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Published: February 9th 2010
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So... we were supposed to get the train from Tampin station (an hour’s taxi from Melacca town) to Ipoh, but when we got to Tampin, we realised that we didn’t have enough cash on us to get all the way to Ipoh and only enough to get to Kuala Lumpur Sentral station. When the train stopped for 10 minutes in KL we planned to quickly get off and purchase the rest of our journey after visiting an ATM. Little did we know, that journey was already fully booked and the next train was not until 10pm, meaning we would arrive in quiet little Ipoh at 2am! Not ideal. We had originally planned to stay in Ipoh for one night before heading to Cameron Highlands the next day, but missing that train really blew our plans. So we decided to stay in KL for the night and found a hotel in China Town, as we felt we needed to treat ourselves to a hot shower and clean sink to do some washing!! We figured we would give up on the train and get the bus in the morning instead, heading straight to Cameron Highlands. We headed out for dinner and a local
dvd sales guy (who had also helped us find the hotel) guided us to a nice street-dining Chinese restaurant. We got talking to a Swedish couple who were seated beside us, they were on a 3 week trip to Malaysia and Thailand and we all exchanged travel tails and stories from back home, which was cool. We then all went to a club called Reggae House in China Town, we had a few beers and some shisha. We also got talking to another group of Europeans who had just gone to Thailand and recommended a diving course to us. You find that when you’re backpacking there is always something to talk about with others, as you all obviously have a common interest - Travelling! Turned out to be a late night and with most of us having early starts, to continue our journeys, we called it a night and said good bye to our Swedish friends. Hopefully we would be catching up with them again at Langkawi Island in the coming weeks.
The next morning we struggled to get out of bed and of course we slept in. We made it in time to Puduraya Bus station to catch
our bus to the Cameron Highlands. We rushed like mad in the boiling heat of midday to get there in time, then it turns out we had to wait 45 minutes as the schedule was behind. The bus journey took 4 hours and cost 35 MYR each ($11.00), it was the best bus we’d ever seen, with reclining chairs and foot rests, like flying first class. We now realise it’s cheaper and more comfortable to catch buses within Malaysia and Singapore, rather than flying. On the bus we got talking with an English guy, Andy, who was on the end of his solo five month stint through south-east Asia, so he had a lot of advice and stories for us, as he’s been everywhere that we plan to go. We also met a Polish guy, Peter, who was also travelling through Malaysia alone. When we hopped off the bus at the town of Tana Rata in Cameron Highlands, the first thing we noticed was the cool air, such a nice change from the heat of the city. There were also a group of men with hotel flyers. We picked a few and they agreed to drive the 4 of us
around to each, so we could see which one is best. Sounded good, so we went to a few places and finally settled for Cameronian Inn. They serve fresh tea and scones, plus they had cheap rooms (45 MYR / $13), so everyone was happy, and we all ended up staying here. That night the group of us went out for dinner and tried a local specialty, steamboat. You are given fresh meat, vegetables and noodles and you cook it all yourself on a table top gas stove in a soup of Tom yam or chicken broth. It’s really yummy and doesn’t take too long to cook, pretty healthy too as it’s broiled, not fried.
The next morning we were booked in for a full day tour and it was a nice cool day at 17 degrees, which felt freezing compared to KL. We visited a reptile and butterfly park as well as a strawberry farm, two tea plantations, a local native tribe and a rainforest walk including the highest point. Out tour guide was a local guy named Ravi and he knew alot as he had grown up there and his family manage part of the tea plantation.
The reptile park was really cool, we all got to hold some freaky insects including scorpions, man-face beetles and giant rhinosoraus beetles. I held a really cute turtle and the butterflys were really beautiful, got some great photos as well as a photography tutorial from Polish Peter. The rainforest walk was also really beautiful, I have never seen such a mossy green forest and I’m from Queensland, so I can tell you it was really something different. I’m not sure we were actually following an actual track, as we were having to bend and squeeze through small gaps between branches and climb steep terrain. The rainforest floor was also interesting, it wasn’t hard, but quite flexible and bouncy due to a build up of natural compost of leaves and branches over hundreds of years. We then visited the Boh Tea Plantation, which is a large producer for the Asian market. We watched the workers in the factory and a guide explained the process which uses machinery used since the early 1900’s. Boh had a really nice cafe overlooking the massive lush green hills and it was pretty busy there but worth it for the fresh pot of tea and scones
with jam. Yum. When we visited the second, smaller tea plantation I noticed a really pretty picnic area surrounded by the tea leaf hills, I told Brent we must go there the next day and so we did. The walk was 6km but felt like alot longer as we had to walk downhill a winding road down the mountain. When we got there we decided we’d get a cup of tea and shortbread (really good) to takeaway and eat at the picnic table area. We set track down one of the hills through the path of the tea shrubs without realising how steep it was. Brent didn’t have his trail shoes on, but I was feeling confident with mine so I proceeded down the hill without him, carrying my cup of hot tea. Then it got STEEP. Before too long I was nearly sliding down the steep muddy hill while Brent was nearly wetting his pants laughing at me! I was determined to get down there so I was already a fair way down, but then realised it wasn’t going to happen so I had to turn back and climb back up! I made it to the top and still
had three quarters of a cup of tea!
We finally made it down to our little spot and it was so nice! We had it all to ourselves and we could tell the people sipping tea up at the cafe would be jealous! We stayed for a little while enjoying the scenery and then we got a taxi back up the hill and caught our bus back to KL to once again tackle the Indian visa situation and sort it once and for all!!
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