7th May 2012

The following morning dawned bright and sunny, the sort of weather that makes you feel vaguely guilty for not doing something outdoorsy. Inspired, we set off for Kota Kinabalu, the capital, at 9:30 a.m. Barely fifteen minutes into the drive, a roadside sign advertising a seafood restaurant caught our eye. We made a mental note to return for dinner, though at this point our main priority was simply to avoid breakfasting on biscuits.

A winding single-track road took us past prawn farms, their water wheels churning away like oversized hamster toys. The restaurant itself proved to be a charming wooden structure on stilts, stretching out into a glassy lagoon fringed by mangroves. After confirming the evening opening hours and admiring tanks of live seafood that looked like they’d been auditioning for The Great Escape, we noticed a few monkeys in cages just outside.

Approaching for a closer look, we came across a friendly Malay man with excellent English who turned out to be the restaurant’s seafood wrangler. He cheerfully offered to show us the establishment’s other residents, ostriches, deer, snakes, and a lone crocodile that seemed to be plotting our demise from behind its toothy grin. We promised to return later for food, then continued our coastal drive.

Not long after, we reached the gates of a naval base. Watching the steady stream of traffic entering, I wandered up to the security guards and casually asked if visitors were allowed. To my surprise, they not only said yes, but offered us the chance to “see the boats” before waving us through.

Inside, it turned out to be an open day for the Malaysian navy, complete with shuttle buses to the docks. After parking up, rather than roast in the lengthy bus queue, Sue and I decided to walk the short distance, although ‘short’ in that heat felt more like a pilgrimage. The place was buzzing, thousands of visitors swarming around, and as far as we could tell, we were the only Europeans in sight.

 

We clambered aboard several warships, admiring their decks while hopping around to avoid branding ourselves on the sun-scorched metal. On one ship, we were provided with none other than the captain himself as our guide. We cooled off with ice creams, browsed stalls selling everything from snacks to souvenirs, and watched car stunt shows that Jamie would have loved. A miniature motorbike race added a dash of eccentricity, while friendly locals stopped us for chats.

After a couple of hours, we headed out and followed a lane towards the sea, eventually finding a hidden lagoon with a restaurant. Burgers, chips, double scoops of ice cream, and enough drinks to float a canoe later, we took a stroll through the mangroves. There, we met a group of teenagers competing to build sandcastles inspired by the Great Wall of China. With mock solemnity, we judged their creations, much to their delight, and were impressed by their English, if not their grasp of defensive architecture.

By late afternoon, clouds were gathering over Mount Kinabalu, and thunder was rolling in. On the way back, we stopped at a roadside cemetery. Lightning flashed dramatically as we climbed the hill to find once-grand tombs now crumbling and vandalised, a melancholic reminder that time and weather will eventually win every battle.

Back at the hotel, we showered, changed, and looked forward to our scheduled night jungle trek… which was promptly cancelled thanks to the storm. Plan B was obvious: seafood.

Returning to the lagoon restaurant from the morning, we found it heaving with diners but were shown to what we suspected might have been “our” table by the water. With no English spoken by the waitresses, who seemed afraid to approach us, we tracked down our earlier friend to help order butter prawns, fried rice, and steamed vegetables. I finally had my first beer of the holiday, and we amused ourselves by observing the enormous family groups dining nearby, one clan numbered over twenty people, spanning three generations.

If their dining style was anything to go by, they enjoyed their food enthusiastically, with the table left looking as though someone had set off a prawn-shell grenade. In contrast, our neat pile of shells and tidied table probably marked us as hopelessly foreign.

We thanked our English-speaking ally for his assistance, then drove back to the hotel, pleasantly full, slightly sun-worn, and ready for bed.