Carbon Offsets and Canopy Walk

Yesterday we went to see the FACE project, Forestry Offsetting CO2 Emissions. It's a collaborative project between Sabah, Malaysia and European nations that aims to restore logged rainforest.  The restored forests will sequester CO2, storing it in the woody tissue, and will not be logged for 99 years.  After 99 years, selective logging will be allowed if reduced impact logging techniques are used.

The nursery for the FACE project can house 1 million seedlings.  The rangers working with the project are quite impressive, being able to differentiate many different species of seedlings by leaves/vegetation only!

Later that day, we went for a canopy walk!  There's a pretty ritzy eco-tourism lodge near the field station (we're at the Danum Valley Conservation Area Field Station), I think it's called the Borneo Rainforest Lodge?  Anyways, pretty fancy, it's about US$350/night and has outdoor bathtubs so you can take a bubble bath and listen to the gibbons.  Needless to say we were only visiting to go on their canopy walkway.  No rickety ladders on this one, sweet solid steps to the platform and nice suspension spans!

As fancy as the ritzy lodge is, they have 3-horned rhinoceros beetles just like our hostel at the field center!  OK, the beetles at the field center were bigger...  they're pretty neat, can you believe these things can actually fly?  I heard if you put two together, they'll wrestle each other... 

Oh, and here's my new favorite food.  Rambutans are the greatest!