Taman Negara #8 - Night Walk.

Through a path at the back of Mutiara Hotel, we came to a building where we were to see a documentary on Taman Negara. But this is peak season and there was a long queue. So we hand around in the gallery reading interesting facts about the National Park. We also took the opportunity to form a circle and introduced ourselves to the other members of the group.

This is a simplified map of Taman Negara and Gunung Tahan. See Kuala Tahan somewhere near the center; that is where we stayed from where we took our boats to all the other locations for our activities. Looking at it, we realized we have covered only so little and there is a lot more to discover.

This poster explained the origin and history of the National Park – Taman Negara. It was first gazetted as Gunung Tahan Game Reserve before being called King George V National Park by the British.

This is a list of the protected animals in this forest reserve. This is necessary as there is an illegal trade in wildlife and many of the animals are also on the endangered list.

Then came our turn to go into the air-conditioned hall smelling of sweat (due to the number of sweaty audience) to watch a documentary of Taman Negara. It was interesting but the dark cool atmosphere after a heavy dinner proved too alluring for some to doze off.

We started our walk into the dark after the show. We walked on metal platform built over the track. It is good in the sense that we will not trip over roots or stepped into muddy holes. But we were also making so much noise that we will drive away any animals in the vicinity.

Each of us was armed with a torch but there really not much to see. It was more a casual group walk.

Every now and then, the guide will stop to point out something to the group but because we were traveling in a single file, only those near to him can hear his explanation.

Basically what we could see are just a few insects not disturbed by sound and maybe even attracted by the lights.

This is a stick insect hiding under a large tree leave. No price for guessing how it got its name.

On the top left hand corner of this picture (light green), you can see a large insect that was disturbed by us and took flight into the safety of the high branches of the trees.

Sometimes our light caught a light shining back at us. We are not sure what it was, whether animal or insect but no one was game to push into the undergrowth to find out.

Here we were shown some luminous mushrooms that glowed in the dark. A huge dragonfly, three or four times the size of the city cousin flied and entangled on the guide shirt before taking off again.

It did not take many steps before the dark will close in and swallowed you up which not even the flash can illuminate. And our weak torchlight is just a pathetic beam good enough only to show us where to plant our feet.

We climbed into the watch tower to try to hopefully catch sight of some large mammals. It will be too much to hope for to see a tiger. It was so dark that looking out the observation deck, we just saw a sheet of black.

But with the combined torches, we did make out a large deer feeding in the water hole in the distance. It lifted its head to look all those lights shining from the tower. I did not know what it was thinking but it did not take off. I set my camera on night mode and hopefully took a shot. When I viewed it, only the a branch illuminated by the torches was visible proving our eyes is much superior to our camera.

After that, we walked back to Mutiara without any interesting incident. We took our boat which again churned up the muddy water to send us back to our hotel for our first night in Taman Negara and for me a long awaited bath in icy cold water.

We did not see any tiger but on the way back to the room, I spied this tomcat trying to impress this demure female cat. When I looked back, he had succeeded and was rubbing necks with her. At least someone will be happy tonight. Hope it did not make too much noise celebrating its love. We need our sleep for the next morning…

To be continued...

Taman Negara #7 - Taman Negara Sunset.

The food was ready by the time we got back to the restaurant. That was just great for I was so hungry that I could eat a horse, or at least a leg of a horse. That food was not great but pretty decent for the price we are paying and the quantity is large enough to fill our stomach.

On the way back to our room, we spied the amusing sign on this toilet – “Don’t Go Here – Snake Inside”. This is understandable as there are not enough bathrooms to go round and there is a long wait during peak hour unless you want to take bath with a snake.

As we will be going jungle trekking at night, I decided not to take a bath. It will be slow going as eight of us were waiting for his turn. So I took the opportunity to hunt around for photo shoots. I took this shot on the high bank looking down at Sungai Tahan partly concealed by tall ficus tree with their overhanging roots.

Another shot of the Sungei Tahan showing the Ficus leaves.

At times, today the sky was a clear blue but most part of the day it was cloudy. But as I looked for the sunse, I was not sure where was west as I lost my orientation with jungles all around. I believed this was west and that is the light of the setting sun just above the tree lines. It was not much of a sunset but it was still something to remember by. I have no time to just wait for perfect moments.

When I look around, I was surprised to see an even brighter spread of orange and gold at the opposite end. Which is the real sunset? It only took me a second to ponder before I trained the camera at it. Who cares as long it is beautiful, right?

The river reflected back the sunset gold but the greedy jungle absorbed it and would give nothing back.












My attempt to capture attracted other photographers with much better gears. This photographer took up position in front of me and clicked away. He seemed quite pleased with his effort. I asked him how was his shots and he proudly showed on the LCD screen.

The Caucasian with his girlfriend was not too pleased with his shot though. He lamented that it did not look great without the tripod stand. It was not a great sunset but it was the only sunset during this trip for it rained the next day. I will take less than perfect pictures over nothing any day.

The light faded but new lights came on. The floating restaurant took on a new look, looking sexier in half light. It has just the right alluring look to welcome you onboard.

Over at the other bank, the dim lights of the restaurant looked trapped by the dark. Everywhere lights were failing and the jungle rose up to consume everything.

It was time to return to the hostel. A white cat with jade green eyes rimmed by yellow lids questioned our presence before her equally white kittens drew her away.

The night now ruled the Earth. Boats and lights swimming in the ink black river illuminated by shimmering lights.

We crossed the other bank to go The Mutiara, the only five stars hotel in Taman Negara with suite costing up to RM1,000 a night. We had our torches ready for the night jungle trekking.

The river can rise many meters during the rainy season. This sign near the entrance of the hotel marked the record it achieved – a staggering 74 meters!

Nights are especially dark here. This was a shot of the river bank from which we came and the white streak is a boat coming in to moor. A serene scene punctuated by boats in a hurry.

Armed with torches, the group took a photo before setting off to search for our jewels of the night...

To be continued...

Taman Negara #6 - Eeeeh! Leeches!!

As we regrouped before setting off, our guide discovered that a leech has bitten him through his socks. He just casually pulled it off. The girls became paranoia and started checking their legs. First there was a loud scream from one of the girls and she started to jump up and down. Alex who brought along a concentrated salt solution sprayed on it until it dropped off. This was followed by another piercing scream as yet another found she was bitten. Even though the salt solution caused the sucker to drop off, the blood kept oozing out freely. Some of the girls were really freaking out and started checking their body having all kinds of creepy feelings and hysterical screamings at imagination. They started checking one another. Actually, it was kind of amusing. When they settled down again, we set off into the woods again.

This plant has rough hairy leaves which the forest people used to polish their rings.

Blue ferns can be seen growing on the ground, its color standing out from the other green plants and the brown of the earth.

We eventually came back to the Batek village again and saw these Batek children performing a flower dance for me. Wonder where they got that yellow flowers for we did not see it anywhere along the trek.



This boy was peering intensely into the yellow flower. What were his thoughts?

Even the Batek are not immune from modern influence. See some of their huts are covered by the blue plastic sheets to keep off the rain. And this lady is carrying plastic containers.

If not hunting or gathering for food, they just while their time away. Whether this is good or bad depends on one’s outlook of life, I guess. But they seem contented with their life which is more than can be said for many of the city folks.

After a short trek, we came to the river again waiting for our boat to pick us up. Along the way another guy was bitten by a leech, a tiger leech this time which unlike the water leech that bit the girls in the cave; has a painful bite. These suckers that can detect you by vibration (e.g. footsteps) and carbon dioxide given off by nearby hosts and will aggressively pursue you. Our friend found one inside his T-shirt so maybe the girls were not so jumpy after all. We gave that one a salt water bath too and sent on its way to leech heaven.

Our boat came and we took off for our hostel. This boat and its owner is leisurely hanging back waiting to pick up his passengers.

We passed this scene which for some reason reminded me of Brokebreak Mountain.

As we passed by this floating boathouse, the children shouted to catch our attention. Then one after another they dive into the water. Unfortunately I was not quick enough to catch them taking the plunge.

Nearing our destination, we saw this fisherman getting ready to cast his nets. I quickly got my camera ready. I always got a thrill whenever I can catch a fisherman casting his net.

Caught him in the act.

The net dropped forming an arch over the water (like a giant jelly fish) before disappearing under. I hoped he had a good harvest. We are now very hungry having worked up a healthy appetite. It was time to eat.

To be continued...

Taman Negara #5 - Into The Ear Cave.

Before we enter the house of bats, we took a picture as proof in case anyone did not re-emerge from it. The Ear Cave is so named because it is shaped like an ear. Like one too, once you enter it gets progressively narrower till it is just a small channel into the inner ear. But even more like an ear, you went in one direction and came out the other. :-)

Last minute advice – “keep your head low, don’t bump into things though I know all of have thick skulls; talk soft, don’t wake up the dead; it is slippery, watch out for the sharp rocks; if it is too slippery, God gave you a backside for a reason; if it is smelly, hold your breath until you came out the other side; if you are not dirty when you come out, we all know you cheated and double back.”

With those words swarming our heads, we climbed in and plunged into instant darkness. The feeble beams of our tiny torches seemed to be sucked in by the darkness and eaten up. Don’t let some of the pictures fooled you. Only when the camera flashed could we see with any clarity. See the three tiny lights in the picture, they were made by torches – not very bright was it? Immediately in and the low ceiling forced us to bend double to walk like a hunchback.

Sometimes we have to climb down and other times we have to climb up. Luckily, there were ropes strung at strategic points in the cave to help in the climbs.

In the semi-darkness, you could just about see several feet in front of you and the general appearance of the cave wall while further away or deeper caverns are shrouded in complete darkness. I did not know there were bats in this cave even though they are just feet away until I used the camera to illuminate the cave.

Take for example this photo. Even with the flash you could not see beyond the rope.





If you grabbed too far, you may end up with grabbing one of the bats instead which are just inches away. They were around us everywhere except we couldn’t see them – we were like they said “blind as a bat”.

They may just be on top of our head and we would not even realize as this picture showed.

Something spooked the bats, probably our loud voices having woke them up from their slumber and they started flying. They flew in erratically in complete darkness yet managed to avoid slamming into anything. We now have to climb up towards a break in the cave where light and jungle greens were visible.

The path we have to climb is the area through which the bats were flying. We have to just hope that their radar is good enough to avoid crashing into us. “Mayday! Mayday! Bang!!”

Well, there were no flaming hits so we made to the next chamber which is all the way down. The first section was easy enough, just have to make sure we had a secure hold.

The second section proved to be more tricky. It was steep but also very smooth and wet and a bit dangerous to try to stand and walked down unless the shoes have a good traction. It is safer to slide down with the buttocks. Four Englishmen were standing here obstructing the traffic, debating on whether to proceed and go back and wondering aloud where this leads to while others just moved round them and continued below. It is kind of strange they way they carried out their conversation as if none of us understand their language. So I volunteered them some information and told them that there is only one way to go – forward. There are still many people coming from the back as we were almost at the head of our party. One of them said to the other “There – there is your answer” and followed us in.

However, we could not proceed far when we had another traffic jam. After sliding down the slippery slope, we have to crouch and crawl through a watery channel. We could not see what was ahead and had to wait until the path was cleared. You can imagine what can happen when this cave became flooded. Incidentally, the Ear Cave is closed during the rainy season for obvious reason.

It seemed the cave got narrower as we went in. This is a slit between two huge boulders and only a medium sized person could squeeze through. One of the participants (not of our group) had to turn back for there is no way his extra large size is going to squeeze through this gap.


There are more tight spots ahead. At the end of the long channel, there is a hole through which you have to push yourself upward with the strength of both your arms. It is not a large hole and our guide told us in an earlier trip, one guy was stuck there for three hours before being rescued. Our guide told us that the cave is getting narrower over the years as the earth movement hemmed the cave in.


But once we pushed yourself through it, sunlight again greeted us and we found that we were at the bottom of a deep narrow ravine. Using our arms and steeping on places of the rocks where there are footholds, we pulled ourselves upward.

“I did it! I am out of the cave!” she seemed to say as she flashed both a beaming smile and the V sign.

Those who have got out helped to pull the others up.

“Look! My front is pretty clean.”

“But my back – well, I did use my buttocks!”

This group of girls said “Hey, we also want our front and back taken.” So I shot their front.

But when they turned their backs to me, they suddenly felt shy and dispersed before I could get a proper shot. Girls!


As we were about to depart, I saw the four Englishmen coming out from another path. I was puzzled and asked them how come. They told me they were tired of waiting for the queue and double back where they came from. I thought – what a pity! So near yet so far. I would have regretted and always wondered what it was I missed, for want of a little patience.

To be continued...