Our flight from Kuala Lumpur to Sandkan had us stopping in Kota Kinabalu. There isn’t too much to do in the airport, except to drink $2 bottles of water and shop at a few overpriced boutiques. We arrived in Sandakan after a beautiful sunset flight over the spectacular Mount Kinabalu. Luckily we met up with a British lady who was also visiting the same hotel (Sepilok Jungle Resort) and had the organization skills we were lacking to arrange to be picked up by the resort.

The resort was unbelievably beautiful. Malaysia was finally starting to look up. Fantastic landscaped grounds with a pond running through the property. Great food at the restaurant, and very reasonably priced – especially considering there were no other choices! We paid $50 a night for a room with AC and hot shower. There were lots of places to sit down and just relax on the property, soaking in the environment of the jungle around you, the chirping of the birds, etc. This was definitely the highlight of Malaysia for us.  The only negative was that there was cockroaches in the room. Not a lot – we averaged one squash a day – and they were coming up from where the shower drained. We couldn’t really blame the hotel – the place was impeccable, and we were in the middle of the jungle, after all…

The hotel is just a 10 minute walk from the the Sepilok Orangutan Rehabiliation Center. The center re-introduces previously captured and injured orangutans to the wild. There are two daily feedings which help newly freed orangutans make the transition to living in the wild. This gives visitors a spectacular opportunity to see the orangutans up close and personal in the wild.

We had enough time at the lodge to see three different feedings of the orangutans. During the first feeding it was raining, but a few still showed up, taking shelter between the trees as they scarfed down the bananas. The second feeding was the best as all the other tourists left after the first 20 minutes, leaving only a handful of us watching a family of orangutans including a mother and a baby. It was an amazing experience. We got pretty close to them (within 10 feet as they swung by on the ropes to the feeding platforms). There were also macaque monkeys, who were a lot less shy (though they can be aggressive) and would often scamper right amongst the tourists as they waited for the orangutans to leave to eat the leftover fruit. Visiting the park isn’t that cheap, about $8 a person (or $4 with no camera).