Borneo, Day 2: ORANGUTANS.

This is the fulfilment of a dream. I’ve wanted to see the orangutans of Borneo for I don’t know how many years. And today – here I am, walking quickly past this mother and baby while taking a quick snap. What a lucky pic!

You can see the stick that a ranger was waving in front of her. We all thought it was to protect her and her baby from stupidity humans, but we found out later that she likes to steal iPhones from people. She was casing the joint.

The Sepilok Orangutan Sanctuary is a place that rescues orphaned and injured orangutans and rehabilitates them to hopefully go back to the wild. The orangutans are at the centre due to deforestation for palm oil and timber. . They like to eat the young shoots at the palm oil tree, which obviously causes problems with the farmers.

97% same genes as us. The people of Borneo call them “little cousins.”

Every day orangutans make a new nest . They wander 2kms a day, never far from food. They are 10 – 20 metres off the ground and it takes 15 minutes.

A mother and baby made a nest in a palm oil plantation. The farmer called the wildlife people, who came and tranquilised the mother. The baby thought its mother died. It cried, threw leaves at the wildlife officers and bolted for the jungle. Both of them were transferred to the sanctuary.

If you are caught hunting orangutans, it’s a fine of 50,000 ringgit (around 12,000 AUD.) Also 5 years in prison.

Baby orangutans stay with their mothers until they are 10. In the wild, they live for 60 years. 

They release the babies back into the wild after they reach adulthood.

These videos were taken through a one-way mirrored window, which has unfortunately made the colours a little wonky. This is a place where the young orphans learn to socialise with each other, under the careful supervision of their keepers.

We were given an hour to sit here and the time galloped by.

When the food was brought out, some of them were chill. Some shared… while this one raced away with food clutched in her feet.

I got very excited when I saw a black squirrel running across the rope leading to this platform. This makes 3 continents that I’ve seen squirrels in! It’s on the tree trunk to the left, doing its best to grab a snack without being seen.
Actually, me mentioning the 3 continents thing reminded me of when I was talking to a stupid American, who wouldn’t believe me when I said that seeing a squirrel was exciting for me, because we don’t have them in Australia.

” You must do!” the stupid American said. “Squirrels are everywhere.”

They went on and on about how every country has them, until I lost patience and snapped, “Ok, so how many wombats do you have in YOUR country?? Everyone knows wombats are everywhere.”

That shut them up.

I’m way zoomed in on these two, heading for the food through the jungle at the back.

Then it was time to head out to the outdoor feeding area.

There were many macaque monkeys there. I don’t know why this one was looking so distressed.

I like this shot.

There was only one orangutan mother and baby at the feeding spot. The rest were macaques. It was sweet when the keeper arrived with the food.

I love how the keeper almost absentmindedly helps the baby. It’s obviously something that happens a lot.

Then all of a sudden it got exciting. I was standing right at the front of where the feeding platform was, when suddenly we were all being told by keepers to stand away from the fence. At first we were reluctant to move, but when they said that a mother and baby orangutan were coming down the path, we all moved back as one to give them space.

It turned out that instead of wanting to walk down the path, she wanted to stick around. She and her baby ended up on the roof above our heads.

You’d better believe that I moved lickety split up and over to where I could see her peering down at us!

Not even 6 feet away.

They stayed up there for quite a while. Apparently, one guy on our tour keeled over and needed a wheelchair. I only heard about it at the end of the day. I was too busy watching these two.

Look at the colours.

So very cute.

Then as suddenly as she appeared, she decided to leave.

I was third on the path following them. We saw them both climb some ropes leading up to the tall trees. I was just in time to snap her swinging away.

This was only the first of four stops today, but I’ll pick up the story tomorrow. This was a wonderful experience in a year that’s been full of wonderful wildlife experiences. I’m a very lucky woman.

Dad Joke of the Day: