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Batu Punggul Cave

Trip to Batu Punggul – Part 2 of 3

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Continued from part 1…

We reached the foothill of Batu Punggul after 10 minutes of boat ride. We walked and climbed slowly uphill. Probably due to the rainy season, the forest floor was wet and the surrounding air was humid. At the beginning of the trail, I saw a few ground leeches fully extended their slimy and elastic bodies to the air, wiggling in excitement. But they were no longer a concern when we moved further away from the river side. I wished I could spend more time in this dense jungle coz you would find rafflesia here (biggest flower in the world).


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After 15 minutes of walking, we saw the entrance of a cave. This cave may have existed for thousands of years and created by limestone erosion. It is quite a big and deep cave. You can walk straight to the end without climbing up and down.


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There is a broken coffin of an ancestor near the entrance. Too bad it was not preserved properly and I wonder how it looked. But this tells us there were people lived here before. FYI, there is another Batu Tinahas about 20 minutes walk away from Batu Punggul. It has more complex (and dangerous!) cave system, which may interest hardcore climbers.

About 10 Meters inside is a low opening. I had to lower my body to go continue. It was very dark so I just followed the light of people in front of me. I heard a few bats flapping their wings flying near me. The air was getting stuffy, with smell of amonia came from the bat guan.

Then I entered a space as big as a hall. I could see light coming from the holes on top. According to the legend, Batu Punggul is a fossilized longhouse, so this cave is probably its rooms. A old monument-like object (photo at right below) was built to mark the territory of the past residents. In the dark, I was sure that I saw a white and blur figure walked into this pile of rocks, but nobdoy would believe what I’ve seen.


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We only wandering in the cave for 10 minutes then we moved on. You see. It was such a rush. I really had no time to explore this place in detail, not to mention setting up a tripod to shoot better photos. Anyway, I still took a lot of photos and I will show you the photo gallery tomorrow.


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Bird nest is no longer available in this cave. Very likely the nests were over-harvested, before the broods had a chance to grow and reproduce. However, the interesting rock formation inside is already worth a visit.


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Haha… a heart-shaped hole on top. But this place is not romantic at all. The locals told us that in the very old day, some people dragged the women to this cave, rapped and killed them. I might have just seen one of the spirits lingering in this cave. At this point, the journey was fun until I climbed Batu Punggul.

Continue to Part 3…

Photos taken in Sepulot, Sabah, Malaysia Borneo

Kampung Minyak (Oil Village)

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Kampung Minyak is the main reason I visited Kudat last month. I had seen hot water (hot spring) and mud (mud volcano) coming out from the ground, but I haven’t seen petroleum does that. The oil seepages are inside a tidal mangrove swamp nearby the Kampung Minyak (Oil Village). It is quite accessible, though you have to drive through a few KM of gravel and muddy road and take a 5 minute walk in a jungle trail to reach there.

Oil seepages of Kampung Minyak

The oil seepages of Kampung Minyak Village are inside a mangrove

From the photo above, you can see that there are 3 oil seepages. They are basically the same thing but look a bit difference to one another. The water at the left is darker. The one in middle is filled with murky water, probably due to the soil washed in by the rain. The one at the right is the biggest one and supposed to be the most active one. Because of vast amount of oil, the tar on top becomes harden, forming a layer of hard bitumen that seals the opening.

The smell of gasoline is quite strong here. At first impression, these wells look like the smelly ponds formed after a heavy rain around an greasy car junkyard. You can see oil films and lot of oil droplets on the water. And there are bubbles constantly float to the surface, suggest the presence of earth activity. I presume each bubble carries thin amount of oil and gas.

The surrounding soil of the seepages is greasy because of the oil deposit. They told me that in early 1900, strange black liquid seeping out from the earth astounded local community and they turned the site into a sacred ground.

Colorful reflection of oil slick

According to the research by Joanes Muda: “village elders used to offer animal sacrifices for various reasons such as for healing from illness and for protection from diseases and other calamities. One-month old newborns were also brought to the area for anointing on the forehead with the black liquid. During those days, anyone visiting the site had to sacrifice a chicken and consumed it there.” (Source: Oil seepages at Kampung Minyak, Bulletin of the Geological Society of Malaysia 56 (2010) 49 – 52)

During World War II, the Japanese also tried to mine the oil here. Then they stopped suddenly because many of them died from a mysterious sickness. Another story says that the Japanese cooked with the oil, then the rice turned into sand in the following day.

Hopefully someone can do a detail documentation about its history, as I think the stories can be far more interesting than the little oil seepages.

The oil seepages still active and release gas and oil

There was oil company had surveyed this place. May be the reserve of the fossil fuel was not big enough for them to mine it.

Greasy soil next to oil seepage

According to them, this biggest oil seepage (see below) is very deep. Nobody knows how deep it is. They used measuring stick up to 100 feet but still didn’t touch the bottom. The tar is solid to stand on, even though you can feel that it is soft underneath.

The oil seepages of Kampung Minyak Village are inside a mangrove

They also build a shelter and 50-feet boardwalk at the site. If you go there, do take a look at the beautiful mangrove trees there. In fact, there was a team of Italy TV crew went there to document the place.

Boardwalk to the oil seepages

Photos taken in Kudat, Sabah, Malaysia Borneo

Murut Warriors

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Murut people (Murut means “Men of the Hills”) are famous for their headhunting history and bravery. Their traditional warrior costume is always my favorite, so are their stories. We still could find pieces of their past in their dance performance and festival (such as Kalimaran Festival). With a bit of imagination, I try to use some photos to paint a complete picture of how they looked like in the past…

Photo: Ontoros Antonom Memorial

Standing in the heart of Tenom town is the Memorial of Ontoros Antonom, a Murut hero who led the uprising against the British colonists in 19th century. Under the administration of British Chartered North Borneo Company (BCNBC) more than 100 years ago, besides imposing many funny taxes, which the locals never heard of, British also forced every Murut couple, who had two children, to give up one of them as forced labor.

Photo: Murut warrior get ready for battle

Running out of tolerance, Ontoros Antonom gathered nearly a thousand of Murut warriors from Tenom, Keningau dan Pensiangan to fight the British empire in 1915. According to the description in Murut Museum, the British officers were totally shocked to see hundreds of Murut flooded their administration building and attacked them. The document also mentions Ontoros Antonom built a few strongholds that even got underground tunnels and houses!

Photo: The rise of Murut warriors

In April 1915, British sent 400 soldiers equipped with firearm to counter attack. Though Murut were only using primitive weapons such as blowpipes, swords and spears, British army failed to take them down. Therefore, they set a trap by offering a peace talk at Rundum. When Ontoros Antonom and his followers were on their way to the venue, hundreds of British surrounded them and arrested them. Later Ontoros Antonom was executed. This Sabah hero died at age of only 30 (year 1885-1915). Seeing more and more corrupted, self-interest and big-mouth Sabah politicians nowadays, the more I respect this hero who loved his land and really did something for his people.

Photo: Warriors departed for battle

Photo: Murut girl celebrated the victory of the warriors with Anggalang dance

Below are the weapons used by Murut to fight gun and bullets. Note the hole in the spear. It is a 2-in-1 weapon (Blowpipe + Spear). Also note the human hair at the end of the headhunter sword. I wanted to buy the headhunter sword (for appreciation, of course not for headhunting), but it costs RM300 (nearly USD100). Ok… O_O

Below are the containers that store the darts and poison for blowpipe.

Photo: Murut girls waiting for the return of the Murut warriors

The era of conflict and headhunting has become a thing of the past. No matter you are British or tourists from other countries, what you will experience here is very warm welcome from our friendly Murut people. They will invite you to dance with them and even try the blowpipe.

Photos taken in Sabah, Malaysia Borneo

Kinabalu Natural History Gallery

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Coz of Nunuk Ragang event at Ranau, I passby Kinabalu National Park. My initial plan was to take some photos of flowers but it was raining. So I paid a visit to their Kinabalu Natural History Gallery.

The entrance ticket costs a few RM. Actually I am not even sure whether I had been here before, everything looked quite familiar. It is a small gallery. They displayed the handicraft, animal / insect / plant specimen, geology info, history, rocks & minerals, photos and any item that related to Kinabalu National Park. For those who are interested in learning, the tour can take half a day. For normal and time-constraint tourists who just want to walk walk look look, it will take less than an hour.

They will show you a 20-minute video about the Mount Kinabalu and National Park too. It gives you a brief introduction about the flora and fauna you will see on the way of climbing to the top of Mount Kinabalu. That can make your experience more enjoyable coz you know what to expect. Many don’t want what they see.

There were too many things to read, and my time was limited. What I usually did was – use the digital camera to take a picture of those writing and document for later reading. If you are a nature lover, you will be pleased to see the specimen of hornbill, lizard, pitcher plant, butterfly, etc. I wish to take more photos but most items are displayed behind the glass, adding unwanted flash reflection to the picture.

More Photos (Click to view larger photo)…

Old Face of KK City

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There is an exhibition about the history of Kota Kinabalu city, at Palm Square of Centre Point Sabah. If I am not mistaken, it will open until 5th of March. You can check out the model below (1:500 scale) if you are curious about how KK looked like in 1930.

Haha… the public toilets of KK city were on the sea. Interesting… just imagine the fishes opened their mouth wide under the toilets. This is the only thing I learn from this exhibition.

The fishes in 1930 were fatter, right? No, no, no… today no difference also, you forget the generous contributions from Gaya Island?

Monsopiad Village and House of Skulls

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Hope the 360 degree Mount Kinabalu Panoramic views did not make your mouth wide open, cool huh? Before you close your mouth, I still have more Panoramic Virtual Tours to show you. Can you digest fast enough? 🙂

Yes, the next one is Monsopiad Village in Penampang. Monsopiad is the name of the most popular Kadazan headhunter, a legendary warrior who harvested 42 human skulls. In the past, the more skulls you owned, the more heroic you were. The headhunters believed that the spirit of the victim would trap in the skull and protected them. Today there is no more headhunter in Borneo, but you still can see the 300-year old human skulls displayed in the House of Skulls of Monsopiad Village. Monsopiad Village is one of the BEST tourism spot in Kota Kinabalu but is not very well-known among the Sabahans. Don’t know why…

Actually I feel a bit guilty to publish this virtual tour because it is so thorough and complete that — after you watch it, you can close your eyes walking in the village and know where you are, like you had been there. I have posted 150+ photos, 4 video clips, and 1, 2, 3, 4… 10 panoramic tours for this village. Goodness… I hope they will not kill me.


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Video Clips of Traditional Dances
BTW, another thing that I would like to highlight is — I find that the Kadazan Sumazau video clip is the most popular download item of MySabah.com.

To make your life easier (find them all in one place), I list all the links to the Sumazau video clips below:
(1) Orchid De Villa, (2) Pesta Kaamatan, (3) Monsopiad Village.

If you are interested in Murut’s Magunatip (Bamboo Dance), I also got four versions:
(1) Monsopiad Village, (2) Pesta Kaamatan, (3) Orchid De Villa, (4) TV3 Carnival (by kids).

If you visit Monsopiad Village, normally they will show you Sumazau, Magunatip and Sazau (by Kadazan Papar) dances. For more video clips of traditional dances of Sabah indigenous people, you may check out my Pesta Kaamatan page.

Photos taken in Penampang, Sabah, Malaysia Borneo