In fact, besides seeing the fantastic looking Asian Paradise Flycatcher briefly, the hike was pretty slow.
White-chested Babbler:
We did have the company of many leeches on this hike. The rain brought them out in force and for the first time we could see them on leaves about waste high. I won the leech count against Karen 6 to 4 on this hike. Of course, the fact that these were large Tiger Leeches made seeing them, and flicking them off, easy. The Tiger Leeches in Danum were much bigger than leeches we saw at previous locations. They can sense body heat and if you put your hand a few inches away they elongate and stretch out in the direction of the heat. It's actually kind of cool to watch.
After having a bit of fun with the leeches, we noticed the sky was getting dark and, of course, it started to rain heavily. We were all prepared with umbrellas though so we didn't get too wet walking back but it was another activity cut short by Mother Nature.
I stuffed myself at breakfast again. It's hard not to when they will make waffles and omelets to order for you. Then we went back to the chalet to digest and sat out on our porch enjoying the rain.
The rain let up by 11AM so we headed out by ourselves to walk the main road. But, we didn't get very far because in the trees right next to the lodge was a large group of Red Langurs. They were pretty tolerant of us and posed nicely for a whole bunch of photos.
From a distance, the monkeys are pretty but when you see them close up they just looked weird to me. In fact, they looked like aliens wearing orange fur coats to me. Am I the only one that thinks that...? The truth is out there...
One thing for sure is that they can leap a long way. This one picked out a branch from close to 30 feet and leapt across the road only to land right on target:
In the same trees as the Red Langurs were some Long-tailed Macaques. There was a little bit of squabbling between the species but they actually seemed to get along pretty well.
Anyone else tired of the rain?
During lunch, the Long-tailed Macaques climbed right past the restaurant and crossed the river which provided more good photo ops:
Rain in the afternoon kept us cooped up again. So, we weren't able to get out until about 5PM. But, our walk on the road and Nature Trail were uneventful.
After dinner, we had another night walk planned with Azmil. Luckily, the rain had stopped by then. Of course Tarsiers were the targets again but we stopped at the frog pond first.
File-eared Frog:
We ended up seeing a Lesser Mouse Deer and our first Black Flying Squirrel but no Tarsiers. This was a big disappointment since I thought we had a good shot at seeing them during this trip. But, it just wasn't to be. So, we went to bed a little discouraged and that's when the plan to return started to form in my brain.
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