Malaysia - Kuala Lumpur & Taman Negara rainforest

The Petronas twin towers in KL
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Malaysia is extremely dense with vegetation and besides being very green is also very clean. We didn't include much of it on our trip but what we have seen has been good.

What we'll always remember:

• The 40m high canopy walk in Taman Negara
• Trying to escape the over excited leeches on the hiking trail ....... and failing
• Coming within centimeters of dozens of bats suspended from the cave ceiling
• Sipping tea at a floating restaurant while a torrential downpour surrounded us

The floating restaurants in the jungle
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Forgettable:

• the holes left in our skin by the leeches that just wouldn't stop bleeding

Details

We decided not to use the agents on Phi-Phi to book a bus from Krabi to Kuala Lumpur as we were convinced they were overcharging and we thought it would be fun to make our own way there. That resulted in us saving only 100 baht each ($30) but spending 2 full days (day 63 and 64) traveling and being forced to stay in Hat Yai, where there really isn't much of great interest. Overall it wasn't really worth it but we did get to catch up on the diary so it wasn't a complete waste.

Our hostel in Taman Negara
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After finally arriving in Kuala Lumpur we booked into a hostel and then strolled the streets of Little China, where we also had dinner.

Day 65 we headed straight to the Petronas Twin Towers and joined the queue to go to the 41st floor and cross the skybridge joining the two buildings. After having visited a number of the worlds tallest buildings, towers and structures we are really starting to appreciate their architectural brilliance.

Then it was off to stroll the streets some more and we covered Little India and the central market.

On the canopy walk
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After booking transport to the Taman Negara rainforest (and sitting out another massive rainstorm), we grabbed a bite to eat and called it a night.

8:30am on day 66 we were on a minibus to Taman Negara. We were dropped at Kuala Tembling jetty 3 hours later where we boarded a wooden boat for a 2 hour trip upriver to the park headquarters.

Our hostel roommates warned us about the leeches and we spent the evening listening to their stories of rats the size of cats and scorpions larger than crabs - luckily we never encountered either of these.

On the canopy walk (still)
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The next day (day 67) we headed straight to the canopy walkway which is suspended 40 meters above the ground. It's brilliantly constructed between the jungles tallest trees and it offers great views of the rainforest. We carried on hiking for another 1.5km's to a hilltop viewpoint and had thus far not encountered any leeches but that was about to change ..........

We took a different route back and could hardly avoid the little buggers. They are brown worms about 5cm's long when extended or hurtling towards you like an excited puppy, with a sucker on each end. When they sense you coming they stand straight up on one sucker and stretch out trying to latch onto a shoe. Then they crawl up till they find skin, hook their teeth in and start sucking blood. When they are full they simply let go and fall off. Because you aren't looking down and don't really feel anything the first you know of it is after they've fallen off and left an open wound that just won't stop bleeding. Socks are no deterrent - these little guys squeeze right through.

Trekking through the jungle
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We rested for a few hours before starting our second walk to some underground caves. There are some pretty tight spaces to squeeze though which is always fun but the highlight was seeing hundreds of bats suspended from the ceiling.

That evening, glad to be showered, de-leeched and de-guanoed, we sat down for a pot of tea at one of the floating restaurants when the heavens opened - it was great.

Now we are back in Kuala Lumpur and have tickets booked to Singapore for tomorrow. That officially only leaves 3 days which neither of us can believe.