Encircled by a wall of foreboding slopes some 1,600m high, Sabah's Maliau Basin remained unknown until a British pilot flew over it by chance in 1947. From the cockpit, he was mesmerised by what he saw.
Streams of water cascading down the steep cliffs at several places, dissipating into fine drops of moisture that form a perpetual cloud of mist which flow and ebb like a mystical ocean floating above the trees, curling up as it hits the cliffs.
Slightly larger in size than Singapore, this crater-like 'Lost World' support an unusual montage of 12 types of tropical forests, comprising of lower montane forest dominated by soaring coniferous trees, rare montane heath forest and lowland and hill dipterocarp forests. In the absence of human intrusion and natural calamities, these forests have remained untouched for millions of years.
It is also home to more than 80 species of mammals, 270 bird species and a diverse flora of over 1,800 species, many of which are listed in the Red List of Threatened Species issued by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
Although the Bornean Bearded Pig thrives in the basin, the native Muruts, to whom this swine is a delicacy; stay clear of the basin. They confine themselves to the periphery during their annual hunt for the animal. The Muruts believe that a dragon dwells in Lake Linumunsut - Sabah's only freshwater lake, which lies in the Maliau Basin.
Inaccessibility topped with a foreboding legend has fortuitously preserved the basin's ecosystem.
Several attempts to penetrate the Maliau Basin proved unsuccessful. Eventually, in 1981, a survey party from the Sabah Foundation landed in a helicopter and prepared the groundwork which subsequently enabled a 43-member expedition to spend three weeks there in 1988.
The basin has the highest concentration of waterfalls - 19 and still counting - recorded in any one area in Malaysia. The most prominent is the mesmerising 7-tiered staircase shaped Maliau Falls. Dead leaves lying at the bottom of the streams secrete tannin, which make the water appears murky.