Text by Andrew Lo Photos by Andrew Lo and Ian Hall ARKITREK – setaip hari dalam hutan (everyday junglism) I have just returned from a 5 day expedition through Borneo’s finest rainforest… What a trip! The landscape is truly magnificent, the terrain is rough, rugged - physically and psychologically demanding, but the places I have been have made all the blood, sweat and cursing all the worth while J We walked several kilometres everyday visiting different camp sites which need developing. At the same time we observed the condition...

Previous posts describe the challenge of designing buildings for an untouched and fragile area of outstanding natural beauty. It is impossible to work in this environment without being aware of the threats to it's exisitence, hence posts have often digressed into related subjects such as reforestation, ecosystem services and palm oil plantations. This post will come back to the point and show you some design proposals. Some of these camps may get built in the next couple of years, the Seraya Camp and Maliau Falls observation...

‘There’s a new route from Kampung Melangkap’ said Jasirin my mountain guide friend. My interest was piqued immediately ‘Have many people done it?’ I enquired ‘Yes lots’ he replied. I was deflated. ‘But only villagers’ he added. My imagination took off again and for some reason the word Melangkap got caught in the mesh of my sieve like brain. About a month later I received a call out of the blue from Graeme Shepherd an old climbing friend of mine from Dundee whom I had not seen for six years. Graeme and I had met in my last...

I was stripped down to my boxer shorts and with my bare hands was clawing great clods of mud out from under the wheel arch. Occasionally I would take a rest from cleaning and lie down in the shallow water to cool myself off. Even with the help of a second tow truck it had taken us nearly an hour to free an old Landcruiser that had got stuck on the way into Imbak Canyon. All three vehicles were now parked in the middle of the Imbak River to receive a much needed wash. By way of taking a holiday from Maliau Basin I had decided...

As we were tucking into our dinner last night we were rudely interrupted by an extraordinarily loud crash. It scared the life out of Eda who immediately leapt into Jamil’s arms, thus confirming a point of gossip that Andy and I had been debating for some days. We continued munching our steamed fish for a few more moments before Andy voiced what I had been thinking. ‘That sounded like it came from the region of our hammocks’. Having managed to let go of Eda, Jamil rushed off to investigate and returned slightly animated...