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Expedition to collect ants at the Mount Mulu (by Dirk Mezger): Part 2
On March 16th, I flew from Kuching to the Gunung Mulu National Park. After a little more than one hour of flight I was happy to be again at the place where I spend many months of field work for my PhD thesis in the year of 2006 and 2007. It is still a great place to experience and to study the astonishing nature of Borneo. The Park Headquarter experienced some changes during that time, a number of new buildings had been added to the complex.
After arriving at the Research Center, I started unpacking all my luggage. Did I already mention that I had seven pieces of luggage altogether when I arrived at Mulu? Sounds like a lot, but for an expedition to collect ants on Sarawak's second highest mountain, you need quite a lot of equipment. I was very happy to see that even some of my equipment I used twelve years ago was still deposited in the store room of the Research Center. And with the help and creativity of the people of Mulu, I was able to replace all necessary material during the following days.
The day after my arrival, I explored some of of the newly created trails. I walked the so called "Paku Loop Trail" winding through the lowlands covered with beautiful alluvial or riverine forest and being home to a many different species of plants and animals. It was wonderful to see again many of the animal species I saw twelve years ago, but also to discover some new one. On the following evenings, I furher explored some of the new trails specially created for night walks where every visitor can experience the diversity of nocturnal animals of Mulu. The days before the expedition to the mountain I was busy with preparing all kinds of things from getting the equipment ready to meeting my team for the mountain: three porters and a guide from Batu Bungan, the village next to the National Park.
Copyright 2019 Dirk Mezger and Martin Pfeiffer