Welcome To Sabah

           Brunei gave the east coast of Sabah to the Sultans of Sulu in 1704 in return for favours in a succession dispute. Sabah (known as North Borneo until 1963) was visited by several western adventurers in the late 1800's. 
Joseph William Torrey, an American trader, obtained from the feeble Brunei Sultanate a lease over the greater part of the territory. This lease was later transferred to Gustavus de Overbeck, an Austrian baron, and finally to Alfred Dent, an English businessman. Dent signed treaties with both the Sultans of Brunei and Sulu, gaining complete control of the territory. In 1881, he succeeded in establishing the Chartered Company of British North Borneo to manage the territory. 

The region fell to the Japanese in 1941. After World War II ended in 1945, the territory was a British Crown Colony until it achieved independence by becoming part of Malaysia in 1963. 

The history of jessetlon, now Kota Kinabalu began well before its official founding in1899.In almost every written account of the era from the nineteen century ,the excellent harbors of Gaya is mentored, for example.

"...one of the best and most completely land-locked harbors on this coast...."(Sir Edward Belcher,1846).Also, Spencer St.John in1862 in his book" Life in the Forests of the Far East "commented that  Gaya was the most important harbors in Borneo..."from its commanding position in the China Seas and from its great security."

    The settlement at Gaya grew slowly but steady despite the lack of water and hot, humid weather. This sleepy hollow was rudely awakened by an event, which spelled its fiery destruction in 1897.

  The island trading station at Gaya was founded in 1883.The residency was an iron water pump for the town's water needs. A small reservoir, conbcrete lined, was located at the base of the ridge to collect water from run-offs from the hill and was then fed into the pump.

     Sabah is the Second largest state in the federation of Malaysia, covers an area of 29,388 square miles with a coastline of about 900 miles washed by the South China Sea on the West and North and the Sulu and Celebes Seas on the East. 

KOTA KINABALU, the capital of the state, is 1,000 miles from Singapore, 1,200 miles from Kuala Lumpur and Hong Kong, 600 miles from Manila and 1,500 miles from Darwin.

Sailor of a bygone era found Sabah a safe shelter from the ravaging typhoons of the South China Sea. The geographical location of the State placed it just below the typhoon belt and Sabah thus earned the soubriquet " LAND BELOW THE WIND" More than just calm shores these early visitors also found a land of great natural beauty and friendly hospitable people.
Mordern visitors to Sabah will find all this is unchanged.
The State, with its vast vistas of virgin TROPICAL RAINFOREST, unspoilt beaches and towering mountains, is one of the few remaining heavens of natural beauty left in this world. Its rich mix of diverse ethnic groups are united in their traditional hospitability and warmth towards the visitors.