I'm back from Taman Negara. The 3 days / 2 nights trip was rather too short. However, for an eye-opener to the oldest rainforest and a break from the office routine, it would be just enough.
We were gathered at the side entrance of Hotel Istana on 28/04/02 Sunday morning at 7.45am. I presumed there were royal families having function at the hotel and a lot of drivers and bodyguards stand-by at the lower lobby. We were not allowed to wait at the lobby but the roadside instead. There were two coaches leaving to Taman Negara on that morning. Both were running by Desinyo Travel. Two of our group members were having difficulties getting taxi on Sunday early morning from the places they stay; one arrived just before our coach left Hotel Istana at 8.00am and another was late, she has to rush to the next pick up point i.e. Mutiara Kuala Lumpur by 8.30am. The tour guide did not seem like helpful, as according to her, they usually pick up guests from Hotel Istana only. Instead, she warned us that the coach has to leave at 8.30am. Luckily, our last member finally made it at 8.20am, then the coach left immediately. Obviously, five of us were the only locals among the passengers on the coach. Right after the coach left, the tour guide explained to us on what should we do when we arrived at Kuala Tembeling and upon arrival at Mutiara Taman Negara Resort.
The journey to Kuala Tembeling took approximately 4 hours. En route, we have a comfort stop (for 20 minutes) at Taman Chatin Recreational Park, Mentakab at 10.30am. There were a public washroom (charge 30 cent for toilet and 50 cent for taking bath) and a row of covered food stalls (about 5 stalls) serving mostly Malay foods. We have light refreshment before continuing our journey.
At 12.15pm, we arrived at Kuala Tembeling Jetty. The registration counters were situated on a hill, as well as the washrooms, sad to say we have to climb the staircases. We registered our names, age, nationality, occupation, length of stay and place to stay at Counter One with the Wildlife Department for the entrance permit (charge RM1 per person) and also the camera permit (charge RM5 per camera). They only need one IC Number or Passport Number for the group/family (no need proof of document). Therefore, is o.k. for only one person to register for the rest of the group/family members.
Then, we proceeded to Counter Two to reconfirm our accommodation and boat transfer with Mutiara Taman Negara Resort. Our booking was under my name, obviously that was the only Chinese name on their list and I was easily recognized without telling them my name. The boat will leave Kuala Tembeling Jetty at 2.00pm. We had our lunch at one of the local restaurants there (i.e. three Malay restaurants in total). There was nothing else to see besides the jetty, restaurants and the registration counters. We had no choice to sit and wait at the restaurant till 2.00pm.
At about 2.00pm, we walked down to the jetty and waited my name to be called. The weather was sunny and hot; the wooden jetty was quite stuffy then. My name was the first to be called; I assumed that Chinese name was rather easy to be pronounced than the Westerners. Our luggage was then loaded onto the front portion of the boat. We have the front seats and the first boat to leave the jetty.
However, not even five minutes away from the jetty. God knows what happened, we have to change boat in the middle of the river, what an experience! We were then no longer the first boat but the third instead. The boat ride then continued for about 3 hours. It was a sunny day at first; suddenly it rained heavily! We were wondering as what we can do as the rain falling on us. Even though the long boat was covered by zinc, however, for those who sit in the front will still get wet when it rains. The boatman assistant came over to the front and covered the luggage with the plastic layer. My colleague and I who sat the first row were lucky to have the plastic layer to cover us. Whereas, the second row and onwards will still get the rain! Luckily, the rain stopped after about 10 minutes. The sky was cloudy.
We found that the boat journey was rather too long and uncomfortable. But I still unable to understand that foreigners enjoyed it!
Upon arrival at the Kuala Tahan Jetty, where lead to Mutiara Taman Negara Resort, we had to climb up a series of staircases before we reached the reception. It was really tired to climb up those staircases with our own luggage. The rain started again when we checking-in. We then proceeded to hostel where we will be putting up two nights here. There were 4 sets of double-deckers, a hanging-cupboard for each person, mosquito net for each bed, a fan and an air-cond in a unit of hostel. The staff at KL sales office informed me that there wouldn’t be any blanket so we have to bring our own or rent it from them. Guest what! They have blanket! We should not have brought ours so that we have lesser luggage.
After we unpacked our luggage and took our bath, we went over to the other side of the river to have our dinner on one of the floating restaurants. By crossing the river, we had to pay 50 cent each person per way for the boat transfer. The foods on those restaurants were "kampung" style. The foods were priced similar with those at KL.
After the dinner, we crossed the river back to the resort’s reception to look for our guide for the night jungle walk. There was a miscommunication between the staff that they couldn't find our record; the booking was received by the front office but somehow it was not passed to the staff who in charge of the activities arrangement. However, this was sorted out without any delay. According to their record, we were on a FAM trip by our company, in fact it was not true, we actually paid for the trip. We finally got our guide, Rosli for the night jungle walk and fullday usage for next day.
Due to the rain, the jungle was wet. It was not many insects could be seen in this kind of condition. We have a short walk in the jungle then we decided to go to the nearest observation hide. We sat in the hide, no lights; which was raised above the ground. We could see the salt lake and the surrounding with the helps from the moonlight; it was a full moon. But, we couldn’t see any wild animals. The reason was because there were far too many tourists at this place; it scared the animals. Otherwise we have to walk far deep inside the jungle. We could actually enjoyed listening the natural orchestra played by the insects while sitting in the hide. Guest what! I heard telephone ringing tone! I wondered why there was no one answered the phone! It made me felt uneasy! Actually, it was the sound made by one of the insects. There was also a sound like a bird singing, it was actually sound made by the insects too. Amazing right?
The next day morning, we had our breakfast at the newly renovated Seri Mutiara Restaurant, formerly known as Tahan Restaurant. Another restaurant (i.e. Teresek Restaurant) was closed. We supposed to have set breakfast which was inclusive in the hostel rates, due to a big group staying there (i.e. over 30 Dutch tourists), we were lucky that we had the buffet breakfast! Wow, eat all you can!
We met our guide again at the reception; we then proceeded to Bukit Teresek and Canopy Walk. The jungle trekking to Bukit Teresek was not easy as what we thought. We were lack of exercise and we found that the trekking was really suffered. We should have done some exercise before the trip. The view from the Bukit Teresek was not so impressive; maybe it was the reason because I have climbed Mt Kinabalu and mountain trekking in Nepal, the views there were more interesting.
The canopy walk was a new experience to me; in fact, it was really scary, because I afraid of height. It was the longest canopy in the world (500m). Some parts of the canopy walk were really scary as you could see the deep valley and passing over all the big and high trees. The visitors had to keep a distance (about 5m to 10m) from each other while walking on the canopy. I was alone while walking on the canopy; there was no one to encourage me when I was afraid. I had to talk to myself in order to chase the fears away. I told myself: "Don't look down, there is nothing to see down there. Look up! You will see monkeys, birds, and some other things. Remember, every step you make, is an effort to move forward. Just keep on going! You have been doing very well, is just a very easy job! The platform is very near, few more steps, keep on going! Don't look down!" I have been repeating saying this to myself and it worked!The trekking took about 4 hours. When we returned to reception, the Assistant Front Office Manager who supposed to meet us for site inspection was out for lunch. We then proceeded to the floating restaurants for our own lunch. You may notice that the same person, who served you meals on the floating restaurants, can be the guide for jungle trekking and also the boatman for boat transfer! They were all multi-skilled!
The staff at the reception was still unable to contact the Assistant Front Office Manager when we returned from lunch. Outside was raining. Our clothes were dirty, sticky and smelly. We left a message for the manager to look for us at the hostel. We took our shower and rested in our room. Some of us were actually fall asleep when someone knocked on our door at 3.40pm. There was another Assistant Front Office Manager. We were rushing for the site inspection as we had booked the guide for a tour to visit the Orang Asli Settlement and Rapid Shooting at 4.30pm. This was the first time I did the site inspection under the rain! I felt sorry for the staff that has to clear up the rooms again after we saw the rooms. We then met with the Executive Assistant Manager at Seri Mutiara Restaurant. We had a short meeting there.
We were late for the tour in the evening. We
started our tour at about 5.00pm. The boat ride was quite interesting as whenever we passed thru the rapids, water splashed on us. We saw people floating on the river enjoying river rafting. We stopped at one of the Orang Asli Settlement. These people were practicing nomadic lifestyle. There was blowpipe demonstration, raise fire from the stone, etc.At the end of the tour, we stopped at the floating restaurant again for our dinner. We did have a short walk at the Kampung Kuala Tahan. There was nothing much to see, only small restaurants, stores, and family run guesthouses. I would recommend Lia Restaurant, one of the floating restaurants. They have variety of foods (i.e. locals and Westerners) with reasonable pricing. Every night the restaurant was crowded by foreigners.
The resort has a Mini Market right after the Seri Mutiara Restaurant. Some of the goods were tagged with a sticker that saying if you return the trash of the goods, you would get a refund of RM1. It was really a good idea to discourage the guests to throw the rubbish everywhere. However, I was disappointed as there was not much souvenir selling there. There were only 6 types of postcards, most of the T-shirts has the Mutiara Resort’s logo, not many of variety of goods, etc.
Finally, we met our roommate who checked-in that morning. Her name was Ms Janet, an old Australia woman, working in Singapore since last 2 years. She was traveling to Taman Negara alone. She said she hated Singapore as the parents were cruel to their children; the city was too clean that no bird flying in the sky, etc. She was a little bit of cuckoo. She taught the common toilet equipped with toilet paper, therefore she did not bring one and also the antiseptic cream for insect bites.
Guest what! We found out that our common washroom had more insects than in the jungle! The lights in the washroom had attracted those insects. It was like a live insect museum!
At the middle of night, while we were sleeping, a group of Japanese came back from the jungle and occupying the next door. At first, I taught they were thief! The hostel door was not locked if there were guests occupying the room. We have to be aware if there was anybody entered our room. They were talking and the footsteps were really a disturbance to us, even though we were not sharing the same room. Or maybe I was too careful.
Next day morning, which was also our departure day, we rushed for checking-out and our breakfast before the boat leave at 9.00am. We were sharing the same boat with a group of youngsters who just came back from climbing the Mt Tahan. As usual, Asian was very noisy. They were making hell lots of noise along the boat journey. We arrived at Kuala Tembeling Jetty at about 11.30am. We sat at the restaurant, which located near to the riverbank, to wait for the coach that, leave for KL at 1.00pm. We also had our lunch there.
The coach left punctually and the driver was crazy. Luckily, our journey back to KL was smooth and safe. At the comfort stop at Taman Chatin Recreation Park, Mentakab, the first thing that everybody did was checking the handphone’s network reception; then, started making call and checking messages.
During the journey back, the youngsters did not make so much of noise, thank God, they were falling asleep. In fact, all of us were tired and falling asleep. The only disturbance was from a man who kept on calling people over his handphone. I could not understand those people that have not even reached home from a holiday, have started their business. Luckily, there was no network reception for handphones in Taman Negara; otherwise, I would wonder if he would keep on calling people while doing the jungle trekking!
Overall, the trip was quite interesting and at least I have seen Taman Negara! I will return for climbing the Mt Tahan in future. That would be another adventure story, I believe.
Yoke Ming
1 May 2002
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