3rd March 1991
We climbed above the layer and passed 7,800-foot Mount Mulu which the clouds, in argumentative confusion, fought to suffocate. Being a National Park, it was thickly coated with trees, but the surrounding hills bore the eyesore scars of loggers’ destruction. Exposed, the bare soil glared like eczema and washed into the rivers, turning them muddy brown. In virgin valleys still awaiting the whine of the chain-saw, the rivers were as black as the Rio Negro: black from decomposing vegetation, not pollution.
Bario, a glint of corrugated iron along one side of the grass airstrip, reposes in a broad valley at 3,500 feet. There were only two ways to reach it: a week-long walk through the forest, or by light aircraft. Kelabit villagers had gathered in the shade of a wooden shack entitled Kelabit Highlands Bario Cooperative Multi-Purpose Society Limited. The older men and women had extended loopy earlobes in which hung massive chunks of brass. The men wore straw hats like baseball caps, with the design improvement of an additional shade for the back of the neck.
From Freedom of the Skies
Glimpses of the journey:
- Around the world
- Crossing the Atlantic
- Saint Louis, Senegal
- Bubaque, Guiné-Bissau
- Timbuktu, Mali
- Cottars’ Camp, Kenya
- Virungas National Park, Zaire
- Mana Pools National Park, Zimbabwe
- Sossusvlei, Namíbia
- Lumbo, Mozambique
- Antananarivo Madagascar
- Adis Ababa, Ethiopia
- Misfat, Omã
- Jaipur, India
- Himalaia, Nepal
- Mae Hong Son, Thailand
- Bario, Sarawak, Malaysia
- Borobodur, Java, Indonesia
- Baliem Valley, Irian Jaya
- Gimbat, Australia
- Munda, New Georgia, Solomon Islands
- Hurricane in Apia, Western Samoa
- Anaa, Tuamotu, Polynesia
- Easter Island, Chile
- Crossing the Andes, Chile-Argentina
- Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
