Saturday, March 21, 2015

Borneo Adventure


The Sandakan airport – in the province of Sabah located in East Malaysia on the island of Borneo – is very small.

By small, I mean – the entire boarding area/both gates are contained in one room.

There is one x-ray machine and one line for security, but it only took about 3 minutes to get through. You land and take off on the only runway.

The runway was started by prisoners of war captured in Borneo by the Japanese in World War II for the Japanese to use as a military airstrip.

Of 2,434 POW’s held in the Sandakan prison compound, only six – who had escaped – survived.

The government later finished the runway and opened the airport, as a memorial to those whose lives were taken.

After arriving at this airport in Sandakan on Monday, we enjoyed the afternoon and evening at and around the very nice Sheraton Fourpoints Hotel.

Tuesday morning, we started on our Borneo Adventure.

We had booked a 2.5 day/2 night trip with Borneo Adventures to see some of the jungles of Sabah.

Eddy picked up an older British couple and us from the hotel in a van at 8am and we drove about 40 minutes to the Sepilok Orangutan Sanctuary.

Since the 1960’s this rehabilitation center has worked with over 730 orangutans to prepare them to be released into the wild.

Some were pets, or animals that had been in captivity, others lost their habitat do to land being developed or natural disasters.

Continue reading (Incl. Pics) at: Borneo Adventure
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