I'm back

[Englishman2010]

I'm back from my latest trip East. Still jet lagged and have a headache so I'll be brief now. I spent far too much time travelling around on planes, boats, buses, taxi's, jeepneys and trikes but still had a great time in Brunei, Malaysian Borneo and The Phil's. Due to the travelling backwards and forwards I ended up filling 4 pages of my passport and got 10 entry stamps and of course 10 exit stamps ( 2 Phil's, 4 Brunei, 3 Sarawak, Malaysia and 1 Sabah, Malaysia)Better start saving up for my next outing in August.

[Doc Alan]

Welcome back, Ian Look forward to reading more about your trip.

[subseastu]

Good to have you back. look forward to tales of your adventures when you get yourself straight.

[Dedworth]

Welcome back - you'd better sign off here and get you head down

[Terpe]

Welcome back Englishman.
Sounds like you had some great times.
Hope to hear about your wanderings soon.

[Arthur Little]

back, Ian ... we look forward to reading all about your adventures once you've had a proper rest.

[steve monty]

Welcome back! I'm sure you had a great time visiting all the different places. Be good to hear your stories. Just need to get over the jet lag now, i guess bed is calling

[joebloggs]

sounds like you need a holiday to recover

[worthingmale]

welcome back

[stevewool]

wow so many places it seems ian , seems someone may be sorry you are here and not still there

[Ako Si Jamie]

Welcome back

[Englishman2010]

Despite the travelling it was a great trip and good to see somewhere different. Borneo is one of those places I've always wanted to go to and would love to go back to and explore more of.
My trip started off with a day and a half in Makati to rest after my initial long haul flight, then I flew into BSB, Brunei to meet Elaine. We stayed in the Gadong district of BSB, which is basically a marble clad shopping mall with a handful of western quality hotels, everything shuts at 10pm at the very latest.
For the next 3 days, Elaine showed me around Brunei - we saw the Sultan's Mosque, Palace, main town centre, Empire Hotel, Jerudong Park and went for a few boat rides along the river and into the national park rain forest.
Brunei is very clean and safe, it's like a low rise Muslim version of Singapore. It is also a very rich city, the Sultan has shared his country's imense oil wealth among his people who all seem to drive very big cars with big engines, but with Petrol at about £1 GBP a gallon, and the 3rd highest GDP per capita in the world it's not really surprising.
Despite that, after 3 days in Brunei, I had seen all I wanted to see and was getting bored with no beer and nothing open past dark. So we booked a 4 hour express coach ride to Miri in Sarawak, Malaysia.
We spent 2 nights in Miri. It is the Chinese part of Malaysia, with ethnic Chinese making up 70% of the population. The good thing about that is, there are plenty of Pork dishes and beer on offer in the restaurants and cafes. We also found plenty of Pinoys working in the restaurants and soon discovered a great place that sold ice cold SML. From Miri we took a day trip to the Niah Caves National Park, which involved an 8KM walk through an uphill jungle track until we reached the 250metre wide mouth of the caves. The inside of the caves was spectacular, and we were able to walk about 1KM inside along very dark wooden plankways.
After Miri, we went back to Brunei for a couple of days so that Elaine could celebrate her birthday with her sister and family, but I was itching to get back to Malaysia.
So we took a couple of boats and made the 7 hour boat journey to Labuan and Kota Kinabalo in Sabah. Labuan is an island just off the Brunei coast and is also a major port serving the ferries that run between the Malaysian ports on Borneo. It's a small place, but is quite a nice town to spend a few hours waiting for a connecting ferry.
We arrived in KK in the late afternoon, and found a Chinese owned hotel near the main town centre and park. KK's a nice town, full of Pinoys from Mindanao, and the night time Filipino Food Market is the best BBQ in the world, with a vast array of fresh BBQ'd seafood on offer at low prices.
I loved KK it was a great town, a real melting pot of asian cultures and culinary delights. If I'd stayed there for a few months I would have got very fat with all of the Chinese, Malay, Indonesian, Indian, Filipino, Thai and western dishes on offer.
KK was also very clean in comparison to The Phil's. Malaysia is more affluent than the Philippines, and it shows as there is no polution from trikes or Jeepneys, very little litter and the sidewalks
and alleyways are clean.
From the main harbour in KK you can take boat trips to some of the 9 Islands of the Tunku Rahman National Park, which take about half an hour to get to. These are all tropical paradise islands, with talcum powder fine sands, coral reefs, abundent tropical fishes and great jungle trails. We had a couple of day trips to Mamutik and Manukan islands. They are both beautiful, but Manukan is the better of the two, it's on par with Pandan Island in Palawan. We took the 3KM jungle trail on this island and came face to face with a growling 6foot Monitor Lizard. Elaine ran away and hid while I got as close as I could to him to get some photo's.
We also took a day trip to the Lok Kawi Wildlife park and saw some of the native animals to Borneo, including Orang Utans, Gibbons and Pygmy Elephants.
We had to head back to Brunei for our connecting flights and took the 9 hour bus journey from KK to BSB, which involved 2 border crossings into Malaysia and 2 into Brunei, 8 immigration points in total. It was a very long trip, but at least we got to see lots of the Temburong jungle National Park.
On our final day in Brunei, we went to Tamak Peraginam Tasik Lama Park Gardens and waterfal. Forget the gold plated marble domed mosques and 7 star hotels, the park is the most spectacular and beautiful thing in Brunei, and the walk around round a perfect last day for us in Brunei.
Elaine headed back to Manila a day before me, so I spent my last day walking around the harbour and Mall in downtown BSB, befoe my 10pm flight back to Manila.
My trip ended with 3 nights and 2 full days in Manila. The first day was a bit of a wasted day, as Elaine said we should go to the waterfalls near Laguna. We took the 2 and half hour bus journey, only to find that to get to the waterfalls, the boat, tour and insurance was another 1300 each. I'd only taken about 2000 in total out with me, so we ended up heading back to Manila.
I've been to Manila of 14 separate occasions, but have never actually been into the main city, I usually end up in Ermita, Pasay, Makati, Ayala, MOA, Bacoor or Imus and really wanted to see Intramuros and Rizal Park, so my last day was taken up by Elaine giving me a guided tour of where she went to University and the main attractions in Manila.
I had a great time with Elaine, and saw some wonderful places. After seeing Malaysia, it made me realise just how dity and poluted the Phil's is. Don't get me wrong, I love the Phil's, but it really struck me this time at just how little pride the people take in keeping their country clean. Everywhere is full of litter, people peeing in shop doorways, sleeping rough, pimps touts and pushers trying to sell viagra, sun glasses and hookers and everybody basically out to rip you off for as much as they can. I don't look at other places with rose tinted specs and realise that every country has its bad parts, but walking around Manila I realised it has some stunning colonial architecture and great road infrastructure and with a bit of pride and money spending on it, it really could be one of the worlds great cities and deserve its name of the Pearl of the Orient. They've cleaned Makati up and it really is like a mini Singapore or HK so why can't they clean Manila up?

[alanmf1]

Welcome back Ian, Great adventures!

[mindanao]

you've made a good comparison I have been to KK and the hospitality is like in pinas, the difference is that- it clean. You could have bought cheap jewelries at KK compared to pinas

[somebody]

Sounds like you had a great time. Worth doing the tours of the region while your Mahal lives there as if she does move away she from phill in the future she maybe keen to simply see friends n family in pinas. If the falls are the ones I'm thinking of we have family connections to the town where family own resorts and know boatman etc but in all trips I have made I have never really seen the falls doh the family prefer the resorts

So true about the park and the Bay it seems to have improved a little in recent years but so much more they could do with little outlay.

[stevewool]

wow ian a great trip, so many places and all sound wonderful,rizel park and surrounding areas was a eye opener for me so nice to walk round and just relax

[sars_notd_virus]

all sounds good and wonderful trip Ian..welcome back!!

[Terpe]

Enjoyed your write-up Englishman. Thanks for your effort and thanks for sharing.

[malditako]

welcome back ian...seen your holiday pics they are all great. nice to see intramuros and luneta once again even only in pictures

[Dedworth]

After seeing Malaysia, it made me realise just how dity and poluted the Phil's is. Don't get me wrong, I love the Phil's, but it really struck me this time at just how little pride the people take in keeping their country clean. Everywhere is full of litter, people peeing in shop doorways, sleeping rough, pimps touts and pushers trying to sell viagra, sun glasses and hookers and everybody basically out to rip you off for as much as they can. I don't look at other places with rose tinted specs and realise that every country has its bad parts, but walking around Manila I realised it has some stunning colonial architecture and great road infrastructure and with a bit of pride and money spending on it, it really could be one of the worlds great cities and deserve its name of the Pearl of the Orient. They've cleaned Makati up and it really is like a mini Singapore or HK so why can't they clean Manila up?

Great write up - I've only been to peninsular Malaysia (10 plus years ago) and always thought it was a bit mucky/tatty - sounds like they've got their act together

[Tawi2]

full of Pinoys from Mindanao

A lot of them are illegals,done the back door trip from pinas to sabah a few times with such folks,the boats normally do a night crossing from Sitangkai.Sounds like you had a good trip,Borneo is a great place

[Arthur Little]

Great write up

... , Ian for sharing!

[stevie c]

Welcome back in sounds like you had a fantastic time

[grahamw48]

Most interesting Ian.

I'm not jealous.

Malaysia has a lot of happy memories for me, as I spent 3 years there as a child.

[Englishman2010]

Great write up - I've only been to peninsular Malaysia (10 plus years ago) and always thought it was a bit mucky/tatty - sounds like they've got their act together

I was in West Malaysia 2 years ago and whilst it isnt as clean as Singapore, HK or Brunei, it was on par with most of southern Europe. East Malaysia is fairly similar, certainly not like the Phil's where litter is everywhere and the pavements are crumbling. The other thing I liked about Borneo was that cars stopped at pedestrian crossings - It must be the manners we Brits taught the colonials

[Englishman2010]

welcome back ian...seen your holiday pics they are all great. nice to see intramuros and luneta once again even only in pictures

Thanks Grace, I've still got a load more from KK and Brunei to post, but they take forever to upload on FB.

BTW, I need to get myself a cheap good digital SLR camera, I'm looking to spend around £300, can you recommend anything?

[Englishman2010]

Thanks for your kind words everyone - apologies for the spelling in my write up, I was tired

It's still nice to be back home, and even better when I get home and it's shorts, t-shirt and flipflop weather

[bornatbirth]

welcome back

just in time for the royal wedding

[Englishman2010]

A lot of them are illegals,done the back door trip from pinas to sabah a few times with such folks,the boats normally do a night crossing from Sitangkai.Sounds like you had a good trip,Borneo is a great place

Yeah, I really liked KK and Sabah, and will definitely try to get back there and see more of it. The Filipino market and night food market were my favorites. Elaine was talking to some of the Pinay waitresses at the eateries, most came from Jolo, Sulu or Zambo, so just a short trip across the sea to make the back door trip

[mickcant]

Very enjoyabe read on your trip, it was hetic for you

I have at least also been to the Rizal Park, and also enjoyed it
Mick.