Leaving the tropics

Today is my last day in Borneo. Soon I will be jumping on a canoe then a minibus then another boat to get back to Bandar Seri Begawan before jumping on a long haul flight back home.

The past two weeks have been amazing and it will be weird to go back home but I have to admit I'm rather looking forward to seeing everyone and sleeping in my own bed!

The thing I'll probably miss the most is the abundance of awesome insects and creatures popping up around every corner. Mantids in the shower, massive spiders on the walk to breakfast, giant moths near the laundry room, and tree frogs just beside our accommodation. Everything at home is small and relatively boring in comparison!

However, I have to leave at some point. So, goodbye Brunei and hello England!

Enjoying the rainforest

For the past week and a half, I have been in Brunei, Borneo, on a field trip studying tropical ecology. In fact, I'm still here now, looking out from our accommodation at the rainforest which is currently living up to it's name. Yes, if you hadn't guessed, it's tipping down with rain. Thundering too at the moment but I don't think the name is going to be changed to 'thunderforest' any time soon.

We are currently at the Kuala Belalong field studies centre which means we're in forest pretty much untouched by anyone except animals and biologist. Trust me, it is stunning. As I've been walking around the forest and travelling along the river, it's amazing to see all the beautiful creatures, all the bright colours and vivid greens, how much larger everything seems to be compared to the British counterpart and how much more painful it is when they bite you...

I'm hoping I'll have some amazing photos when I get back to a place with internet that doesn't slow down to snails pace whenever it rains or more than 2 people are using it but for now you will have to take my word. Moths larger than my hand, ants that could rival some of our British spiders in size, spiders that could rival our blue tits and sparrows for size and birds that come in all colours of the rainbow. Oh, and did I mention the bats? So small yet fly so elegantly as they pick insects out of the air.

Sure it's ferociously humid and it took most of us a week to acclimatise fully but I can't tell you how much I'm enjoying myself. Kayaking around a peat swamp searching for crocs, setting camera traps, going into forest barely touched and off limits to the general public, waking up to the sound of cicadas, falling asleep to the sound of barking geckos and almost tripping over a massive moth on my way to bed. Part of me doesn't want to come home.

However, Sunday is fast approaching, home time looming, and I want to enjoy as much more as I can fit in without exhausting myself too much. Canopy walk tomorrow morning at 5am is currently on the agenda!

See you soon England!

We're all going on a summer holiday

My exams are over, and now my summer is spread out in front of me like a wide river that needs to be crossed and I've barely dipped my toes in. If you hadn't already gathered, I have an awful lot planned for the next few months. I think I'm spending more time away from home than at home and I have no idea when I'm going to have a chance to see many friends and family. Nevertheless, this summer is going to be exciting.

I've only ever flown once before (a trip with school to Poland) and this summer sees me doing three return flights, one of which is the long journey over to Borneo. I still haven't quite processed the fact that I'm flying to pretty much the other side of the world in less than a week. I have all the things I need to take, flights are booked, last meeting was today, however, it still seems unreal that I'm actually going to be leaving the UK. Maybe by the time I'm all packed properly it will seem more real. I guess we shall see.

Of course, Borneo (Brunei to be more specific) is only the beginning of my summer. The first of two third year field trips which will both be a mixture of fun and work. I'm currently unsure of the ratio... Nevertheless, these two trips alone take up practically a whole months worth of summer and that's before you include the usual volume of volunteering and a four day trip to Paris. Busy doesn't really cover it.

Unfortunately, this means I'm going to be away from my home church(es?) for most of the summer. At the most I'll have two Sundays in London and the same applies for Kent. More annoyingly, four of those Sundays will be swallowed up by travelling to, from or during the two field trips. I love my university course but I do wish I didn't have to miss so much church to join in on the field trips. On a more positive note, three of those Sundays will be taken up by plane journeys so I can still listen to sermons. Talking of which, can anyone recommend any particular sermons and give me a download link? I never know where to start!

Therefore, although I have only just started getting back into this blogging malarkey, I cannot guarantee regular updates over the summer. Sure, I'll have a lot of exciting things going on but who knows when I'll have time to tell you about them?! Maybe this is the year of the scheduled posts....