clog blog: Borneo: Kota Kinabalu to Sepilok

Borneo. Mountains, forests, orangutans, proboscis monkeys, clouded leopards, world renowned diving, coral reefs, turtles, hammerhead sharks. What’s not to love? In the middle of last year, Justin sent me a link for turtle island, a small island reserved for nesting turtles off the coast of Borneo, with the short message of: When are we going? A seed was planted and a year later we were jetting off!

Sipadan Island

Borneo is the third largest island in the world and is comprised of the Indonesian state of Kalimantan in the south, the two Malaysian states of Sarawak and Sabah in the north, with the tiny principality of Brunei squeezed in inbetween. There is a lot of ground to cover and for this trip we decided to stick with the Malaysian state of Sabah starting in the state capital Kota Kinabalu.

Flying direct from Ho Chi Minh City to Kota Kinabalu would probably only be about two hours, however there are no direct flights and one has to fly via the Malaysian capital of Kuala Lumpur. We were due to fly late Friday night, stay over in KL, and continue the journey to KK the next day. However, the airline changed our flights last minute without our knowledge. There was a bit of a scramble and confusion, but both flights were finally rescheduled for the Saturday. Instead of landing in KK midday Saturday, we only landed late-ish on Saturday evening, in the rain. A quick and easy dinner was found and then it was an early night before a busy 3 days.

Traditional pho (and ice tea) at the airport

Ready for take off!

Kota Kinabalu is the easy access point to Kinabalu National Park, home to Mount Kinabalu, the highest mountain in Borneo and Malaysia and the third highest island peak in the world at 4095 metres. It’s popular to climb the mountain over two days with sunrise at the summit. We decided to skip this activity though and were happy with our decision after chatting with some people through our trip who had done it. We chose instead to have 3 days of diving and snorkelling in Tunku Abdul Rahman National Park.

Justin had previously completed the PADI Open Water scuba diving certification and decided to use the time in KK to do the next level, Advanced Open Water (AOW) which would be needed later on in our trip. The first day was a day of fun diving for a refresher and getting back into the swing of all things underwater, followed by two days of the AOW course. Bron did two days of snorkelling and one rest day of material shopping (unsuccessful) and cafe hopping (chilled!). It was full days of being on the jetty at 08:00 and getting back to the accommodation around 16:30. Lunch was provided at a different island each day. We went with Scuba Junkie for all our diving in Borneo and highly recommend them! The guys were really fun and we felt safety was prioritised. They have more than one location in Borneo and also in other places such as Komodo and Bali. We were, however, disappointed with the quality of diving/snorkeling in Tunku Abdul NP. The visibility was really poor all three days due to unseasonal rain and the general state of the coral was disappointing. It was good for Justin to do the AOW course there, but we would not recommend diving/snorkelling there in general, there are much better places in Borneo.

A well deserved beer after the AOW course, cheers!

There was quite some rain during our 3 days in Kota Kinabalu. Our first full day was the only day it didn’t rain in the early evening. We rushed off to the only stretch of beach in KK for a long walk and to enjoy the sunset and were not disappointed! It was really special.

Sunset on Kota Kinabalu Beach

A special shout out to our accommodation in KK. Justin booked us an apartment rather than a hotel room and it was just perfect for what we needed. It was so cosy and comfy and nice to have some more space. It was nice to have a full size fridge and stock up on breakfast items and snack food at the supermarket, to have a washing machine, and to be able to relax on the couch with a hot drink and a Netflix movie after all day on the boat. Highly recommend this style of accommodation for longer stays and this kind of trip.

After 3 days in Kota Kinabalu, it was time to leave the coast and head inland for the jungle part of the holiday.

We flew from KK to Sandakan and transferred to Sepilok where we would be staying at the beautiful Sepilok Nature Lodge. The Lodge is well thought out with each room its own little stand alone villa connected by wooden boardwalks around a central lake. Our room was large and cosy with its own bath in the window.

Our beautiful room at the Sepilok Nature Lodge

Around the grounds of the lodge

Dinner and drinks at the lodge

Our cosy room villa in the morning after all the rain

In the afternoon we took a walk to the nearby Rainforest Discovery Centre (RDC). The RDC is an environmental education centre set in virgin jungle reserve. Things to do at the RDC include viewing wildlife from the elevated Rainforest Skywalk with three viewing towers reaching into the treetops, walking in the forest on one of several trails, discovering plants in the Plant Discovery Garden, and enjoying a guided night walk.

Unfortunately it started raining heavily soon after we arrived at RDC, but we made a start on the Rainforest Skywalk. We continued on the skywalk until the end and enjoyed all three viewing towers but sadly didn’t see much due to the rain, only (a very cute and happy) squirrel or two and some (unidentifiable) birds in the distance. It must be really lovely though when it’s sunny with good opportunities for spotting wildlife as the walk is eye level with the trees. We returned to the cafe for a nice hot mug of Milo and to wait out the rain. We wanted to explore some of the trails but it was so muddy with more rain imminent so we decided to skip. We had a short wander around the Plant Discovery Garden and then walked back to the lodge for dinner and a quiet evening.