The Borneo Gallery is available from now on. Photos of some endangered species such as the Orangutans, the Borneo Pigmy Elephants and the Proboscis Monkeys can be found there.

We travelled to the Sabah region of Borneo, which belongs to the Malasian part of the isle.

Our itinerary included the following places:

• Mount Kinabalu NP. Our visit to this area was limited to the parc services area, per the temporary closure of nearly all the paths due to an earthquake and some landslides caused by some hard rains that happened later. Some of the paths have been opened at the beginning of December 2015, but the Mesilau area, where the pitcher plants we wanted to see were is still closed and there is no tentative date for its re-opening.

• Pooring Hot Springs, where we saw the Rafflesia, the biggest and rarest flower of the world, about which I already gave you more details at my previous post.

• Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Center, founded in 1964. They rehabilitate and reintroduce orphan orangutans into the nature.

• Kinabatangan river and its inflowings, where we were able to closely see from a small boat a group of Bornean Pigmy Elephants that were taking a bath at the river. This is also one of the few remaining places where the Proboscis Monkey (Nasalis larvatus) lives. Endemic from Broneo, it is extremly endangered as it exclusively depends on this fragile habitat which is threatened by the Palm Oil Industry.

• Danum Valley Conservation Area, 438 square kilometers of primary forest, mainly untouched… a paradise where we were able to see some wild Orangutans (Pongo pygmaeus) and Red Leaf Monkeys (Presbytis rubicunda), among others.

• Tabin, secondary forest (it is not what it used to be), but we were able to see Müller’s Bornean Gibbon or Grey Gibbon (Hylobates muelleri), two different types of otters: the Hairy-nosed Otter (Lutra sumatrana) and the Smooth-coated Otter (Lutra perspicillata) among other interesting animals.

• Sepilok Rainforest Discovery Center (RDC), very close to the Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Center, it’s an Environmental Education Center. There is a Canopy walkway and some observation towers within the Kapili-Sepilok Forest Reserve. The Plant Discovery Garden and displays a big number of Bornean plants. We were able to see some orangutans and Hornbills here.

The photographs included in the gallery would like to represent the different species that we found thru our itinerary.

I wish you like them.

See you soon!

Esther