Tuesday 8 October Tanjung Puting, or Revenge of the Orang utans, Day 2

We'd spent the night tied to the jetty at the park office with six other boats and had an early start to continue up the river to Camp Leakey. On the way we saw our first Proboscis monkeys. They were very close on trees hanging over the boat, beautiful golden coats and the big noses. The local name is tiger monkey for the sound they make, like a tiger roaring. There were the noisey long tail macaques too, screaming abuse (or possibly compliments) to each other as they flew through the branches. Although we looked closely, no crocodiles and no pygmy hippos – probably too wise to hang around a busy river bank and had gone off to somewhere more private deeper into the park.

our keletok

Percival the tin snatcher

For lunch we were tied to the bank, next to the jetty with another half a dozen boats around us. On the jetty there's a pagoda (grand word for what it is) and a raised board walk which runs through the undergrowth and trees up to the camp. One cheeky young male orang utan was waiting for the boats. He wanted an earlier feed time and when no one was looking he dashed aboard an unguarded boat and swiped a tin of sweetened condensed milk and dashed off again and up a tree to savour his booty. The look on his face was pure joy and cheek at what he got away with. When he emptied it the can was dropped on the floor and a young female picked it up. She opened the tin with her teeth and then used her fingers to wipe around the inside for the final pickings. Her larger Mum named Muti followed along keeping an eye on her daughter.

Muti's daughter

Young daughter was trying to get on another boat by pulling on the mooring line to bring it within leaping distance but she was chased off. Thwarted but not beaten she decided to try our boat and swung up into the tree where our stern line was tied to. She gave it a pull. David thought it would amuse her if he pulled back so they ended up having a tug of war. Poor orang utan didn't seem happy and moved off only for Muti to take up the challenge. She and David played for a while. She was making smacking lip noises at him – as usual David's a favourite with the ladies – until she'd had enough and threw our line off the branch. There were more kissing noises until she distracted by the first group making their way up the board walk and went off to see them.

Ten minutes later it was time for us to go ashore and we were walking along the same board walk with Tricia and Dick ahead of us and Yosi the guide behind. I spotted Muti and daughter reclining across the walk way. Yosi advised not to approach and went ahead to tempt them to move aside by throwing orange pieces down into the bushes alongside. Daughter obediently leapt down but Mum wasn't interested in food. She'd spotted David. Those kissing sounds she'd made weren't friendliness, it was a sign of anger and she wanted revenge. Yosi yelled 'Run' as she spotted David and was coming to get him. We turned and fled with Yosi getting passed David but not me, poor Tricia and Dick weren't so quick to react and jogged after us. David and I were giggling. We know because the video camera was still running and we captured it all. Yosi then pulled up a plank from the walk way and forced her away and into a tree. By now Captain had heard the commotion and joined Yosi in pushing her back while we got passed. Because we evaded a mad ape it was a funny episode but it could so easily have turned nasty if she'd caught us.

Muti starts to chase Yosi

The moral of the story is never tease or laugh at an orang utan – they have long memories . Yosi said if David ever went back Muti would remember him and attack again.

King Tom

Up at the feeding station, with no more incidents, we watched many more apes coming and going for their feed, all oblivious to the humans studying them. We were told these are wild animals, but they looked very tame to me, most placid. With each animal having it's own regular route to the platform they came walking passed us, pushing us out of the way if necessary. Once the females had fed and gone, most of the watchers left too. With only a TV crew and a handful of people the Big Guy made his appearance. He's the King, King Tom and he's big. As soon as he appeared all the others left except for one young female. He came in from somewhere behind so we weren't in his way but he left trough the viewing area. The guides were very clear that we were to step away and leave a clear path for him. After our earlier experience with an angry Mum I wasn't staying around to see if he wanted to be friends. Of course, David and Dick needed to get some good shots of the King Tom and were deaf to entreaties to come away. Our walk back to the boat was pleasantly uneventful, no hundred yard dash to do this time.

Our overnight stop was back down the river in a quiet spot tied to the reeds with Macaques in the trees next to us and more fireflies illuminating the night.