Sarawak

Finally got into Miri and found a place to stay for the night.

We went to Niah caves and walked about 10ks on this day... Stayed the night in a fairly nice cabin in the national park...

Next day travelled to Bintalu.
While having breakfast at the junction I saw a strange prehistoric turtle in a fish tank...

There was some some strange fruit here too so had to try that...There is not a lot in Bintalu but had a good feed and a few beers. There was a bike festrival on and there was the usual cook up with lots of smoke...Left next day across some ranges by 4WD (179ks) via logging roads (four and a half hours) to Belaga. This is looking down on Belaga (with a rain storm) on the way in.. It is a small inland riverside town with about 2500 people. Not a lot to do here but an ok spot to relax for a bit.
Left a couple of days later on a long boat to Kepit (the next main town down river) ....
Here is mum sitting on top of the boat... 155ks down a river by boat and down through some of the Sarawak inland....

Here is an old totem pole out front of a longhouse...

The people make really long houses where up to 100 families (up to one thousand people) live in them. This is one of the longhouses from the boat... Through some rapids (Window photo)...

Not a lot around Kepit but we had a look at an old fort and the museum and just walked about and had some good foods. This is on the river front in Kepit...

One more boat and we were into Sebu for a night...Found a pretty good friendly Chinese lady who ran a good eatery here.. very nice chicken and veggies.Here are some chickens ready to take home...Got another boat from Sebu to Kuching...Didn't think much of Kuching at first because we walked into the older part of town and it was a bit dirty. Ended up walking along the river for a bit until we walked into the new part of town.. not bad really...There is a lot of good food here, lots of veggies and some pretty mean Malaysian curries... unfortunately it is the same as the rest of Malaysia, cooked in a lot of heavy oil (It might be Palm oil, not sure). I will have to have a cholesterol check up when I get back to Australia.
On the other side of the river they have an old run down fort....There are easy day trips out from here too.
Went to Gunung Gading National Park and saw a Raffesia flower (Meant to be the biggest flower in the world although this one was only about 400mm diameter....We also did a bit of a climb up a hill... to a bit of a view point looking back towards Lunau...Went to Semengok Nature resrve where they have more Orangutans...