Natural World

The highest peak in south-east Asia, Kinabalu, was once a mountain of legend and fable. To Chinese adventurers it was the abode of a dragon, rumored to guard a pearl by a lake at the very summit. Today's visitors have yet to find a pearl.... or see a dragon ... but there are riches of another kind. A cool island rearing precipitously from the hot and humid lowlands, Kinabalu is a treasure-house of plant and animal life. Bizarre carnivorous pitcher plants, big enough to drown a rat, share its slopes with huge begonias and stately tree-ferns. Flamboyant rhododendrons shelter the elusive ferret badger as it hunts for giant worms, and there are nearly 1,500 kinds of orchid, many found nowhere else in the world.