Page 1 of 1

Borneo Dispatches #27: Big Borneo Photo Dump

Posted: March 2nd, 2012, 6:11 am
by Hans Breuer (twoton)
Here's a collection of miscellany pix I took over the past few weeks, every single of them either too uninteresting or too cellphoney for a dedicated post. So buckle up and get ready for some kick-ass mediocrity!

Let's start with a roadkill appetizer. This is a snake I've long wanted to see, if not necessarily in this particular condition. Blue Coral Snake, Calliophis bivirgatus, ca. three feet and change. Sadly, the ones in Sarawak ain't really blue.
Image

Image

A little innocuous expat fun with an Oriental Vinesnake (Ahaetulla prasina). If you're stationed in Kuching and you love nature, you and your family will live in paradise. If you don't, it's an East Malaysian backwater without theaters and art galleries, but there's always the pubs downtown...
Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

No, they're probably not self-aware. Still a cool pic :-)
Image

Welcome to Borneo Highlands Golf Resort, an exclusive country club in the middle of a rainforest. The place is located at 3600 feet, and the cloud sea you're looking at is Kalimantan, the Indonesian part of Borneo. Right at my feet is a two thousand foot drop that allows spectacular views of the above-canopy bird world.
Image

Image

Image

The woods up there are cloud forest - everything's covered in moss, and you keep stumbling - literally - over rotten branches that have fallen out of the canopy, still bejeweled with orchids...
Image

Image

Image

Image

Image

Twoton jr. with yet another Red-tailed Racer (Gonyosoma oxycephalum). There WILL come the day that we find a live one. Mark my words.
Image

This fallen six-foot branch scared the living piss out of me when I passed it by the first time....
Image

Sarawak Reed Snake, Pseudorabdion saravacense. The snake is dead, the pic atrocious, but hey, that's a critter so rare I needed to call Indraneil Das to ID it.
Image

Image

Big Wagler's (or is it a Borneo Keelback Viper?), the first adult I've ever seen. To far away in the mangroves to grab, though.
Image

Juvie Tropidolaemus wagleri with a nose hair problem.
Image

A katydid I found on the roof of my car.
Image

Nepenthes mirabilis inflorescensce, about my height.
Image

Hornbill watching tower. Yes, it's as scary-creaky as it looks, but my son went up the entire eighty feet anyway. What was I to do, tell him not to climb it? Then he'd just do it on the sneak...without me downstairs to catch him.
Image

Horny ant molesting peaceful beetle! Or something.
Image

Varanus salvator baby, chillin' in the mangroves. Barenaked and indolent...a true creature of the inner tropics.
Image

Image

Re: Borneo Dispatches #27: Big Borneo Photo Dump

Posted: March 2nd, 2012, 6:27 am
by BillMcGighan
Another good one, Hans. Thanks.
my son went up the entire eighty feet anyway
Even with a fear of heights, I'd rather climb that than watch a kid do it. Good job, Dad.

Re: Borneo Dispatches #27: Big Borneo Photo Dump

Posted: March 2nd, 2012, 6:47 am
by Hans Breuer (twoton)
BillMcGighan wrote:Another good one, Hans. Thanks.
my son went up the entire eighty feet anyway
Even with a fear of heights, I'd rather climb that than watch a kid do it. Good job, Dad.
Thanks, Bill. Yes, it was definitely not easy to watch...but as I said, he needed to get it out of his system (until the next hornbill breeding season :-) )

Re: Borneo Dispatches #27: Big Borneo Photo Dump

Posted: March 2nd, 2012, 12:37 pm
by Warren
Great post! Gives the flavour of Kuching.
Much better than the flavour of Vietnam, which is oddly fishy.

Re: Borneo Dispatches #27: Big Borneo Photo Dump

Posted: March 3rd, 2012, 4:08 pm
by Viridovipera
Warren wrote:Great post! Gives the flavour of Kuching.
Much better than the flavour of Vietnam, which is oddly fishy.
HAHA! :lol:

Cool post Hans! Thanks for sharing the beautiful scenery with us.

Re: Borneo Dispatches #27: Big Borneo Photo Dump

Posted: March 3rd, 2012, 4:24 pm
by mikemike
Fantastic post as usual, Hans. Thanks a lot for posting.