Borneo

Borneo. Even just saying the name makes us think of dense jungles full of huge bird-eating spiders and wild monkeys that have never seen a tourist. So we decided to check it out, but we had no idea what to expect. Would the airport be a dirt landing strip? Would we have to bring all our own food? Would we get eaten by giant cockroaches?

Well, the reality isn’t quite like that. The cities in Borneo are pretty developed, and the infrastructure is better than most places in Africa. For example, there was a Starbucks in all three airports we went to in Borneo (that counts as infrastructure, right?).

We first flew into Miri, which is in east Malaysia. Miri is an oil boomtown, and the entire place is seemingly sponsored by Shell and Petronas, including the shiny new petroleum museum. There’s also a very strong Chinese influence in eastern Malaysian Borneo, which we saw in all 3 cities we visited.

From Miri we flew to Gunung Mulu national park, the site of Deer Cave, the largest cave passage in the world and star of the Caves episode of Planet Earth. It was cool. There are 2-3 million bats living there, and almost every night they leave the cave to go hunting, a process that takes almost an hour because there are so many of them.

After a few days in the rainforest of Gunung Mulu, we headed to Kota Kinabalu, up in the northern part of the island. From there we took a bus across Borneo to the Sulu sea, then drove 2 hours into what used to be jungle, but is now palm oil plantation. Unfortunately, about 50% of Malaysian Borneo has been deforested to grow palm oil trees.

But there was a wildlife reserve along the Kinabatangan river, where we spent 2 days cruising the river spotting Proboscus monkeys, lots of birds, and even a wild Orang-Utan. We got close to pygmy elephants, but only heard them. The wildlife and the river there are beautiful, though the proximity to palm plantations was a grim reminder of how endangered many of the species are.

Once we left the jungle, we finished up our honeymoon with an upgrade from our normal budget hotel and backpacker accommodations. We went to a small island 90 minutes off the coast of Borneo, and stayed in a hut at a beach resort for 2 nights before beginning the long journey home.

Check out some of the amazing photos from our time in Borneo.

Borneo

Bali

After the hectic pace of Java, we needed a bit of relaxation. Luckily, Bali was the perfect spot. Bali is beautiful, interesting, and definitely relaxing.

After spending one night in the beach town of Sanur, we waded out to a boat heading to Nusa Lembongan, a small island off of Bali's south coast. Nusa Lembongan has few cars and the pace of life is centered around the constant Hindu ceremonies and the tidal harvesting of the seaweed.

We stayed in a beach hut on the remote side of the island and rented a motor scooter to get around. One the scooter it takes about an hour to tour the whole island, so we had a lot of time to read or nap on the beach. It was a perfect spot to spend a few days.

Then we headed back to the bigger Bali, where we toured terraced rice paddies, visited the Hindu temples, and wandered the streets of the artist town of Ubud (of Eat, Pray, Love fame). Almost 90% Hindu, Balinese life is dominated by ceremonies and the homes and towns are all centered around temples. Even though the temples there are very old, they are still used almost daily, and we ran across many elaborate ceremonies involving entire communities.

We could have easily spent another week in Bali, but were getting pretty excited for our next destination: Borneo.

Check out some of our pictures from Bali.

Bali

Java

After a two day trip that took us through Germany and Thailand we landed in Jakarta, which is on the island of Java in the country of Indonesia. Indonesia is made up of some 20,000 islands and is well known for the wildlife in Sumatra and Borneo, rice paddies, temples, Bali, and the bombings in both Jakarta and Bali that targeted tourist locations. We went because it had a good mix of culture, beaches, and wildlife (and it wasn't the rainy season).

We spent two nights in the crazy, overcrowded, hot, dirty, and fascinating city of Jakarta. We saw a few things but mostly learned how many people you can pack into a very small space (NYC is nothing!) and how it might be easier to take a taxi across the street than to try to cross on your own.

Our next stop was Yogyakarta. To get there we took a train across Java. The train took 8 hours and we spent most of the time watching the mountains, volcanoes, rice paddies, and daily life go by outside our window. Yogyakarta is a good size city, if we hadn't been to Jakarta we would have thought it was a big city but in comparison it was calmer and smaller. The main reason we went to the city was see two temples. Within 45 minutes of the city is the world's largest Buddhist temple and South East Asia's largest Hindu temple. Both were beautiful and amazing feats of human engineering.

After three nights we were now off for our next adventure in Bali. Here are some pictures from our week on Java.

Java

Honeymoon

For the past month we have been on our honeymoon traveling through South East Asia. Four countries, 13 hotels, 12 flights, and six islands later we are home. We are going to post pictures in three groups, a post for each main island we went to. But here are some things we learned from our trip.

1. Java has more motor bikes that you have ever seen in your life (and the drivers are crazy!).
2. You are never far from a Starbucks or a KFC.
3. You have to bargain for everything.
4. Rice paddies are beautiful.
5. Everything is always an adventure, you never know what to expect.
6. Bali is famous for a reason, it is beautiful and fascinating.
7. Stick bugs are really cool.
8. South East Asia is really really really far away.
9. You can watch proboscis monkeys forever.
10. Planet Earth was right, Borneo is really cool.

Friendly racing

After 5 years out of the sport of rowing, Joe and I decided to make a comeback yesterday. We've been maintaining a rigorous training schedule of at least once-every-two-weeks practices since the fall, so we decided to enter the Michigan Club Invitational regatta in Ann Arbor. It's 1000 meters of intensity, with clubs coming from as far away as Madison, Wisconsin. Despite our lack of fitness, seriously rusty technique, and my mistaking 300 meters to go for the finish line, we won the open double event! And more importantly, we had an awesome time rowing together and are satisfied enough to wait at least another 5 years until we race again.

Before the race: nerves of steel

We've still got it!

Look at that catch timing!

Delirious - it didn't use to be this hard

Summer Goodness

This just might be my favorite time of year. The farmers market is getting to it's peak and there isn't anything much better than wandering around the market on a Saturday morning. Last weekend Arthur and I got up and jumped on our bikes and headed to the Pastry Peddler and got a fresh warm pastry. Then we made it to the market where we got our iced coffee and wandered through all the stalls before we started making our purchases.

We have also joined a CSA (community supported agriculture) and pick up our box of goodness on Wednesday. We drive out to the farm on Wednesday after work and our box is waiting there for us. There are some extra goodies out on a table that you can choose from, flowers, herbs, green tomatoes, etc.

Here are some pictures of the best of the summer.
Our first CSA pick up














Beets and goat cheese from our CSA share


















Farmers market bounty


















Organic heirloom tomatoes and our own basil














First batch of blueberries

Local Salad

Yes, this was fresh lettuce.

Also, look how much our tomato plants have grown in just 2 weeks. They're 5 feet tall now!

2 weeks ago, they were just up to Courtney's waist!

Beet seeds went in the ground yesterday.