Of two offered rafting trips, I opted for the one on the Padas River rather than the Kiulu River for two reasons: (1) rapids with a white water ranking of III and IV and (2) access to the river--located in the rainforested interior of the island--required a train ride on the oldest train (19th century) in Borneo. Indeed, the train ride was as amazingly memorable as the rafting.
After the collection of rafters from various Kota Kinabalu hotels, we headed by bus to Beaufort, about an hour and a half journey.
Our train at the Beaufort Train Station.
In Beaufort we boarded the train--a local train, I should mention--and within 15-20 minutes, rainforest had extinguished any visible sign of a road; only a single railroad track, a river, and sporadic villages and jungle plantations emerged amid the lush vegetation.
A paved road.
A dirt road.
No more roads.
Other than pauses at designated rail-side "train-stops" or an occasional "station" to allow for the movement of embarking and disembarking passengers, the train chugged its way through lands once occupied by the Murut, the last Borneo tribe to forsake the headhunter livestyle.
"Train-stops"
At the Rayoh Station, the rafters alighted briefly to off-load goods and possessions not intended for the wet of raft travel while the train and the remaining passengers graciously waited. (Scheduling, I'm sure, takes into account the significant contribution rafters make to the revenue generated by this train route.) Once we had all reboarded, the train continued on its way. At the Pangi Station, we exited again, this time to launch the rafts and commence our journey by water.
Once arrayed in helmets and life jackets and then briefly schooled in rafting skills and safety, we received our raft assignments. One of two singles on the trip, I was placed with a group of four from Hong Kong.
They were super sweet to me, kind and accommodating!
Bryan, our raft's chief guide, immediately situated the two guys at the front--placement for the strongest paddlers--and then began the small talk banter that, in reality, provided him background information on our experience with rafts and rafting. Come to find out, I was the only one, other than the guides, who had ever rafted before. My USA status plus previous raft experience rather promptly sparked the question, "Have you rafted the Colorado?" Well, I have, and I think the two guides were unduly impressed with my experience whereas my Hong Kong cohorts had no concept whatsoever of any significance "the Colorado" might impart. Not too long after we were underway, both of the guides and I became acutely aware that our Hong Kong friends really didn't understand much about rafting and that commands given in English might or might not be acted upon. Consequently, the guides played many of the rapids we ran more cautiously than some of the other rafts because their passenger-paddlers were not particularly effective! At one point, Bryan even moved me to the front of the raft! Still, it really was a grand time on the Padas River!
About and hour and a half later, just above the Rayoh Train Station, we pulled out of the river. After showers and a change into dry clothes at Riverbug Rayoh Headquarters, we lunched on barbecued chicken with fixings and then chilled until train time. As trite as the expression may be, I do believe that a good time was had by all!
Rayoh Riverbug Headquarters and our lunch location.
Some of the river guides' children hanging out at the lunch location.
Collected rafting gear awaiting train transport.
Our train "home" approaches the Rayoh Station.
1 comment:
Good to see more of your posts.
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