Our favorite Borneo tours and excursions

From multi-day rainforest treks to tribal longhouse stays, Borneo offers some of the most unforgettable travel experiences on the planet.

You don’t come to Borneo to do things by halves. You want the very best guides, in the very best locations, with the very best range of activities, or nothing. In the world’s greatest wildlife destination, why settle for anything less?

By its very wild and untamed nature, much of Borneo impossible to explore without a guide – and we’re only interested in working with the very best. You can always spot them: they’re the ones who’ve never stopped being enthused about the sheer magnitude of the forest, and the ones who are as excited by a big cat’s pawprint as by the tiniest rare spider, even after years of guiding. Those are the people we want to show you Borneo.

Borneo isn’t just an untouched rainforest paradise. It’s a living, breathing island full of culture and contradictions, with street-food markets to explore, mountains to climb, coral reefs to marvel at, conservation challenges to face, and scores of different indigenous groups with whom to share an evening and a little tuak rice wine. These are the experiences that’ll get you beneath the surface.

Mount Kinabalu climb

Watching sunrise from the top of the highest mountain in Southeast Asia is an unforgettable experience.

It’s an 8.8 km steep trail to the summit, taking you from lush and humid lowlands to misty forests of tea and eucalyptus trees thick with moss, where you’ll stop at a shelter for the night. Rising at 2am the next day, you’ll continue for the final stretch through cooler granite boulder forest and treeless subalpine scrub to Low’s Peak, to be rewarded with views as far as the Philippines in the distance. Be warned: the ascent is steep, the summit is cold, and altitude sickness can strike anyone – but the rewards really are spectacular.

Trekking in Tabin Wildlife Reserve

Malaysia’s largest wildlife reserve covers well over 1,000 sq km in the far east of Borneo yet is home to just one wildlife resort.

To really appreciate the range of wildlife that calls Tabin home, you need to experience it at every time of day – so the best way to uncover its secrets is with a series of short hikes with an expert nature guide. Hike to a continuously erupting mud volcano to look for animal tracks and spot pygmy elephants making the most of the salt lick. After dark, go in search of sambar deer, bearded pigs, and tembadau (wild cattle). At dawn, ascend a birdwatching tower to spot spidercatchers, bristleheads and flowerpeckers.This is what Borneo is all about.

Trekking in the Pinnacles in Mulu National Park

Trekking the Headhunter's Trail & Mulu Pinnacles

Challenge yourself with this guided five-day expedition into Mulu National Park, combining cave exploration with two of our favorite treks.

Start by following a trail once used by fearsome Kayan headhunting parties, who paddled up the Melinau River to the gorge and dragged their longboats for three kilometers to launch raids against the Limbang. Then comes the real challenge (should you choose to accept it): the 45-meter-high, razor-sharp limestone Pinnacles. Though only 2.5 km in length, the path to the Pinnacles ascends some 1,200 meters in altitude, emerging onto a rocky outcrop with magnificent views. It’s a tricky climb with an even trickier descent – but don’t worry, it’s optional.

Meeting the Iban people

Borneo’s Iban people may have abandoned their former practice of headhunting, but thankfully their traditional culture survives in many other forms.

Iban live in longhouses with up to 30 families under one roof, and in the evenings, these houses are filled with drinking, dancing and general merriment. Spend the night and be prepared to be plied with tuak rice wine and roped into a dance or two, to the inevitable amusement of your hosts! The Iban way of life may not have all the mod cons (or privacy) you’re used to, but it affords a sense of community that’s long faded from Western culture, and for us it’s one of the highlights of a trip to Borneo.

Exploring Mulu's caves

Mulu National Park is home to some of the most impressive subterranean landscapes you’ll ever see.

In Lang Cave, swallows and swiftlets flit between stalactites and stalagmites, while at gargantuan Deer Cave, a towering side-profile of Abraham Lincoln watches the nightly exodus of over two million bats. In Wind Cave, dripping flowstones appear like frozen waterfalls and spiky helictites give the impression of having formed in zero gravity. With two days in the park, you can trek from cave to cave, taking dips in cold springs and spotting wildlife from canopy walks in between.

Rainforest kayaking

On this tour, your guide will take you out of Kuching, through rice fields, rubber plantations and pepper farms, to the ancestral heartland of the Bidayuh: the second-largest minority group in Borneo.

Jumping in a kayak, you’ll paddle along a shallow stretch of river overhung by trees and overshadowed by looming limestone mountains. If you’ve had enough of trekking, this is a refreshingly different way to immerse yourself in the jungle, as you float over gentle rapids, beneath trailing vines, and stop at Bidayuh villages along the way to meet the locals and experience traditional life in the forest.