Trip to Taman Negara (Day 1: 20 Dec 2007)

Approximately two weeks before we departed to Taman Negara in Pahang, news about flood and landslides were all over Malaysia. I wondered, "Will this trip be a success? What if it rains? What if we are caught in a landslide while we are trekking through the jungle?"

Haha... Nope.

We departed from Petaling Jaya around 8:30am by bus (arranged by the agency through which we booked the whole trip package) to Jerantut, Pahang and reached at 11:30am. Not much to be done in Jerantut. After lunch, we departed to Kuala Tahan at 1pm. Around 1:45pm, we reached one of those floating restaurants at Kuala Tahan. Then, we juggled our way down sandy riverbank and hopped onto boats to go across the river (Sungai Tembeling) to our lodging (Mutiara Taman Negara - National Park Resort).

Yeah... We didn't camp. We stayed in "dorms" since there were 35 of us, including kids.

The adventure has just begun...

Our first "task": Jungle trekking and Ear Cave exploration. Here are the keywords; the rest, I leave to you to imagine.

Keywords: Raining (yes, it was raining!), muddy, slippery, leeches, tiring, soaking wet, very cold... but rewarding! Well, I waited for them outside the cave, I didn't go in. Now I realize I need more physical exercises to boost my stamina and to overcome my fear of all physical activities. Haha...

Those who went into the cave saw bats hanging from the ceiling. Oww... Look at those sinister-looking creatures.

By the time they came out from the cave, the rain was getting heavier and heavier. The trails were getting muddier than before. I've to push myself to the limit. No matter how I feel, I gotta get out of the jungle and I did. I seldom take the risk to do things that I DON'T LIKE. This time, I guessed I did the contrary.

We were dripping with mud, sweat, and rain water. Some were targeted by leeches and came back with blood trickling down their legs. So, it was time to clean up the mess. We took a long time to shower, wash our mud-soaked clothes and sports shoes.

Guess what? Since we were in contact with the nature, we could see wild boars, monkeys, and monitor lizards. We didn't see them all the time but when they appeared, we were excited.

Note: Got this photo from the website.

Here's the wild boar that loved to "visit" us and made lots of noise and mess. Some of us took quite a number of photos of this gentle beast. I've no idea how could it be so "friendly" but we still kept our distance, in case it charged at us out of a sudden.

To be continued...