While covering a familiarisation trip for a group of travel agents from Aussie last Sunday, I decided to join them for a cruise upstream Brunei River, thanks to Ahim for reserving me a seat on the boat. For the travel agents, their objective was to look for proboscis monkeys, primates only found in Borneo.
But for me, I embarked for my own mission, to catch a glimpse of salt water crocodiles. Tide was low, I was hoping to see one basking on the mud. Upstream Brunei River is the habitat for these ferocious reptiles, further up Damuan river up to Bengkurong. An apex predator, they are capable of taking animals up to the size of an adult male buffalo, either in the water or dry land.
As we cruised, Sam, the eagle-eyed tour guide showed us various wildlifes of the mangroves. His eyes and instinct were so good that for a moment we thought those animals were purposely placed on its respective spot for tourists. The wildlife tour was fantastic, except for the fact that Brunei River is infested with garbage, bottles, cans, etc., acts of irresponsible people. I felt a huge shame in front of those foreign tourists.
Ah well, I'll let a long-tailed macaque tell his story in future posts. Now let me share the photos, I love wildlife photography!
An Egret, they can be found basically everywhere
I can't remember what's this called, a Silver Heron?
bright coloured Kingfisher, they are able to see well both in air and underwater while swimming
eeee... a Boiga, otherwise called mangrove snake or cat-eyed snakes, they're mildly venomous. This one was taken just less than 10 metres from our boat.
White bellied sea eagles, they're endangered species
Ahh a juvenile proboscis monkey posing for my camera. Monyet Belanda in Malay, or Bangkatan in our local call.
A well stuffed monitor lizard or biawak. Must have eaten 1 or 2 chicken from the nearby residentials, just behind Tasek Meradun
At this point we turned back for the return trip to Portview jetty. I was almost frustrated not to find a single croc despite the perfectly low tide. Until Sam the tour guide yelled, "Look!" pointing to muddy area by the shore.
There! A baby salt-water crocodile sunbathing, it's eyes sharp and fiery, probably less than a metre long, camouflaged in the mud. Wish I had a good angle or contrast for this shot, I had like 10 seconds to capture it before it darted into the water with a burst of speed due to an approaching boat. Man, they're fast! Imagine an adult one.
Just a baby croc for now. Brunei river, I shall return!
