Fri 8 May 2009, 8.19PM
I visited Borneo in 2008, on the recommendation of a friend who had gone several years before. I should say that I am not a "package tourist" - all my holidays are carefully planned myself, and take in as much of a country as possible. For my holiday to Borneo I booked a car & several hotels, taking me from the west of the island to the east, and back again. Overall I would say that I was a little disappointed - there was so much deforestation to make room for the palm trees (for oil), that you had to travel quite a way to get to "real" nature.
Whilst driving we saw dead monkeys and a leopard that had been hit by traffic - possibly by one of the hundreds of huge lorries that constantly travel the roads.
One place I visited was the Orangutan sanctuary near Sandakan, and again I was disappointed. Other than 15 minutes of feeding, twice a day, you dont really get to see that much of them, and there is almost nothing else to do. Lots of tourists came on trips they'd spent a lot of money on, to stay only an hour & when it's raining they close it early.
What really was quite evident was that they just had no idea about tourism, or perhaps I should say Eco-tourism. This was a stark contrast to Costa Rica, which we had visited the year before (and can highly recommend).
Perhaps if Borneo re-thinks it's policy on palm oil vs nature, then things will improve, but it seems unlikely. Such a terrible waste... 
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