Boat parking area at the entrance to Clearwater Cave, Mulu National Park, Sarawak, Malaysia
Happy Malaysia Day! 60 years ago, on 16-Sep-1963, Malaysia was born, when Malaya, Singapore (yup, Singapore was with us at one time), Sabah (then called North Borneo) and Sarawak united to become 1 country! Hurrah! (For the non-Malaysians, this isn’t Malaysia’s Independence Day. Independence Day is celebrated on the day that Malaya gained independence from Britain i.e., 31-Aug-1957.)
What better way to celebrate Malaysia Day (for me) than to continue on my posts of Sarawak’s Mulu Caves! (Yeah, I’m just looking for excuses and reasons like these to post picture posts, haha. I already have loads of these cave photos downloaded and sorted out. Posting all the caves at one go would be bloody boring. Who’d wanna see photo after photo of rocks and holes?!!!). So here goes. Part 2 of the Mulu Caves.
The Wind Cave and Clearwater Cave (and also Lagang Cave if you choose to visit) can only be reached by river. Yippee, a river adventure. What’s a trip to Sarawak without a ride on a river? Sarawak after all is famous for its rain forests and rivers. It contains Malaysia’s longest river, the Rajang River (Batang Rajang). River transportation still plays a big role in Sarawak. Many of the settlements in the thick jungle interior are still accessible only by river and/ or by foot!
Off we go! This is fun! On the Sungai Melinau Paku
The ascent to Wind Cave. Before that, we actually made a short stop at a Penan village (but more on that later, another post I think)
A chamber in the Wind Cave with an open roof
Inside the Wind Cave, which is anything but windy. Hey, where’s the wind?? It’s humid like a steam bath. There’s actually a river inside the Wind Cave (that explains the humidity) which connects to Clearwater Cave. But that is strictly for the adventure caving enthusiasts. The connection is 5km along the underground river. It takes 6 to 8 hours and you’d have to climb over rocks, get muddy and swim in the underground river! Interesting, but no thanks. Not for lazy bones here, hehe
This is the easier way, hah! Via river boat on the Melinau Paku river. Here we go again, onwards to Clearwater Cave
We’ve reached Clearwater Pool which is at the entrance of Clearwater Cave. (You can swim here, which we will, later on)
Jayden makes a friend. Jayden calls him Luke (he said his name is like the number 6 in Chinese), but I think his name is actually Louie, or something like that, as clarified by his mom, but my memory’s a little fuzzy to recall it all. He is half French (dad) and half Hong-Kong Chinese (mom). The single leaf plants hanging above them, on the cave entrance grows ONLY in Clearwater Cave according to the guide!
Looking back towards the entrance. That’s where we entered from. Here’s a picture of the whole family at the entrance of Clearwater Cave
Downwards into the cave. There’s a rumbling sound all over the cave, the roars of the underground river…
The roar gets louder. There you are, the river… Nope, no swimming here. Too dangerous. You can swim in the pool outside
Up again
Emerging from the abyss
Chill out time, on the Clearwater Pool. It’s bloody cold, but relaxing. We’re the first ones in the pool, yours truly and the kids and Louie
That’s all for now.
For those who’s wondering why Singapore isn’t with Malaysia anymore, here’s my 2 cents’ worth. (But don’t quote me, I’m not the historian here. This is just my take on it). Less than 2 years after the forming of Malaysia, Singapore got kicked out. No, they didn’t agitate or fight for independence or anything like that. Singapore actually wanted to remain with Malaysia, but Malaysia expelled them. Which other country do you know of, that got evicted to become an independent nation of its own?? I know so many countries who had to fight tooth and nail for years just to have freedom, and here we have a country ‘expelled’?!! And for what reason? Ummm… I think Singapore was just being a pain in Malaysia’s ass. That’s putting it a little crude. We just differed in opinion on how to run things. Singapore meant business right away, putting things right, no fucking around, unity, integrity and clean government is everything. Screw corruption, screw racial politics, equality for all regardless of race or religion. Malaysia was like …hey, rilek lah bro, little bit here, little bit there, slow a little bit, is OK lah, and the Malays still need some time to catch up with the other races, OK? Unfortunately, letting people do as they like, and a little bit of cronyism and corruption here and there, became a lot, and see where that got us. Looking back, Singapore did a way better job than us. They’re developed and grouped together with the first world countries (since the 90’s). And despite us creating a Vision 2020 in 1991 (where among other things, we’re supposed to become a developed nation by the year 2020 – that’s 19 friggin years to do it, OK??!), we’re still arguing about letting Zahid (the Deputy Prime Minister) off from all his corruption charges, and thinking of ways to stop the Islamic zealots (who’ve taken over the north of Malaysia) from coming to power (and transforming Malaysia into the ‘Islamic Emirate of Malaysia’ or something like that). But not all is bad though. Look who’s the nanny state now. Not Malaysia, haha. Chillax man. Signing out for now. See ya.
