Apparently the trip between Kota Baru (where we stayed for a night after the Perintians) and Taman Negara is best done by the Jungle Railway, a 7-8 hour journey which, based on the reviews I'd read of it, was something I had been looking forward to since we began planning the trip. Kota Baru is pretty much the centre of Islamic thought and practise in Malaysia (60% Muslim) and is accordingly quite different to anywhere else we've been in Asia. It is a city which is pretty vibrant and a lot more interesting than many of the other stop over cities we've stayed in for the night, saying that, it probably wasn't worth staying longer than one night and after a walk around the town, a bewildering trip to the supermarket for a few essentials (not including the 'Taliban' or 'Sadaam Hussein' perfume they had for sale) and a good old fashined Muslim Malay KFC we went to bed in order to get up at 5am the next mornign and catch the train.
So the Jungle Railway, as I said, something I'd been looking forward to. I don't want to go into a rant again about transport like the last entry but it was a bit of a let down to be honest, not that much jungle and none of the camaradery or local banter I'd envisaged. Instead a bit of a stuffy and fairly boring journey which was punctuated by long stops for no apparent reason. Still, it was a good journey in parts and was indeed something of an engineering feat, in parts. Ah well, to the jungle.
We got to Taman Negara, a massive national park in the middle of Malaysia and home to what is apparently, the oldest rainforest in the world. We stayed in a droen with another couple we'd met and a bloke who seemed nice but who had written in his diary that he was sorry Vietnam had won the war because he would like to kill all of the people there. It put me off him a little. The base camp we stayed in was, as you'd expect, hot and sticky and there were a lot of bugs about but it was surprisingly quiet which was nice as a few people we'd met told us it was a bit of a tourist trap. After settling in and staying our first night we set of early in the morning on a trek in the jungle guided by our insticts and jungle knowledge (haha, not really, more of a long walk guided by signposts) towards the 'Canopy Walkway', a network of rope bridges suspended high (high!) in the jungle canopy and linked by teeteding wooden platforms in the trees. On the hour long walk there we encountered wild boar, monkeys and er, squirrels which was a pleasent surprise to be honest; the walway itself was great fun, scary and not entirely inspiring as a monument to safety but nevertheless, a lot of fun swinging high up in the canopy. Nerves prevented any wildlife spotting though, I couldn't tell you if there was much up there.
After the walkway we decided to climb a hill which had a view point at the top, an eager hike turned into a sweaty slog and finally an obligated scramble to the top, flies drowning on my forehead and my back shining with perspiration. At the top we had a short time to admire the great view of the green carpet of forest before the Kodak mafia turned up, it was worth it, even if just to feel like I'd done some sort of "trek." On the down one of the blokes we were with turned over a leaf and a massive hairy (call it a tarantula for arguement's sake) spider jumped about 3 ft at his face and he obligingly jumped about 10ft down a slope, twisting his ankle. After laughing our heads off for about 5 mins we struggled down again and finally back to base camp (a hotel, sounds good though).
We turned down the oppertunity to take part in a night safari that night, feeling we'd had our share of jungle, to my slight relief in all honesty, it turned out to be crap anyway.
So we only spent two nights there, it was a bit uncomfortable really but we did what we wanted to do really and headed off the next day to the Cameron Highlands.
By the way, I know there haven't been any photos up for a month, its soemthing I keep meaning to do but always try when I'm tired and/or frustrated and they don't really mix with computers. There will be an update soon, promise
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