Bako National Park – Home of Proboscis Monkeys
This week, let’s go to Bako National Park together in Borneo Malaysia!
To orient us, first let’s get the map out.
We are on the island of Borneo, specifically near the Red X, which is by Kuching, the capital of that region.
Welcome to Bako National Park!
But first, just to back up a little, we needed to wait for the bus.
After the bus, we then need to take a boat past these fishing traps to get to the park entrance.
At low tide, it’s necessary to get your feet wet and jump in and out of the boat.
Since all the accommodations was full, we finally used the camping gear we’ve been lugging around. But, we are not allowed to set our tent up until after 6:30 pm and must take it down by about 7:00 am. We must also never leave our tent unattended, otherwise the macaque monkeys will come over and have their version of shopping spree as they tear through all our stuff.
We’re watching out for you little cheeky macaque monkey!
But this monkey was one of the main reasons we went to Bako National Park, to see the proboscis monkey.
And yes, proboscis monkeys really have big noses like that. In the proboscis monkey world, the bigger the nose the more attractive.
There are a lot of other cool reasons to be here as well, like these pitchers plants. Pitcher plants are the ones that eat insects! Meat eating plants – not something you get to see every day!
All those plants hanging there are just waiting to eat meat, mostly insects. Life in the rain forest is hard.
There was also non meat eating flowers that just looked pink and pretty!
And little delicate purple ones that clung to shaded rock cliffs.
Difficult to spot, and especially in the daytime, we saw this flying lemur.
Although hard to tell in this pic, this female was about 25 feet up in the tree. Protected underneath her belly, she was also hiding a baby.
Hot and sweaty, after a few hours of hiking, we arrived to Teluk Pandan Kecil Beach where I almost didn’t want to walk across this exposed area because it was that hot. But we did anyway in the name of photography.
Always on the lookout for wildlife, this juvenile monitor lizard was making good use of the sun along the boardwalk around the park.
We also saw a waglers pit viper resting in a tree around the park.
Bearded pigs casually strolled along the beach…
…as we watched the sun drop down behind the mountains.
After much excitement over the quality wildlife sightings we had, we gleefully cruised back to the transport point. The difference of the tree line really showed itself. In the foreground we can see the heavy sediment filled water, adjoined by the light green mangrove swamp trees as mixed forest trees coat the hill sides.
Our time at Bako National Park was filled with meeting nice people, hiking, sweating and having some of the best views and photo opportunities of the rare, found only in Borneo, proboscis monkeys. Thanks so much for coming along with us. Man – this traveling thing is awesome!
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If you go:
Check out the Bako National Park website. If you want to stay overnight in the park, BOOK EARLY! Currently they are doing a lot of maintenance on the accommodations in the park, which means what’s left fills up fast! (And this park has been doing “maintenance” some of their trails for two years, so who knows how long this maintenance will last either.)
To stay over night (in any of the nationals parks in Sarawak) you will need to book ahead here. Alternatively you can call the booking office at Tel: (+6) 082 248088. No matter what, you have to book ahead and the sooner the better.
We actually used our tent to camp one night. We really wanted to go to Bako and there was no other way because everything was booked out for over three weeks. It was hot in the tent. The second day it rained, but, then there was a no show from another guest, so we got a hostel room which was a score!
Be aware of time. You have to take a boat to get to the park. The boats run from 9 am and the last boat is at 3 pm. So if you are only going for the day, get an early start to make the most of it! Tip: you can get a take away from the canteen if you think you might be out hiking the trails at lunch time.
This is not a swimming park and in fact we saw a 6 foot crocodile gliding along about 200 feet off shore. There is a small-ish river with waterfall you can get in, but visitors are advised not to swim at the beach.
The canteen had decent food. It was serve yourself style so you just go along a line of food, pick what you want and then pay. It was nice and I liked being able to choose what I wanted and the amounts. Plates were around $16RM.
Entrance fee to the park is $20RM foreigner. Return boat transfer is $40RM pp.
Bus $3RM pp. Whichever bus you are taking, most likely you can except a mini bus to come about 15 minutes before and offer to take you for $5RM. This might not be a bad idea. When we got on the bus it was packed with a group of students and we actually had to stand most of the bus ride. On the way back we took the mini bus.
In Kuching, we stayed at Marco Polos and loved our stay there. We also checked out the facilities and heard from other travelers they enjoyed their stay at Singgahsana Lodge.
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What's the craziest animal you've seen in a National Park? ***
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GREAT Bako National Park your!!! LOVE all the more than unusual animals and plants with fantastic photography. Not too often you can spot a flying lemur and the bearded hog is just surreal (like from Star Wars). Nice post and thanks again for all the insight.
Thanks so much! Yeah, staying overnight at Bako was the way to increase our odds at catching these animals. If we could have, we would have stayed three nights. The bearded pigs – they just fascinated me! Those eyes!!! And they looked blue for some of them. Just so captivating. Can’t wait to see what’s next! 🙂
I appreciate the map the most I think. Hard to imagine where you are at with out it, so thanks. That’s quite a pack Chris is totting , get a horse! LOL
The wild life is so amazing! And so different but that is it’s charm.
What kind of “people flow” do these parks generate and do a lot of locals visit frequently? (like in the US)
mare
Thanks – I really liked that map too! I know, our bags are big, BUT, without bigger bags we wouldn’t be able to carry camping equipment and we wouldn’t have been able to stay overnight in Bako. We’ve gone back and forth a bit on the stuff we’re carrying, but overall happy we are carrying it! 🙂 You just never know when you need it!
What an interesting post. The pictures were amazing, cant say which ones I enjoyed the most they were all incredible. Thanks for sharing your adventures!
Oh thank you Christine! 🙂 Bako was such a cool park!!! We really enjoyed our time there and glad we did not have any incidents with cheeky monkeys or hairy pigs!!!!
Oh wow – what an experience! And all that wildlife! Your photographs are amazing btw, especially those skies. #FlyAwayFriday
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Thanks so much Alex! Bako was a great place for wildlife photography! Happy travels. 🙂
Oh my gosh those monkeys!!!! So cute!!! The sunset photo is GORGEOUS too, absolutely dreamy. I’ve yet to visit Malaysia but I’ll definitely be checking out the monkeys when I do! Thanks so much for sharing on #FlyAwayFriday – hope to see you again this week! xo
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Thanks Kana! It rained our second night so we really lucked out with the sunset the first! We have so much enjoyed our travels in Malaysia. We have so much exploring of Asia to do, but Malaysia travel all around has been so enjoyable. Thanks for hosting #flyawayfriday. What a great idea! 🙂
My goodness these pictures are amazing! SO beautiful! I’ve been dying to get to that part of SE Asia and now the wanderlust is even worse! haha, thank you for sharing on #FlyAwayFriday and look forward to your next post!
Hey Chloe, thank you so much! Malaysia and Borneo Malaysia has just been so great to travel through. Thanks for the comment and look forward to following along with you! 🙂
WOW!!! Talk about your amazing photos! Some one is getting a good eye for photography and a great landscape to practice on.
Thanks so much Laura. We’ve been working really hard at trying to improve our photography skills. Glad you noticed! Bako was a great place to photograph! 🙂