Kuching Round 2 - Matang Wildlife Park

Well after a couple of nights roughing it in the jungle in Bako, we were sort of glad to be back to the comfort of our hotel in Kuching. Hot water, tv with Fox Movies, air con and not so many bitey things!
Kuching is in the Sarawak part of Borneo and is quite a developed place so it has it's shopping malls (low key compared to Kuala Lumpur), KFC and McDonalds. Where we were staying was away from the main tourist area so more low key which was good but for our taste in food it meant a 15 minute walk every night to get our dinner. Oh well the exercise is good! There isn't a massive amount of tourist things to do here so we decided to get a taxi to see more orangutans at Matang Wildlife Reserve. It meant about 1 hrs drive out of town so we ordered a taxi using our 'Grab' app.
Well, usual thing, the app notified us that the car was downstairs so in the lift, out the door and jump in the waiting taxi. Big mistake. This wasn't our taxi but an executive cab that somehow happened to be there and let us think it was our car! We were about 10 minutes into our drive when our mobile rang and Daz was alerted to the mix up. We asked the driver how much he would charge us and he came back with a price nearly 5 times more than the app quote. No way, we got him to pull over and drop us off, paying him 3/4 of what he demanded for the journey so far which made him quite animated and he kept saying 'rubbish', 'this is rubbish' waving the money at us  We laughed and wished him a nice day - poor man obviously needs a holiday!
At Matang, we started off at the visitors centre looking at the various stuffed animal exhibits on display including a creepy goggle eyed orangutan. We then walked through the animal enclosure area to see the crocodiles, Buffy Sea owls (one was enjoying a nice paddle in a pool!) and a Binturong (bear cat) which was worryingly pacing up/down probably thinking of an escape plan. Next up was some Bornean gibbons who took a liking to Daz making little squeaky noises at him (must be the long arms!) then finally the orangutans.

You looking at me/? What's wrong with my hair I've just had it styled!

Can you tell I work out? I used to be a male model you know....

Some of the orangs were in large caged enclosures which was disappointing - this place does rehabilitate them but we didn't see why these type of cages were a kind or natural way to keep them there. There were bigger walled enclosures with grass and wooden climbing frames for the majority of the orangs which seemed to house much happier animals as a consequence. There was also a large male who had been rescued as an infant, gone blind in later life then had a cataract operation at the reserve to restore his sight. He was kept on his own and just looked like he needed somebody to throw a rope ladder over the wall so he could escape and spend the rest of his life a free ape. Sadly, we didn't have a rope ladder.

River view on our trek at Matang

Camouflouge is the latest in tree fashion here in Borneo

After a seeing the animals, we went off for an hours trek in the nearby rainforest on one of the marked trek paths. It was very peaceful with lots of different flora, rivers and swing bridges to keep us busy. No encounters with any bitey/stinging things - or so we thought! We called our taxi guy who promptly arrived to take us home and we sat in the car tired/looking forward to a shower. My (K) leg started to hurt so I rolled up my trouser leg to apprehend the fire ant causing the problem, found it, squished it then on to the other leg. Woah! What's that black slimey slug thing on me? Urggh, a leech! I quickly let out a shriek followed by a karate style couple of flicks in its slurpy little face and it instantly fell into the footwell of the car. Tissue, leech and out the window! My leech love bite wouldn't stop bleeding so I improvised with some tissue and my sock until first aid could be applied at the hotel.