Sepilok's canopy walkway
Rainforest Discovery Centre
Run by the Sabah Forestry Department, the Rainforest Discovery Centre is a 106-hectare gateway into the Kabili-Sepilok Forest Reserve with a vast steel canopy walkway.
Our view
Sabah's easiest canopy morning
If you want to see the rainforest canopy without booking a deep-jungle lodge, this is where you go. Located just 2 kilometres down the road from the Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Centre , the skywalk offers steady canopy views. Pair a visit with the Bornean Sun Bear Conservation Centre for a broader Sepilok wildlife itinerary.
The main draw is a 620-metre steel skywalk that threads through the mid-canopy at a height of 25 metres. Because the walkway is wide, rigid and entirely free of sway, you can set up a heavy tripod or walk it easily with young children.
Highlights
Walkway and wildlife highlights
- A 620-metre steel canopy walkway 25 metres up in the emergent trees
- Over 300 bird species, the Bornean bristlehead and rhinoceros hornbill among them
- A purpose-built ground hide on the Pitta Trail for understorey birds
- Red giant flying squirrels seen on most evenings, gliding at dusk
- Guided night walks for western tarsiers, slow lorises and sleeping pittas
Bornean Bristlehead
In the right season, bristlehead parties cross the walkway on most mornings and are seen with luck and patient watching. These are highly nomadic canopy foragers that move unpredictably in noisy flocks.
Plan
How many mornings to give it
Buy tickets the afternoon before to enter at 6am for dawn birding. Visit the orangutan and sun bear centres mid-morning, then return at 4pm for afternoon birding and dusk squirrels. Beyond Sepilok, explore the Kinabatangan River for wild boat safaris.
Getting there
The RDC sits about 23 kilometres from Sandakan town and 17 kilometres from Sandakan Airport. It is just 2 kilometres from the Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Centre. Most local eco-lodges are a 20-minute walk or 3-minute taxi ride away.
Alternatives
The rest of Sepilok and beyond
Sepilok Orangutan Rehabilitation Centre
Located 25 kilometres from Sandakan on the edge of a 4,362-hectare forest reserve, Sepilok is where orphaned apes learn the skills to return to the wild.
Bornean Sun Bear
Helarctos malayanus euryspilus
Kinabatangan River
The Kinabatangan floodplain holds the highest concentration of wildlife in Borneo. This is where you go to track orangutans and proboscis monkeys from a boat.
Danum Valley
2.5 hours by road from Lahad Datu, Danum Valley is 438 square kilometres of lowland rainforest that was never logged with three very different places to stay inside it.
Where it is
Plan your Sepilok mornings
Tell the team your birding priorities so they can fit the centre's dawn and dusk sessions around your Sepilok days.