Mulu: Clearwater Cave & Cave of the Winds

The next day I took my longboat tickets down to the river to take my ride up to Clear Water Cave and Cave of the Winds.


Outfit of the day


They're located way up north and either needs couple of hours walking in the jungle or just a quick 45 minutes on the longboat. On a entirely different direction to Deer Cave.

Naturally, I picked the easier and more fun version of travelling, as usual.




Though I saw that I wasn't the only one with that idea on my mind.


numerous boats ready to depart.


My boatman for the first ride.




There were two boatmen on my boat, one in front in control of steering, the other at the back in control of the engine.




And off we went into the jungle river. My head at this point went something like: "Ooo... this was pretty exciting."





with my hair tied up


Honestly, the boat ride was just like many of the forest/jungle river rapid shoot I've done in my past: there were plentiful in Indo-china, one in National Park on the West Malaysia and perhaps, oh.. I couldn't remember.

It wasn't anything fancy, but the fact that I was cruising down the rainforest river kinda made the whole experience a little bit exciting.













It was hot, then it was shady, and then hot again. I couldn't decide if I was about to have a sun stroke because then a nice area with lots of shades and then it felt like heaven.




Like a typical National Park boat ride, I was stopped off at a native residential area to have a peep of the local natives in their natural habitat.




Oh look... a cock roamed freely about.


What? I did say a cock.


And a hen.




And natives wearing modern day over-washed t-shirt selling local made products.


This aunty let me took numerous photo of her while maintaining a strict face to appear candid. So cute.











The view from this place was remarkable. It felt like a cut-out from a golf resort poster overlooking cloudy mountains in the distance.










I love this shot of this cute foreign girl trying to hang out with the local kids.




If only the world could behave more like kids.




After spending nothing on the one-stop-shopping-detour, I went back to the boat to wait for our next stop: Cave of the Winds.




Now Cave of the Winds has got to be one of the most beautiful caves I've seen in my lifetime (thus far).








my ranger



The natural breeze that flowed through the caves has allowed many quirky formation within the caves that were both perculiar and beautiful.






















Reasons for Stalactites, Stalagmites and Helictites (horrizontal formation):




Another description telling you what moon milk is (Moon Milk?).




In the Cave of the Winds there were random limestone formation that looked like animals.


a bat



mother and child

Which reminds me, there's this father and daugther that's just the cutest.




Imagine going caving with your baby daughter like that. Aweee....




Walking away from Cave of the Winds, we took a wooden trail down to the river where some of the tourists went swimming in the cooling river.










Why nobody informed me I should bring swimwear. T_T (oh I know, because I didn't ask).

So while taking a rest and watched others have their brought-along lunch, I went to observe the system that was Clearwater Cave.




It's amazing how extensive the cave and water system ran inside these mountains.

It's even more amazing how human can trace these system out.





Getting to Clearwater Cave required a steep climb up several flights of stone steps.







(well, a lot more than several flights)




Now Clearwater Cave has got to be the coolest cave in Mulu.

Once you reached the top, you would need to make your way down the cave by descending into the water cave. Yes, you hear me, water cave.


The stairs to the right led to the Lady Cave (this would be mentioned later *wink*)






stalactities on the outer part of the cave


now before I show you the amazing photos I've taken in Clearwater Cave, here is a description of how the cave's formation came about.




Basically there used to be a lots of water the flowed through this cave. And when the cave was full of water, the limestone was "cut" by water evenly making a very even tube shape within the cave.

Eventually the water resided and more "cuttings" were done on other parts of the cave making other "holes" and "passage".

Thus... was how Clearwater Cave came about.










I didn't manage to take a lot of photos in this cave, firstly because, my 500D wasn't equipped with a good lens and I didn't have a tripod back then, and taking photo in such a condition under such lighting (pitch dark cave) was just... DIFFICULT.

So I could only show you three photos that I was most proud of. :)


Onto the last cave of my trip, and the last part of this post - The Lady Cave.




Why it was called the lady cave.

Initially I thought it was the formation on the roof of the cave.




I see two holes there, one long slit and one tiny round hole, the rest is up to your imagination. *whistle*

What are you thinking?

It's called the lady cave because there's a shadow reflection in the cave that looked like this.




Formed by this stone.




Doesn't it look like a lady?

Well, we'll never the real reason behind the name of this cave. *smirk*

So let's finish up with a few more cave photos and let's get out of Mulu.













I missed civilization and proper cellular connection.

Bye Mulu. See you again when I return one day with a better camera.