Steph and I left early on Friday to get a flight from London to Kuala Lumpur. The flight is about 14 hours direct, and we made it there on time. We got to the hotel and were exhausted, but due to the time difference it was early morning. We decided to push through and went on a walk to the butterfly house. It was hot and humid, and I have not been used to that for a while, so I was sweating buckets. I fully saturated one of my button down shirts. The walk also was longer and more confusing than expected due to the large drainage ditches and highway. We made it there eventually, with a nice detour through a park and a call to Steph’s parents. We then made it to the butterfly house and saw lots of types of butterflies. It was really nice to see them all, and we took a relaxed time going through the air conditioned exhibits before leaving for some mall shopping.

Steph wanted to see a wagashi place, and it was in an art themed mall. Each store was an artist or group of artists, with some food mixed in. The wagashi place was a mix of art and food, and they had some extremely ornate exhibits of wagashi along the normal ones. For dinner we made it to Uncle Roger’s restaurant, Fuyoh!.

We caught the planes to Mulu the next day. It is a little strange how Malaysia has different immigration per landmass, but I guess that makes sense with the history and landmass layout between peninsula and islands.

Mulu is on Borneo and we stayed at the Marriott there, which was surprisingly nice. We met Jess and Diana there, and I crashed the first afternoon while they checked out the park. The main attraction for Mulu is the national park. It is a gorgeous bit of jungle, pinnacle mountains, and caves. We only did the jungle and caves parts, and didn’t do the mountain hikes as those were intense and multi-day.

We started off with the easy Botanical Trail, then went to the Racer Cave. This was an intro trek to see who would be able to do the more rigorous Clearwater Connection route. Steph and I were the only ones who ended up doing the Clearwater Connection. It wasn’t particularly hard, but it was long and everything was so slippery. I also didn’t enjoy the hand sized huntsman spiders. I had a good time in the river portion, but that only lasted around half an hour of the three hour trip.

We did the canopy walk, which was a long set of hanging walkways going from tree crown to tree crown in the rainforest. It was nice to do, but didn’t give a good view of any animals as I assume they avoid it. We went to the tower and it was much the same. Near the tower was an amazing strangler fig that had a gorgeous crisscross pattern at the base with the hole in the middle where it had killed off the host tree.

The last main activity was going to the gigantic Deer cave. It is one of the largest chambers in the world, with millions of bats calling it home. The cave is 148m high inside, and even more across. We also go to see some of the rarest cave formations, the showerheads, where water makes a pipe coming down from the ceiling.

We then went to Kota Kinabalu for scuba diving over two days. We did 5 dives the first day and 3 dives the second day. It was amazing diving and we saw: lots of nudibranchs, puffer fish, a seahorse, a turtle, lots of clown fish in anemones, and so much more. The reef wasn’t 100%, but it was doing much better than most reefs we’ve seen recently.

We said goodbye to Jess and Diana and headed back to Kuala Lumpur to meet up with Jeff, Patty, and Elizabeth.

Steph and I did our tours separate from Jeff and Patty, but we both went to the Batu Caves. They have been converted into a Hindu temple and have monkeys roaming around them. It was amazing to see, and the stairway was gorgeous. The temples themselves were so colorful and the atmosphere was delightful. I really enjoyed see them.

Steph and I also did a cooking class, and we got to see a typical neighborhood market and cook three Malay dishes: coconut rice, spicy noodles, and sweet pancakes.

We had diners with Jeff, Patty, Elizabeth, and their Aunt and Uncle. It was nice to talk to them, and I got to show them all my recent work. They were blown away by how well the AIs work now.

For the last evening we went by the mall under the towers and saw the fountain lights show. It was a good end to the trip and I was ready to get back. A 13.5 hour flight back the next day and we were in London.

What would be week 128 and 129 in London.