Taman Negara, Part 2

18-July-10

Just back from a mediocre dinner on one of the floating restaurants of Kuala Tahan, we debated if in our travels if we have ever encountered a more unattractive town. After much discussion, Kuala Tahan, you are the winner so far. It would seem that you would have to try hard to create a greater mess. As a side note, our hostel "Yellow Guesthouse" is the nicest place we've stayed so far and we are really enjoying our bubble gum pink room.

Enough of that and onto our current object of affection, Taman Negara National Park, located a stone's throw across the river from the Kuala Tahan "river walk." Last night we participated in a guided night walk in the national park. Our tour at first reminded us why we generally hate group tours, but ended in brilliance. The tour started in a disorganized mass, as 50+ tourists from a myriad of countries were split into a number of groups and then led down the same path-moooo! The night walk improved as we gained space from the other groups and used flashlights to spotlight various insects including a number of walking-sticks. Shortly thereafter one of the flashlights spotted a python (about 3 feet in length) snaking its way through a nearby tree. The hike proceeded to an observation platform where we spotted 5 sambar deer grazing in the distance. Toward the end of the walk we hit the lottery with the spotting of a slow loris, making its way from tree to tree a short distance from the path. A slow loris is an extremely cute, rare, nocturnal primate only found in parts of Asia. It basically is a tailless monkey with raccoon eyes. For more info check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Slow_loris.

Today we headed out for a long hike leading from the entrance to the park, which at times resembled aerobics inside a sauna (Rachel compares the experience to bikram yoga). The hike first lead us to the much-advertised tree canopy walkway, said to be the longest of its type in the world (don't we all just love superlatives). The canopy walkway consists of ropes, wires and planks strung from tree to tree for more than 1000 linear feet, at times 130 feet above the ground. The whole walkway sways as you walk (don't look down) and is both scenic and scary. As we exited the walkway we were greeted with the viewing of what we believe was a cream-colored giant squirrel (this was one big squirrel).

From there we climbed the nearby Teserek Hill, hemorrhaging sweat and soaking in a spectacular view of the park's interior. The trail down from the hill involved slipping, sliding, steps and ropes, and emerged adjacent to the Tahan River. After a long, leisurely stroll along the river gazing at a multitude of beautiful butterflies we made it back to Kuala Tahan. Thoroughly exhausted, we have been resting in the AC ever since.

Tomorrow we plan to head out on another long hike, which leads through the Telinga Cave. Bat shit and maggots here we come!

Taman Negara, Part 1

17-July-2010

"Open your shoes, get out the boat, and push!" After only about five minutes of our upriver longboat ride into Taman Negara we were stuck. The fifteen or so passengers looked around a little bewildered, but we all "opened our shoes", rolled up our pants, and jumped over the side of the boat. The water came up to about my knees (which isn't that high, considering my height) and was running fast but very low. After only a few seconds the boat was unstuck, we all jumped back in the boat as fast as we could, and away we went on our 3 hour river trip.

As the boat powered along, we relaxed just inches from the Tembeling River in our low, wooden longboat. We saw monkeys staring curiously at us while jumping from tree to tree, a few species of kingfisher, a possible hornbill, water buffalo, and wild pigs along the way. Like our rivers back home, in some places the native vegetation --the jungle-- existed as a thin strip near the river while palm and rubber plantations stretched out on the floodplains.

Upon arriving at Kuala Tahan, just across the river (a 1 ringit boat ride, about 30 US cents) from the national park, we were amused to arrive at a floating restaurant and walk across a gravel bar to get to our hostel up above. In this town, the majority of the restaurants are literally floating and the tourists are forced to pick their way along the gravel bar to get to or from their accommodation on the hill above. In addition, the hostels and hotels are not connected by roads as much as by a series of unmarked trails overgrown with the ever encroaching forest. This is a very strange design for a town.

After settling in, we "doped up" (as Nick says) with mosquito repellent and spf 50 and went for a walk along one of the many trails in Taman Negara. It did not take us long to experience the joys of Taman Negara's rainforest. About 30 minutes into our walk, Nick felt a strange feeling on his ankle, screamed upon examination, and watched as I removed the newly-attached leech from his leg. What a wimp! We tucked our pants into our socks and avoided the freeloaders for the rest of the hike. At least leech bites are painless and they don't communicate any diseases.

The sounds of the rainforest are truly amazing. A never-ending chorus of clicks, chirps, squeaks and squawks from innumerable birds and insects greeted us with every step. At times the sounds were so loud you could barely hear yourself think. The highlights of the walk included a huge gray butterfly, a blue Selaginella (a fernlike plant for you non-botanists), beautiful fungi, and insects wearing a kaleidoscope of color on their exoskeleton. We also saw a huge tick (slightly larger than an M&M, check out our photo gallery if you dare).

After sweating what felt like gallons of our body fluids we headed back to to the comfort of our air-conditioned guest house-modern conveniences rock! Tonight we head out on a guided night hike on which we hope to see more spectacular insects, and mammals if we are lucky.

They call Taman Negara's forest, Malaysia lungs, a huge intact swath of forest which lives and breathes diversity. Scientists estimate the this forest is over 130 million years old, and has remained unscathed through countless glaciations and geologic events. After our first taste, we are impressed and yearn to experience more of Taman Negara.

Perhentian Paradise, Part 2

16-July-2010

Our last few days at the Perhintian Islands was spent scuba diving, snorkeling, swimming, reading, watching the nightly lightening storms, and enjoying the views of neighboring islands. We both passed our scuba tests with flying colors and enjoyed a dive to a boat wreck where we saw a school of puffer fish, a huge barracuda, a lion fish, and a few scorpion fish. We tried our best to fully enjoy ourselves and I think we accomplished our goal. Each moment was wasted to its fullest extent.

Yesterday we left the Perhentian Islands and spent the day traveling by boat and bus to reach, Jerantut, the gateway to Teman Negara, Malaysia's premiere jungle national park. This park boasts 100 tigers, 600 elephants, and a variety of other small cats, mammals, and birds. We would have to be some of the luckiest people in the world to see either the tigers or the elephants, but we do expect to see some smaller wildlife.