Woohooo....from KK, we flew to Sandakan.
Only two flights daily on AirAsia. We took 7am flight to Sandakan. The journey was short. Fasten your seat belt, grab a meal and the next thing, you have reached your destination.
Once we touched down, we headed to the tourist counter hoping to join some guided tours. Unfortunately, none available. We were advised to head to Sepilok Orang Utan Rehabilitation Centre as the feeding time is at 10am daily.
The next thing we did was to hop into a taxi will all our luggage and off we go. Taxi from Airport to Sepilok Rehabilitation Centre was RM35.
Since we reached there really early, the ticketing counter was still closed.
So we headed to the cafe nearby for some breakfast.
I was expecting an expensive price at a tourist attraction like this, but it was not.
Probably because it is still very early in the morning, they couldnt really offer much. Anyway, the food was terrible, horrible, oily and totally failed!
Finally, here we go. With tickets in hand, here we go totally excited to see orang utan. The main reason for us to travel to Sandakan. Entrance RM5 (local) and RM10 (each camera).
Anyway, we managed to spot an adult orang utan in the wild with her baby. Probably, the workers purposely bring the orang utan to reduce visitors' disappointment.
After a quick rest, we headed to the famous Puu Jih Shih Buddhist Temple of Sandakan. You must not miss the beautiful scene at the temple. It was situated on the hill facing Sulu Sea. The view was gorgeous.
The sea breeze was great and we walked around the temple before heading back to our hotel.
That's very much what we did in Sandakan as it was a short detour from KK.
We were scheduled to land around 6pm that day, what's more interesting was we had the chance to see a different sunset! Sunset from the plane. A different angle of sunset from high above the ground. It was beautiful. Minutes later, we were shocked with the weather. We starts to fly in thick clouds. As far as i'm concern, flying in clouds can be very dangerous due to the poor visibility, thunderstorm and turbulence. Anyway, I'm not an expert but it's not restricted to these hazards.
Few moments later, the 'seat belt' light was lit and all passengers were advised to be seated. Then, turbulence!!! Meanwhile, the pilot announced the situation out there as we were all panicked with the strong turbulence with all the dark clouds. I was shocked with the sudden change in weather. I thought it was due to the dawn, but dawn was kind of early. Anyway, the pilot announced that we were expected to some turbulence and will be landing slightly later due to the heavy rain in LCCT.
My first time hearing such long speech from the pilot. And I began to panic! The turbulence was so strong I felt myself in some roller coaster ride! You will go up, suddenly down, and shaking as it it's earthquake for a while. The experience was unexpected. I got off my seat once in a while which made me hole tight to my seat.
Anyway, we went round and round while looking at the dark clouds and rain through the windows. We also get to see the lights lit for the night. Around 15 minutes later, we were finally allowed to land. Fuuuh...
Thanks to the pilots! Good job!
My Borneo story ends.
check out My Borneo Story: Labuan & KK (Day 1), KK (Day 2), KK (Day 3), Sandakan (Day 4)
