Last Wednesday I went to Malaysian Borneo for what turned out to be quite an eventful trip. Beforehand I had low expectations for the holiday as sooner or later one of them has to not be so good and on top of that I hadn’t really thought about what I could realistically get done over the four days or where I would stay on my arrival at 1am.

After a long transit flight via Kuala Lumpur I got to the backpacker area in Kota Kinabalu fairly smoothly but the so-called 24 hour hostel I intended to check into seemed to be closed for the night. Likewise for the nearby Lucy Backpackers which I eventually checked into for only three pounds a night having woken up the owner.

         

My last two holidays this year were beach resorts so the reason for choosing Borneo was to experience something a bit different but nothing much changed on my first day as I took a 15 minute speed boat to Mamutik Island which is part of the Tunku Abdul Rahman National Park. I met a guy called Jonathan at the jetty and so hung out with him at the nice pleasant beach with good snorkelling in the crystal clear waters but nothing compared to what I’ve experienced elsewhere.

I later walked up the hill behind my hostel to signal point lookout which wasn’t as spectacular as I thought it would be and probably not worth the sweat which was maybe further elongated by my lack of direction which saw me go the wrong way three times!

    

The weather forecast had said heavy rain all week but it was far from that on a lovely afternoon but it did pee it down at night when I went out for dinner and a few beers with Jonathan before I headed home ahead of a very early start the following day.