It's my first week back on the Monday Morning Walk except this morning's wasn't a walk but a river trip to spot the Proboscis monkey. The monkeys can usually be found 10 mins boat ride out of town. I have only been there once with Donncha and the kids on Manaia and we did not see anything apart from a family of macaques - and really in Brunei we usually spot those outside one of the supermarkets. So today with our young but experienced boatman on a calm beautiful morning with the tide receding we were all anticipating a morning full of wildlife.
And we were not disappointed. Just outside of town we came across our first family of proboscis but unfortunately they were on the move so no pictures. That was followed by sighting a lone otter, followed by a family of baby otters and our first monitor lizard of the day - but it was small. We then proceeded to a section where most of the wildlife was spotted.
Eddy, our eagle hawked guide spotted this huge monitor who was resting obviously after a feed. He must have been pretty full as he didn't move while we took pictures from only a short distance away.
Within minutes Eddy then spotted two mangrove snakes curled and sleeping on branches. Glad they were sleeping as these snakes are very poisonous. 
Just as we stopped to watch a proboscis family from a distance we spotted this monitor lizard just below the boat.
Though we saw plenty of other wildlife we did not manage to see too many proboscis and only spotted a handful. I was lucky to take this picture before this guy moved up higher but sadly missed his nose!
Our main highlight of the day was spotting this 5 foot crocodile basking in the sun with mouth wide open. He was good to sit for an least a couple of minutes before he made a dash for the water. It's now not uncommon to sight these large crocodiles especially at low tide but it's not guaranteed to sight them all the time. This was actually the second crocodile we saw having sighted a much smaller guy who did not hang about further up river.
Spot the weird scales above the croc's leg, it looks like a face!
And the icing on the cake was spotting a family of otters on our way back to town.
We finished the trip with a visit to the boatman's water village house and we were kindly served with tea and cakes. Eddy actually works for his uncle who now has four boats serving tourists and locals like ourselves. Something I have not mentioned was the state of the river where we spotted most of the wildlife including the big croc. The river was filthy, there was rubbish everywhere. The strip is still full of wildlife and what we experienced today is the closest to being on a boat safari - it's a gem and should be a cleaned up and be a protected area. Afterall a huge percentage of the tourists that come to Brunei go there and for Eddy, his family and many boatmen like themselves the area is their breadline. All the more reason to clean up!
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