A pleasant, learned, funny, silly romp through the jungle. On a
scientific quest of sorts, British naturalist O'Hanlon and a
friend, poet James Fenton, decided to spend two months in darkest
Sarawak, traveling from Kuching on the South China Sea to the
headwaters of the Baleh River, whence O'Hanlon climbed Mount Tiban
(ca. 6,000 feet). Along with three Iban guides (one of whom spoke
ingratiatingly fractured English), these two unlikely adventurers -
O'Hanlon was fat, Fenton out of shape - endured the most appalling
trials from steambath heat, leeches, omnipresent insects, dangerous
rapids, and a constant diet of sticky rice and insipid, bony
sebarau fish. Happily, the potentially lethal menace of poisonous
snakes (or large pythons) and hostile Ukit tribesmen never
materialized. The ostensible purpose of this expedition was to
determine whether Didermocerus sumatrensis harrissoni, the Borneo
two-horned rhinceros, presumed extinct, might not still be in
existence. Ultimately O'Hanlon tracks down an ancient Ukit hunter
who tells him that in his youth he speared eight such rhinos near
Mount Tiban. "Our search," O'Hanlon mock-solemnly intones, "had
ended." But it had been more of a (slightly deranged) lark than a
search: O'Hanlon reveling in "the world's best reading matter,"
Bertram B. Smythies' The Birds of Borneo (third edition), as his
motorized canoe pushes upriver and stunningly beautiful live birds
fly past him; O'Hanlon endlessly twitting his droll, unflappable
companion (who spends most of his time reading Les Miserables);
O'Hanlon arriving at the remote hamlet of Rumah Ukit and being
forced, almost at spear point, to teach the natives the "seven-step
disco." ("We have already a tape of music and we have a recorder.
You have batteries?") O'Hanlon's readers will be glad he left the
comforts of home to dine on monitor lizard tail and get drunk on
tuak - and equally glad they didn't join him. Fine light
entertainment. (Kirkus Reviews)
Armed with equipment and advice from 22 SAS, Hereford, and accompanied by three trackers, Redmond O'Hanlon, the naturalist, and James Fenton, the poet, set out on a long river voyage into the interior of a tropical jungle hoping to reach the Tiban massif. At once funny and knowledgeable, Redmond O'Hanlon's account of how they battled with insects, discomfort and setbacks is a hugely entertaining and informative adventure story in the best tradition of the world's great travel classics.
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