Cameron Highlands

Trip Start May 05, 2008
1
77
97
Trip End May 09, 2009


Loading Map
Map your own trip!
Map Options
Show trip route
Hide lines
shadow

Flag of Malaysia  ,
Monday, January 26, 2009

The Cameron highlands were not quite what we expected. From what we read, we thought we would find an oasis of British culture in the middle of the jungle. After all, the area has a much cooler and rainier climate than the rest of equatorial Malaysia, and is the main reason why the British established a hill station here complete with European style mansions that look like they were teleported here from Switzerland or Scotland. The area's main sources of income aside from tourism - its strawberry farms and the tea plantations would seem to create a quaint illusion of a tropical Britain. But the Cameron highlands don't live up to their potential. The city looks poorly planned. Sure, many buildings are lovely, but then again many othersright next to them look ramshackle and the supposedly relaxing hill station is choked with traffic and suffers badly from a lack of sidewalks. It didn't help matters that being Chinese New Year when we visited, the whole place was inondated with Chinese tourists, to the point where it was next to impossible to find a room Chinese vacation resort
Chinese vacation resort
 . We thought we would do some serious trekking in the surrounding hills but we gave up after one long day. That day we had to walk for a few hours on a busy road after the bus which was supposed to take us to the start of the trek broke down. We stopped by a tea plantation overrun with loud tourists where our idea of enjoying a cup of the local tea while overlooking the verdant tea plantations on the hillsides below quickly fizzled out when confronted with a gaggling crowd of hundreds of loud tourists snapping pictures and prices for tea that would not have been out of place in London (you could have a full meal elsewhere in Malysia for the price of one cup of the tea which endured the long journey of twenty meters from the plantation to our table). Then we finally arrived at the start of the jungle path, not before wandering for half an hour through a flower farm manned by Indian immigrants on what once was a diverse jungle. The trek would have actually been interesting: the jungle is just what you would expect it to be minus the dangerous animals stalking you at every turn. But then the final stroke of bad luck befell us: it started to rain, and it rained for exactly the time that we were in the jungle, all of two and a half hours. So we wandered in the mud, in the jungle, for hours, not seeing much wildlife except for one giant millipede we almost stepped on and a few birds. Still, in the end we were happy about having done it and we found a new respect for anyone who spends a long time in such an environment.
Slideshow Print this entry Georgetown hotels