Our final adventure day trip in Kuching was to get to one of the national parks to get a taste of the wilder side of Sarawak, in Bako national park. It is right by the sea and requires a bus and boat to get there. The national park is known for having a vast aray of plant and animal life with amazing scenery and jungle to explore as well as several beaches. We got up nice and early and headed to the market place in Kuching to board the bus to Bako market. We found the No.1 (Rapid Kuching) bus leaving adjacent to the Electra Building. It runs from 7am, hourly until 6pm, also stopping to pick up passengers opposite the Riverside Majestic hotel. (4MYR each way). The bus took about 40 minutes to get to Bako where we then had to queue up at the boat counter (just by where the bus drops off) to buy entrance tickets (20 MYR entrance each and 40 MYR each return boat tickets) and board a boat. The boat service counter is open 9am-3pm all week. From May to September transfers are usually every hour 8am-4pm.
The boat ride took 20 minutes starting at a sleepy fishing village and speeding up the rivers and mangroves before entering the South China Sea to the furthest point by the sea, to finally enter the park at the Teluk Assam jetty.
Once in the park we had to head to the park headquarters to register that we were there before heading off on some trails. There are a range of different trails to explore depending on time and length you want to walk. Around the headquarters before we had started any trails we found a heard of wild bearded pigs on the beach, macaques in the trees and found a couple of proboscis monkeys hanging around in the trees with their long bulbous noses. We were incredibly lucky as this was the main animal we were hoping to see here, as they can only be found in a couple of places and are endemic to Borneo. Then we made our way out to explore the park.
General pictures of park by boat, beach, HQ, bearded pigs, macaques and proboscis by HQ
First of all we headed off to the Paku trail where we made our way through the jungle, clambering over large tree roots and scouring the trees for wildlife, mainly hunting for more proboscis monkeys hiding. Just before we made it to the end of the trail near the beach we heard some movement in the trees, and just managed to spot some proboscis monkeys way up high playing in the trees. The beach itself was pretty and we spent a few minutes soaking in the scene.
We journeyed back along the path and then went on the Delima trail taking a boardwalk through the jungle for 20 minutes before trekking to the mangroves. On the way back to the HQ we saw a couple of proboscis monkeys hopping about in the trees in front of us.
After getting a drink at the café we headed back to the jetty to board the boat at 3pm. There were many more trails that we could of tried- longer ones over looking beaches with great views and you can stay in bungalows for cheaper there for the night if you want to explore more. We had tried to do this but all bungalows were full for the time we were there. We had a great time at Bako and would highly recommend it. We saw some wonderful scenery and animals and it was relatively easy to get too from Kuching.
Alex
Comments