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Our tour guide said he speaks 60 languages. He spoke English very well.
Get up-close to some of Borneo's most famous inhabitants as well as gain some fascinating insight to the island's heritage and culture. You'll travel along the Penampang-Papar old road to scenic Lok Kawi Zoological Park, with its 280 acres showcasing both the wildlife and botanical aspects of Borneo. You could stroll through the park along the mile-long walkway. But most likely, you'll want to spend your free time visiting such endangered animals such as the Borneo Pygmy Elephants and Borneo Sun Bears, Orang Utans and Proboscis Monkeys, as well as the spectacular tigers and assortment of native birds, including the hornbill. Next, you'll visit the magnificent KDCA Cultural Village located just 30 minutes away from Kota Kinabula City. Nestled at the famous "Hongkod Koisaan" or "Unity Hall" in the Penampang district, the KDCA Cultural Village offers an insight into the various ethnic tribes in Sabah. Try the famous Borneo trampoline or better known as "Lansaran". Enjoy various demonstrations such as fire-making using bamboo, beads-making, tattoo art, rice-wine sampling, process of making blow-pipe and enjoy some local ethnic games. This visit also offers you the opportunity to see and experience the culture and lifestyle of how indigenous ethnic groups used to live in the olden days. Notes: Guests will expected to walk up/down on the houses staircases and also walk pass to a short hanging bridge heading to the Murut house. Wear light clothing, proper walking shoes/sandals. Bring sunscreen, hat, camera and local currency. Tourist is NOT ALLOWED to feed the animals at the Zoological Park
Twelve contemporary indigenous Houses offer a perfect introduction to Sabah's major ethnic groups and cultures. Hongkod Koisaan is a must for visitors to Sabah to sample the uniqueness of local indigenous hospitality.
KOPIVOSIAN and Welcome to Hongkod Koisaan (Unity Centre)
The Koisaan Cultural Village is considered as one of the finest contemporary Living Museums in Sabah which combines both traditional and contemporary cultures, and lifestyles in both modern and traditional architectural settings. Scheduled educational and life theatre performances are held for visitors to enjoy the uniqueness and diverse cultural extravaganza of the Sabah's indigenous.
Visitors will be guided by professional guides that will not only inform you but connect you to the past of our indigenous ancestral cultures and traditions. Your visit will include various interactive games and cultural activities such as tapai and traditional cake making, headgear and beading demonstrations, a traditional wedding dais and photography goes on.
With 12 unique contemporary traditional houses of the Kadazan dusun and other indigenous groups spread over a specially developed landscape linked by a traditional hanging bridge widely used throughout Sabah, the Koisaan Cultural Village will definitely give you the ideal introduction to local indigenous cultures. It is a must visit for any visitors to Sabah and a gateway to the hinterland and unique cultures of the largest ethnic groups in Sabah.
Sumpit (Blowpipe) - A blowgun (also called a blowpipe or blow tube) is a simple ranged weapon consisting of a long narrow tube for shooting light projectiles such as darts. It operates by having the projectile placed inside the pipe and using the force created by one's forced exhalation ("blow") to pneumatically propel the projectile. The propulsion is limited by the user's strength of respiratory muscles and the vital capacity of the lungs.
First made in the Sabah native tribe, a traditional blowpipe is also known as the sumpit. They were originally used as hunting tools and weapons of warfare. Even though they still make an effective hunting tool, the more common modern uses are as props in traditional dances or for decorative purposes.
You need courage to swallow a wiggling Butod (sago worm). At first bite, it feels like a capsule, then it bursts and fills your mouth with protein fluid that is as creamy as cod liver oil. The taste...? Try it and you will know. Actually not everyone consumes live Butod. The cooked worm is as delicious after being fried to have crispy crust outside but soft inside. Hey, how dare you're running away!
Yum!
Above left is a photo of samples of vegetable, meat and fish indigenous foods. The above right is a photo of fried bananas. Those were definitely delicious. A lot more palatable than the live worms.
Tapai is an iconic Sabah wine made by traditional method with fermented tapioca, white rice or glutinous rice. Though Tapai is sweet and sour in taste, it's high in alcohol. Tapai is a necessity during festivals, celebrations and banquet, where it is shared in a big porcelain jar for guests to take turn drinking it from a straw.
They offered us free samples of both the Lihing and Talak Tapai. Barbara and I each took a taste of each one. They were both ever good. Tapai tastes very much like Saki (rice wine), especially the Talak. There were selling bottles of each, about the size of beer bottles. I think they were selling the Talak for $2 per bottle and the Lihing for $5 per bottle, or vise versa. We would have purchased some but I don't think they would let us bring it back on the ship for consumption since it is alcohol. They probably would have held it until we disembarked but we did not want to have even more to carry off the ship than what we had already purchased during this cruise.
Our tour guide skipped a number of animal displays on the route deeper into the park, or didn't stop long enough for me to get photos. Our tour guide left us to explore the park on our own once he had shown us all the highlights that he wanted to show us. So, from there, we explored the rest of the park at a leisurely pace stopping at all the animal displays on the way back to the park entrance that we had missed on our rapid pace with the tour guide.
We didn't go into the Botanical Garden. The wildlife park was very hilly, mostly uphill. It was difficult pushing Barbara in the transport wheelchair up the hills in the park. Fortunately the wheelchair had brakes like a bicycle or it would have been difficult going down the hills. I figured I'd need to preserve my energy to push the wheelchair back to the park entrance. Barbara often wanted to get out of the chair and walk with her cane, but I insisted that she save her energy as she might have to walk up some of the steeper hills if I could not push the chair up those hills. Fortunately the road back was more downhill than uphill and I didn't have a problem pushing the wheelchair back to the entrance. Barbara only had to get out of the wheelchair and walk a few times where there was an unexpected gap, rut, grate or step along the route.
There is a lot of transportation near the port. I think the guide said these are public transportation buses that serve all of this district. There are other buses that only serve his city plus a lot of taxis. Unfortunately you have to make a long walk to get outside of the port before you can get to where you can get a taxi.
Appetizers: Seafood Quiche - Marinated salad greens; Rare Finds - food you always wanted to try, but haven't yet dared... Chicken Liver Napolean - Baked apple ring. I'm not sure what is so "Rare" about chicken liver pate. I order it whenever I find it on a restaurant menu and this was pretty much the same thing with some thin apple slices.
Mains: Grilled Japanese Sea Bass Fillet - Honey jalapeno slaw, sweet potato mash; Curcur Udang - Malaysian Shrimp fritters, sweet chili sauce.
Main: Featured Vegetarian - Indian style vegetable dish with lentils, basmati rice, pickle, papadam and raita.
I've had this Featured Vegetarian Indian Main several times on Carnival cruises including on prior Carnival Splendor cruises early this year, but this meal was fantastic compared to the prior times that I've had it! All the Indian food (actually almost all the food) on this cruise has been really really good! But, it is especially the Indian cuisine that has been so much better on this cruise than any prior cruise I have ever been on. I'm just sad it took me this long to try the Featured Vegetarian Indian Main on this cruise. I didn't order it earlier on this cruise as this selection had been OK, but not great, on my prior Carnival cruises. It was never spiced enough for my tastes. On this cruise, however, it is spiced just right: not too spiced to be inedible, but spiced enough to really bring out the flavors. I might have to order it again for dinner on each of the few remaining days of this cruise.
I actually prefer this dinner selection of Indian food over what is offered at the Tandoor Grill in the Lido. I like vegetarian Indian dishes more than meat dishes and they usually have just a few hot vegetable selections at the Tandoor, usually not enough for an entire meal.
This time we only had our favorite Mules: Moscow Mule, Peach Mule, Vanilla Mule and Mexican Mule.
I was telling our bartender that the very first time that we had the Mini Mule Tasting and Mini Martini Tasting was on the Carnival Miracle on our cruise through the Panama Canal a couple of years ago. He then said that he was serving at the Alchemy Bar on that cruise. It turns out he was the bartender that served us these the first time we had them! What a small world! Here is a photo of him from that cruise:
The bartender's name is Dragos Lucian (LWD) and he has his own Facebook page at: Facebook.com/dragos.lucian.16. He is very involved in photography and also administers a Facebook page at: Facebook.com/LWDphotographyTimeLapse/.
As I mentioned earlier, this is our third cruise on the Carnival Splendor this year. We haven't spent about a month or more on the Carnival Splendor this year if you add up all the days from all our cruises this year on the Carnival Splendor. It has been a mystery to me as to where and what is "THE WEB". I've found every venue on the ship except for "The Web". Signs on decks 4 and 5 point the way to "The Web", but they lead to a dead end. I explored from end to end Deck 4, which is where "The Web" is supposed to be and could not find it.
I posed a question about it to the Facebook Page for this cruise and received an answer within just a few hours. "The Web" used to be their Internet Cafe (which makes sense) and used to be where the photography studio is now located on the deck 4. The Internet Cafe is now just a few computer terminals and a printer located in a small section of the Promenade on deck 5.
There might be a chance that during the refurbishing on the Carnival Splendor in Singapore they will computerize the display of photos as they have done on all their new ships. On their new ships, such as the Vista Class Ships, they just use computer terminals where you can scan through and select the photos that you wish to purchase. This tremendously reduces the amount of space needed for posting photos on walls, eliminates the need for printing any photos that you do not intend to purchase, and makes it easier to find the photos that cruise photographers took of you. If they do that, they can reduce the space needed for displaying photos. Maybe they can then return that area that used to be called "The Web" to being an Internet Cafe. With the number of people that now want to go online during their cruise they certainly could use a larger area than what is devoted to it now on the Carnival Splendor. It would be nice to see this area returned to its original purpose.
Above is what is located on Deck 4. The Robusto Bar is probably the largest lounge with the most available seating than any other lounge on the ship. They have rarely scheduled any events to be held in this room at all on this cruise. On our prior two cruises they mostly had Latin Jazz in this lounge. When I went to this lounge at about 8:30 PM there was just one person with headphones on in the corner. There were also two staff members at the corner of the bar talking to the bartender. I think the bar was open. There were a lot of open bottles of wine and other spirits behind the bar. But, the FunTimes never showed any times for when this bar was supposed to be open. I was told by one of the crew members that this is going to be converted to the "Red Frog Pub" during the rehab in Singapore. I hope so. That would be a great use for this huge space. As you can see, it probably has the largest bar area on the entire ship which would be ideal for "The Red Frog Pub". It is a bit hidden on the ship as there is almost nothing on deck 4 and almost nobody ever goes to deck 4.
Other things on deck 4 include "The Board Room" and the upper levels of "The Gold Pearl" and "The Black Pearl" restaurants as well as the middle level of "The Golden Atrium". "The Board Room" is reserved for private events so is seldom used on the ship. "The Black Pearl" restaurant usually does not allow you to enter from these doors. They want you to enter at the other end of the restaurant on deck 3. This effectively cuts off being able to get from this end of Deck 4 to the Splendor Lobby side of Deck 4. As far as "The Gold Pearl" restaurant goes, it looks like you are allowed to enter through these doors if you have been assigned to a dinner table on Deck 4, the upper level of "The Gold Pearl Restaurant", for either Early Dining or Late Dining.
I found the below sign hiding in front of the Level 4 entrance to The Gold Pearl Dining Room. I think the only people that are likely to ever see this sign are those that are assigned to a dining table on the upper level of The Gold Pearl Dining Room for Early Dining or Late Dining. I did see a notice about the Wine Packages, maybe on the first day of the cruise, that said to go to the "Cherry On Top" Sweet Shop for more info but that notice did not list the wines or the prices. Maybe there is a sign or flyer similar to the below in that shop.
SAVE up to 25% on Premium Wine Packages through our Cruise The Vineyard Program. Ask your server for details.
Your order can be delivered to your dining room table or stateroom.
18% gratuity will be added to your beverage charge.
Neither of the above Wine Packages would have worked for us as most of those that we have tried from the above list we did not rate very highly. Of the wines that we did rate highly, only two are in the above list. We would rather pay full price for wines we like than get 25% off and be limited to wines that we don't like.
That is all that I could get to on Deck 4 without cutting through "The Black Pearl Restaurant" to get to the rest of Deck 4.
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If in this report you see any typos, misspellings, factual errors or other types of errors, please let me know.
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