My mini safari trip in Lahad Datu continued with a flight from Lahad Datu to Sandakan via Mas Wings…

We arrived at Sandakan Airport and boarded the small bus which took us to Myne Resort…

Myne Resort is located at Kampung Bilit, along the edge of the Kinabatangan River and just also at the edge of the Kinabatangan Wildlife Sanctuary, 122 km away from. Sandakan Town…

We arrived just in time to go to the toilet, and enjoy the cool refreshing drink the staff prepared for us and was ushered into  the boats for our evening sunset cruise down the breathtakingly huge Kinabatangan River..

For your info, the Kinabatangan is 560km in length, and it is the longest river in Sabah, and the second longest river in Malaysia…

It was such a thrilling experience cruising along the Kinabatangan, keeping an eye out for long tailed macaques, pig tailed macaques, and those rare long-nose proboscis monkey which can only be found here in Borneo…. At the same time I was trying my best to see if I could spot any crocodiles but to no avail…. And neither was my luck at spotting any pygmy elephants… Huhuhuhu…

We only got to appreciate our monkey sightings, some birds and the magnificent sunset as the sun sank into the lush vegetations of the Kinabatangan (at least it was what we saw) from the distance…

We then headed back to  Myne Resort, and given our room keys… Thrilled, my room mate E-wen and I, headed to our room only to find it being the last second room at the top of the steep stairway….

Nevertheless we hauled our luggages up bravely, huffing and puffing until we got to our room..

Our room was beautiful, it was a wooden chalet perched on stilts.. There was a queen bed and a single bed, and a balcony… The ensuite bathroom was pretty neat too..

I opted for the single bed and sank on it gratefully.. Yup.. After all it was a pretty tiring day with my ass seemingly getting bigger almost glued to the van and then the plane and then the bus for hours…  And it was also just a quick rest before we headed back to the main area for our dinner…

Dinner was a simple affair and pretty yummy…when dinner was over, we were drawn to the excitable sounds of one of the guests of the resort…

And we headed out to the entrance where we were greeted with an amazing sight… There was a whole family or tribe of wild boar, from the young to the old there at the side of the resort… A couple of bigger wild boars were on the defensive as there were also babies there…

We were told the wild boars always appeared in the evening and will hang out there and the resort before heading to below our chalets for “guard” duty… Then they will head back to the jungle when it is about 5ish in the morning just before the sun rises..

In the middle of the excitement, our guide at the Myne resort then grouped us together before proceeding to the Merbau Trail for our night jungle walk…

The Merbau Trail is named after the 100 year old Merbau Tree that you will be able to see during your trek. This tree is a pretty huge tree and has a hole underneath big enough for you to crawl in.. It is said to be a hiding place for some villagers to hide their daughters during Japanese occupancy in North Borneo…

Our guide crawled in and disappeared from sight and I was next to half crawl for a peek.. As I was nervous about what was in the tree… A couple of other team members of the group also started crawling inside the tree and I regretted not going in… So I proceeded to crawl in too…

The tree was indeed spacious and big enough to hide half a dozen people or less comfortably.. We could see the moonlight at the hollow at the top of the tree and there were a couple of fruit bats fluttering around…

Our night walk continued with us spotting birds asleep at their trees and also stick insects… There was a slow loris and a civet cat somewhere but we did not get to see it…

We however got to see a Hornbill’s nest as well with the mom “locked” away with her young inside the hollow tree…

I was just a bit too concerned with hopefully not getting any leeches on my bare feet (as I was just wearing a pair of knee length hiking pants) and was lucky not to!!!!

Once we arrived back at the resort, we headed back to our rooms for a shower and to catch up on our much needed rest…

We got up at 5.30am and headed downstairs for some light breakfast before proceeding to our morning river cruise… To be honest I was like why yet another cruise…

Along the same river though at a different time but all the thought disappeared when the boat slowed down and we were half squinting and half looking at both a baby and an adult crocodile a few metres apart at the riverbank…

Now I was the one getting excited while some of my team members were also getting a bit freaked out finally realizing I was not joking about the river being croc infested…

Our little morning cruise continued with another Croc sighting, some macaques and even the silver leaf monkey before we journeyed back to the resort for our second breakfast of the day…  Once we finished our breakfast, we headed back to our rooms to shower,  pack and by mid-morning at about 9.30am, we checked out from the Myne Resort and headed to Sandakan…..

The Myne Resort offers pretty good rates at just about RM288 (Malaysian) 1 person per night , or RM428 (non Malaysian) 1 person  per night…

The price is inclusive of full board meals and activities – 1 jungle walk, 1 cruise…

Call for more inquiries or special rates…
Tel – +6089 223366 / 223377
Mon – Fri, 8:00 – 17:00
Sat, 8:00 – 13:00
Address – Kampung Bilit, Kinabatangan, Sabah
Website – http://www.myne.com.my/

My gratitude to Tourism Malaysia, Sabah Tourism Board, Sandakan Tourism Association, Malaysia Airlines and MAS Wings for making all this possible and the opportunity…