Beaches and leeches

We have just completed an interesting week in Malaysia, we felt the need for a break and to explore the east coast beaches. We took the bus out of Singapore and up to Kuantan. I thought the lady at Konsortium said that it arrived at 7:00am but we discovered she meant it took 7 hours. So we found ourselves on the side of the road 15 km north of Kuantan outside the Swiss Garden Resort at 5:30 in the morning. This was Top End accomodation and we were on a Budget. Duta Village Resort was the one nextdoor. It might have been cheaper but it was certainy adequate, they were happy for us to spend time on the beach and using their facilities until we could check in. We spent three nights here. Kuantan is a place to pass through, there is not a lot to keep tourists in town for any length of time. It does have bus transport to other places. The stadium and malls were huge.



This was our beaches section of the week, Besarah and Balok are historical fishing beaches. Besarah has Water buffalo carts that go out into the water to collect fish. Fishing boats travel up and down the beach and locals seem to treat the beach as a road for their motor scooters. We didn't actually see the Water Buffalo carts.
We did decide that it was worth renting a car to go furhter up the coast to Cherating, to visit the turtle sanctuary. We would recommend this place for a visit. On reflection, we would have liked to stay at Cherating and take part in overnight turtle spotting, to see the turtles come ashore to lay eggs and maybe even see the baby turtles released into the ocean. We saw turtles in pools and some baby turtles that were soon to be released. We thought they were startling, with their clear markings. We plan to return another time and travel further up the coast. We still believe we haven't seen the best of the beaches.



The highlight of the week was our trip inland to the rain forest at Taman Negara. We booked a 3 day and 2 night package with Nusa Holiday Village through the Kuantan Tourist Information Centre. We were surprised to find out that the buses ran to Jerentut but not all the way to Tembling Jetty and they did not match up with ferry times. It was a bit of a mission to arrange transport to get things to link up. However it is all very cheap and in the end we took a taxi all the way to Jerentut then got another taxi to take us to Kuala Tahan and the Park HQ. The people from Nusa Village resort were waiting for us at their jetty office. A mission, but well worth it. We could have spent an extra night at the park HQ as there is plenty of accomodation there. We are learning as we explore.




The first night it rained so we did not get out on the Night Jungle Walk part of our package. It was Fasting Month for the locals, so the dining room was working around local times for breakfast. We waited until after 8:00pm for dinner. But we were treated to a local feast of fish. It was worth the waiting. We were entertained by bats that fluttered and darted around the diningroom. Which was a large open verandah, looking out over the river. The sounds of the rain forest at night are so different to New Zealand Bush noises. It was a feast for the senses.




Day 2 was our adventure day, we had a delightful breakfast and were taken down river to do the treetop walk. This closes early on Friday so we did the walk first. This is the longest treetop walk in the world. It is an adventure,in places it gets up to 40 metres high and is a series of swing bridges that consist of aluminium ladders held together with nylon ropes tied to wire ropes,all anchored to the nearest trees. There are no strong metal towers on this walk you walk from tree to tree along swinging rope bridges. You do get a new perspective on life in the treetops.




After this there was a walk with our guide up to Bukit Teresik, a climb up to a superb view over the forest park. We were lucky to have a great guide who was passionate about the forest and able to share lots of facinating information. He also showed us many interesting details. The highlights of the walk included hearing a hornbill, hearing strange frogs that I thought were birds and seeing a skink that was several sizes larger than any we have seen at home. All the way up and down there were signs of pigs, aparently there are a large number of wild pigs here.




We returned to Nusa for lunch which once again was very good food. Then we met the guide who was going to take us on the river to shoot some rapids in his river canoe, this was an opportunity to explore further up the river and to get wet. He did make a point of ensuring we got wet. We came away impressed by his boatmanship, but agreeing he was a little crazy. After dinner that night we got our Night Jungle walk.We were starting out on our walk behind the lodge when we came upon a Slow Loris out on a line. I was sent back to get the camera, as I was racing back to the chalet I nearly ran full tilt into a wild pig that was on the grass in front of our chalet. By the time I got back th Loris was still out in the open and Ruth managed to get a couple of snaps. The insects were reasonably active and we saw many new creatures including scorpians and leeches.



I actually had a leech on my hand, thinking it was a caterpillar I was trying very carefully to get it safely onto a leaf. The guide came back to check me out and he thought it was a huge joke. When we got back from the walk we were told to check for leeches. As Ruth was taking her socks off we noticed a leech on the sock. There was even one that had attached, it was several sizes fatter with her blood, luckily it came away with the sock and crawled off. Meanwhile she continued to donate her blood as she bled freely for quite a while afterwards. I had thicker socks but there was a leech trying to bury itself into my sock as well. The next morning we took the boat back to the Park HQ and the local bus to Jerentut from here we caught the Jungle train back to Singapore. 9 hours on the train arriving back at home about 12:00 midnight. The Taman Negara park is a Malaysian Treasure and could be worth another longer visit the next time we want to get close to nature.



Malaysia is such a contrast to Singapore and I am sure that we have not seen the best it has to offer yet. There is so much of it to see we will go back and check out the next destination in both of these areas.


You can read and see more on Ruth's Blog at http://www.biddybid.blogspot.com/