Day 5 - Cameron Highlands and multitudes of tea

---

We left Lumut at about 9am to head to the Cameron Highlands.
It didn't feel like as long of a drive as the drive to Lumut from K.L. but the mountains made me feel very sick, so I slept a lot of the way.
The mountains were really beautiful. It was an incredibly bendy road, following the mountain which was completely covered in thick rain-forest. It was so green and dense.

We stopped for lunch at a small town that was pretty much based on the fact that strawberries grow well there. I don't think they can grow them anywhere else in Malaysia because it is far too hot, but it is a lot cooler up in the Cameron Highlands, so they just cover every inch of the land with farming. They have little greenhouses everywhere (not glass ones, just thin plastic) and they farm all the way up hillsides. I guess that is one advantage of hand-farming rather than using machinery.
We had a lovely lunch (Danny is very happily reminding me of how good the pork was) and then explored the town a little bit. They had gone completely crazy about the whole strawberry thing. They had strawberry cushions, strawberry umbrellas, blow up strawberries, strawberry shortcake dolls, strawberry jam, strawberry cordial, strawberry t-shirts, strawberry pencils, strawberry key-rings, strawberry towels, strawberry blankets, strawberry watches, strawberry ear-rings, STRAWBERRY EVERYTHING! It was insane. I have never seen so much red in my life!

We headed to the tea plantation after lunch - it was so cool getting closer to it, we could see the tea planted all over the hills. It looked really soft and made me want to sleep on it, but once we got closer you could see that the branches on the tea bushes were actually quite tough. The road going into the plantation was the width of a driveway, and very windy (bendy, not blowing wind). There were signs up the whole way telling us to honk our horns on blind corners. Lucky we did too, there were cars right around a few of them, and there was a bit of reversing and shifting to try and get around each other.
We climbed to the top of the viewing area, which was completely exhausting! It said 175m, but I think it was way more. The steps were really big and uneven, so it was a rough climb. I think Manford was the only one who wasn't puffing by the time we got to the top. We took some photos and then went down to the cafe, had a well-earned cup of tea (well, Peter and I did. Danny offended them by wanting coffee) and then we went on a tour of the little factory. So if you ever want to know how they make tea, I now know. In fact, I picked one leaf and put it in my pocket. I intend to dry it out, cut it up and drink it in hot water. I don't think I'll have enough for a full cup, so I might need to find a tiny mug somewhere.

On the way back to K.L. we hit another big storm. There was lightning crashing all around us and the rain was so heavy that we were making bigger waves on the road than we were on the jet ski in Pangkor! We saw two more car crashes on the way home (after they had happened, thankfully, unlike the one in K.L. which we saw in real time) and sadly one of them was a BMW Z3 Roadster that looked like it had been shunted by a bus.

We chilled out for a while, and went out for a very late dinner, after which we went to get some snacks (I'm desperate to find salt & vinegar chips but they don't seem to exist here, they have been replaced by chili flavoured chips!) and also found a chemist. We finally managed to find some after sun care aloe vera (another thing that hasn't seemed to exist here, I don't think they actually burn here) since we both got burnt on the jet ski yesterday. They also had sleeping pills, so we took Beth's advice and got some for the overnight trip to Paris on Saturday. It would be nice to have slept when we arrive at 6am with a full day of sight-seeing planned! They cost about 3RM for 10, so 10c each in AUD. Pretty good!

On the way back from the chemist I saw my first Malaysian rat. Ewwww! I freaked out and could feel things on my feet for the next half hour. Danny just laughed at me and tried to defend the rats. He thinks they are cute for some reason. Gross.

That's about it for day #5, tomorrow we go to an elephant sanctuary so we should have some good stories from that!!

Manford loved the tea plantation. You will see his excitement in the photos.

Love Skye, Danny and Manford.

---

Comments

[Wez]

Popping pills?
Already? Just use nature's sleeping pill and walk up that mountain a few times before the flight =p Also I do not think Manford loves tea.

[mum]

Manford looks happy!
You all look like you are having heaps of fun, especially Manford. You may need to slip a sleeping pill into Manfords cup of tea if he gets too excited! Hope you are feeding him well as he looked hungry with his mouth open all the time, he may be dropping a hint! Ron and myself leave for Bali tomorrow, cyclone's gone so we can fly out of here now! So if you don't hear from us until next weekend remember we are praying for you and we love reading about what you are doing, as well as seeing all the photos you are taking. Catch up with you soon. love mum and Ron