As the forest ranger has not yet arrived Surahmansyah takes his place and begins by asking how many days we would like to stay in the park. The difficult thing about Sebangau is that we don’t have a detailled map and are counting on them to tell us what our possibilies are… We are open for any options, just as long as were able to see some wild animals and perhaps even be lucky enough to see a wild orang utan. Even being so close to the park, we did not imagine that it could be so complicated and would involve so many people. No one seems to have any written information on the park about what there is to see, do and how to get around.
Finally after a while of dicussing with translations back and forth we agree on a plan. We will use 4 boatmen and stay one night in the visitors center and come back again the next morning at 6 a.m. to catch the boat back to Kasongan.So much for our 3 days permit inside the park. We stocked up on food in Baun Bango with plenty of dried noodles and cookies to last us the next 2 days. The boatman are bringing their own food, stove and fuel. When everyone is ready Henry, Nono, Suandi and Idam welcome us on their boats. As the klotoks are quite narrow and you have to sit very still in the center to prevent it from tipping over. We wave goodbye to the villagers and are on our way.
By the entrance canal fishermen are busy with their nets. As we get closer we can see lots of tiny, shiny fish wiggling in the nets. Apparently now is the best time to catch fish, when the water level is low. Entering further into the canal we come across big logs that are left over from the logging frenzy. They are sticking out of the water all over the place making it quite dangerous at times to naviagate between them. Sometimes we have pass so close between two logs that that I am sure we will crash. But the boatmen are used to this and swerve their klotoks carefully around each log, even if they have to get into the water thigh deep to maneuver the boat. On each side of the canal you can see stumps of trees where thick forest once was. It looks quite desolate and sad.
Further inside it begins getting denser and greener. My boat is the first of the four I am lucky to see a gibbon scurry across the canal, beautiful giant kingfishers flying off in front of me and some macaques monkeys playing in the trees. Unfortunately we have the motor on and are scaring the animals away as well as we enter the park…
We arrive at the visitors center. It is a pretty looking building painted in blue-green and yellow and made of wood with a tin roof. It was just finished last year and we are quite excited to able to stay here. Soon the water level will be too low to arrive by boat and the visitors center will be cut off until rainy season comes again. The center stands on stilts and is surrounded by an area of logs bound together. This enables you to walk around the building and get to the boat. Otherwise there is no possiblity to walk. An elevated boarded path of about 300 m has been started just behind the center to help the researchers with their surveys.
Surahmansyah has the keys to the center, we are the only ones here. As we step inside we notice there is nothing there except the structure! There is a mandi in one room and would you believe it, a shower and american toilet in another room, but no running water… Apparently they tried to drilling down to 8 meters to find fresh water and only found red peat water. They are now waiting for a new machine that will permit to drill deeper. The boatmen proudly tell us that the villagers of Karwing have built the visitors center. Together with the WWF they hope to attract ecotourism and researchers to the park. Since Sebangau opened to the public in 2006 there have only been about 4 other tourists that came in the same way as us and stayed at the center. Researchers usually come in for the day and end up staying either in Karwing or Baun Bango.
We set our stuff inside. Only we have come prepared with a camping matress and moskito nets. The others will be sleeping on the floor… After a short rest we set out again this time 2 passengers per boat towards a lake located further inside the park. We take even smaller canals that spring off right and left making it seem like a huge labyrinth. In this part of the park it is very dense. Sitting in the klotok you have to watch your head constantly for low lying braches, big spider webs, etc. We turn off the motor just before we reached the lake. It is not very big, but peaceful and nice not to hear any human made noise for some time. From the boat we try to see if we can spot the monkeys we heard in a huge tree by the entrance of the lake. You can hear ruffling in the leaves and branches snapping, but it is now already 10 am and no one is ready no come out. Maybe we will be luckier later in the day.
We make our way back to the visitors center rowing this time. It takes us a while and I keep having to ask directions to make sure I am going the right way. I row most of the way and it is hard work with only one oar. After lunch (noodles!) we rest for a bit until we go out again this time back towards the entrance canal.
As we have no trained forest ranger with us we test Surahmansyah with some questions. He seems to know quite a few things as he comes here with researchers twice a month. He tells us about a sun bear tearing up the moskito netting in the back of the center trying to get some food left behind. We row our way down the canal and stop to see some macaques playing in the trees high above us. There are little water snakes, very quick birds and butterflies, but not much else to see from the boat. Then suddenly Surahmansyah makes us stop the klotok all excited and saying he’s spotted an orang utan! He takes off his sandals and goes off into the peat. He is soon back motioning us to be very quiet and to follow him. I think for a few seconds… How am I supposed to walk in the peat water without my sandals… What if I get sick, I don’t even know what I am stepping into…
Time to turn off the mind, who cares about getting sick, there is a wild orang utan to see! After a few meters I see Aini and Surahmansyah both looking excitedly in the same direction. It is big female orang utan and she is making her nest for the night! We are standing about 20 meters from her and as I look through the binoculars I can see her looking straight at me! What a beautiful sight! She has reddish-brown hair all over her body and is breaking branches one by one and resting in between. I never imagined to be so close to an adult orang utan. She is probably about 45 kg and about 1.20 m in height. She is alone as they are solitary in an area of about 1.5 km.
Orang means «person» and hutan means «forest» in Bahasa, thus making «person of the forest». They are about 2/3 the size of a gorilla and have large, bulky bodies, very long, strong arms, short, bowed legs and no tail. They are the largest of living arboreal animal and known for their intelligence. Their diet consits 65% of fruits. Orang utan or Borneo eat about 317 diffrent food items including young leaves, shoots, seeds, bark, insects, honey, bird eggs, etc. There are only a few thousand orang utan left in the wild in Kalimantan and Sumatra, so we are extremely lucky to see one in its natural habitat. Many of the ones that have lost their homes due to poaching, forest fires and logging were brought to various rehabilitation centers throughout Indonesia.
We watch her for a while as everyone takes turns looking through the binoculars. Slowly we make our way back to the boat, each with a big smile on their face. It is now shortly before nightfall and time to go back to the visitors center. The boatmen take their mandi (bath) in the river, using their sarong. Aini also finally musters up the courage to do the same, while the boatman tease her as the city girl. She is too hot to worry about the red peat water and follows their example. We hesitate for a long time and opt to use some of our precious drinking water for a mini shower instead of washing the river. We decide that our trip is too short to take the risk of getting sick.
As we prepare our dinner, the boatmen offer us some of their delicious dried, salty river fish to accompany our noodle soup. Aini even tries some rice they’ve cooked that has turned red from the peat water. She makes a face, apparently it has an odd taste.
We sit around and talk a mix of simple Bahasa and English passing our phrase book back and forth. The boatmen all look very young, but we find out that every one of them is married and has kids. They are very shy and only if we ask them a question they answer giggling. It is not easy starting a conversation. We seem worlds apart when we hear one of them say that they thought all european men were soccer players… Most of them have worked in logging before the sawmills were suddenly shut across Borneo in 1997. Now they try to find work wherever they can. At the moment they are working by cleaning the rattan they find in near the village. They clean it and can sell a bundle for a small sum of money that will go to a factory making ratan furniture. There is also a new palm oil factory buing built behind Baun Bango village that might soon be another possibilty of work for them. Their future prospects do not sound very bright. It seems as if everyone is trying to survive as well as they can.
After boarding up our room (to make sure no sun bear will come in the night) it is time to go to sleep. It is actually quite cool in the room compared to last night in the losmen. Maybe we will sleep well and perhaps even dream of our encounter with the wild orang utan…
