar for short. March 22.

I had several decent periods of sleep last night even though the plastic airport chairs were hard underneath my folded blanket. The restaurants were open early enough to have breakfast and I was off on the short flight to Bandar arriving shortly after 9:00 AM.

I knew taxis were crazy expensive so I got the hotel shuttle bus and unloaded at the hotel. I didn't want to waste one of my two days here sleeping, although the bed did look inviting, so I got busy making plans. This afternoon I am taking a city tour for three hours.

It is the end of the wet season here and it still rains a little every day. The temperature is 30 degrees today.

There is a large community of dwellings which are on stilts over the river known as the water village. Below I am boarding this water taxi to go across to have a look. Part of the tour was to be a visit to a home for tea. I still didn't know at this point that it was this man's home we were going to.

This is part of a large school. There are a couple of others like it in the community.

Here are some homes along the outside of the group. They have power, gas, Internet and television, everything the land dwellers have.




Here are a couple of the children from the family I am going to meet, waiting to greet me at the dock.



From the dock we walked straight down this walkway to their home, All the houses in the row are connected and there are other walkways that also connect between the rows similar to city blocks. They park the boats underneath the houses.

Here I am in their living room having tea with three of the seven children and mom.

The house was very spread out with large rooms. This room is air conditioned but others are not.

This Mosque is also part of the village.

Next we visited the Brunei Museum which had a wildlife side and a cultural side with an art exhibit in the center. They did not allow pictures.

A visit inside the Jame Asr Mosque was not possible because prayers were being held while we were there but I had a walk around in the grounds.

This mosque was built and owned by the former sultan and is now owned by his son who had already built the Omar Ali Mosque which I will also see today.

I don't know if they had weddings in mind when they designed this stair case but what a place to hold a wedding. It is more likely to be used by the Royals.

Just another beautiful door.

This is all you can see from the street at the Royal Palace. The buildings in the back seem to be no more than two story and reasonably modest, at least from the outside.

You can see the two standing guards.

This one outside the fence was just security.

This very impressive mosque is the one owned by the son of the former sultan who is now deceased. It is called the Omar Ali Mosque. I was only allowed to photograph from outside the fence.

It is surrounded by water on three sides. I have no idea if the boat in front is just decorative or has a purpose.

Standing beside the Omar Ali Mosque and turning my back toward it I can view these houses across a small road. They are on stilts in a muddy but soon to be dry river bottom. Quite the contrast.

Another view of the river houses.

Next I was taken to the Royal Regalia Museum. Photographs were only allowed in the foyer where this Royal carriage is located. It was difficult to get all of it in the photo. When used it was powered by manpower.

That was the end of my tour but I still had some daylight so decided to look around town a bit more. Here are some shots:

I very much like the city and the people are very pleasant and most speak English that are dealing with the public.

Tomorrow I have booked a trip to the rain forest.