The 1st of June marks the Gawai Dayak or harvest festival, and for lucky Malaysians meant a four day public holiday. For us it meant the town was a bit on the sleepy side (for sleepy read hungover on rice wine). Still we had ample time to check out the local markets and hawker stands. It's been over two weeks now in Malaysia and this is the longest we've gone without cooking, the closest we come is putting bread in the toaster in the morning. We've been randomly working our way through the local dishes; Laksa, Rendang, Tom Yam, Nasi Lemak, Mee Goreng, Nasi Soto, Kampungs and Belacans. All in all a lot of different types of rice and noodle dishes. So far we haven't come across anything we don't like, but we definitely have some favourites.
With the city asleep we made our way to the star attraction. As seen on BBCs Planet Earth, Gunung Mulu National Park, home to the worlds largest cave system. Buried so far into the rainforest a 30 minute flight is required, or a two day river crawl... we opted for the flight.
Return flights are only 290 MYR, that's less than £60, but that equates to 50 odd meals here. In a bid to recoup a bit of cash we spent our three nights at Mulu outside of the park at a homestay with a local family. Very basic accommodation, but we had a room with a couple of beds, cold shower and electricity for three hours a day, what more could you ask for.
We were here for the caves, and there's a whole heap of relational facts they can throw around.... x number of football pitches, x number of jumbo jets, even a St Pauls Cathedral can fit inside these cave systems.... the largest single cave system, the largest underground river system, the largest natural chamber, none of this really matters, these caves are just B-I-G BIG! We started with the Deer Cave, one of the biggest, but also home to between two to three million bats. They all come flooding out just after dark in a snake like procession so you just need to take their word on the number of them. It takes about ten minutes for the bats to exit the cave and is quite an extraordinary site as they corkscrew out in batches for a bit, before a five minute constant stream comes pouring out in what can only be described as a well executed synchronised display. They are of course going off to feed, and the stats say that each bat consumes 10 grams of insects a night, doing the math that's upwards of 20 tonnes a night.... that equates to a big mess on the cave floor each morning.
We also took a boat downstream to the Clearwater and Wind Caves. Clearwater is stunning and as the name suggests has an almost magical charm with a clear water river running through it. It is another monster of a cave in terms of size and walking around inside can be a bit disorientating but the sheer size of it and the sight of the lush green rainforest when looking out is sight to remember. The Wind Cave as you can probably guess took its name from the wind blowing through it, however didn't seem particularly windy to us. All the caves did however offer a nice cool respite from the heat and humidity of the jungle outside. Of course there was also the obligitary 'jungle trek', this time we were lucky enough to pass right under a viper snake who had made himself at home above the trail.
The caves are of course full of hundreds of beautiful rock formations that have been formed over millions of years. Stalactites, stalagmites, even a face that resembles Abrham Lincoln, however its the sheer unimaginable size of these caves that sticks in the mind.
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