Taman Negara Rainforst: box ticked!

Hello beloved home peeps and those farther afield...

So....me and young Tom who I've told you nothing about.....27 from can't remember where but someplace in the UK and a very funny and pleasant traveling companion who had left his other female traveling companion on an island in Thailand partying her socks off whilst Tom and I got our socks on in the Cameron Highlands. So yes, we were both intending to head in the direction of Taman Negara and decided to join forces. This is a rainforest in the middle of mainland Malaysia and guess what? Is reportedly the oldEST rainforest on Earth!!! Have the Kiwis been here? Actually it turns out to be only ONE of the oldEST rainforests on Earth....but hey that's no claim to shame. I first heard about it in my book "40 Best Things to do bla bla..." and was a big fat tick box on the old Shelley must do on travels list. Therefore rather excited was I.

A mini bus journey eventually deposited us at the nearest village to the forest and our pre-booked guest house came to pick us up. And what a place it was...talk about make you -in particular me- feel at home...it was filled and I mean filled with Ikea products right down to the cutlery! Nice but for christ' sake is there no escape!! Every single bloody thing mind!! Was very amusing as it goes...I tested to see how easy it was to irritate Tom by telling him the names of all the products continuously but as I suspected he was far too easy going to wind up. We'd hummmed and harrrred about staying here as was pretty expensive but included everything during your stay....was someone's home basically and the guests occupied the upper floor and ate with the family etc downstairs. Lucky for us there was no other guests and the family was away so we pretty much got spoilt rotten by the staff and had our own mansion to muck about in for 3 days!!! Horrraggghhh!!!

There was constant net access, motorbikes free to use, a wine cupboard and a fridge full of more snacks and soft drinks than you could shake a rainforesty branch at. TV, DVD with lots of kids films to boot! And to continue the childish behavior Tom and I seemed to fallen into with glee we danced about on the balcony that ran the length of the upper floor doing impressions of all the local amphibians (of which there are many in the jungle I'll have you know.) After a slightly awkward and formal dins with the staff on the veranda with not an object hailing from another store other than the Swedish giant, we kicked back with a bottle of red in oversized glasses and reflected on what lucky people we are.

Dec 6th

The map your seeing for the location of this rainforest is a total lie by the way, it's just to the east of the Highlands...that cleared up lets continue....a fabulous day that one was. Woken by the jungle song we breakfasted ,formally again and politely shuffled round the staff's resistance to conversation. We then got a map....thankfully more reliable than the last one although equally hand drawn and dodgy looking. A quick bike ride to the park entrance through the misty morning hills and a short boat trip saw us on the path through the jungle proper.

Wow....amazing feeling this. The best part for me being able to look up and see shafts of sunlight glittering through leaves. Peaceful is not the word. Up a hill we went...me nearly having a heatattack but just think of the pain had you not nearly had all those hearattacks over the last few days!! Unfortunately there was about 40 people at the top of this particular hill and no emotional moments were to be had as I romantically gazed over the tree tops and mentally ticked that box. This was made up for by the amusing spectacle of a treestump being used as a cheesy photo opportunity in Val Doniken style.

Tom and I decided to press on...down the steep incline that no one else seemed to want to venture down. And steep and muddy it was indeed. We ate the packed lunch our shy and lovely staff had made for us...marveled at lizards, rat type things, birds and hoards of insects. We shimmied over a high ropes walkway that claimed to be the highEST in the world...give me a break! And by the afternoon were contented and nackered as we came across an area of river recommended for swimming.

I did a strip tease behind a bush thinking I was far from the path only to just about cover the essentials as a young man of hispanic origin arrived. (I was changing into a bathingsuit by the way...do not be alarmed). And this place was a real winner for me. It's not every day you get to swim in the rainforest where all you can hear is the animals and the breeze, watch the monkeys playing on the opposite bank, get the living daylights frightened out of you by strange things nibbling at your knees....

Sitting on the bank just listening to the noises....suddenly we hear:

"Hoooooonnnnnkkkkkk" Looking at eachother in alarm...

"Hoooonnnnkkkkkk.......WWWOOOOOSSSSSSSSSSSHhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh"

Eyes widening....

"Whhhhhoooooosssshhhhhh/whhhhhhoooooshhhhhh/wwwwhhhhhooooshhhh"

Imagine a helicopter in slow motion with some unearthly hooter attached.

"Wwwwwhhhhhooooshhhh---hhhoooonnnnkkkk-wwwhhhhooossshhhh"

Eyes nearly popping out of heads now this thing seems to take forever to reach us... we have no idea if it's by land, water or sky, if it's from this epoch or a Jurassic Park job which would surprise me not in the least right now the setting is such a good match. We simply can't move! Until....until.....over the trees above us emerges this.....average white bird. Yes folks, you simply can't imagine the unearthly loud and terrifying noise that came out of your run of the mill hornbill's beak. Saying that the beak itself is about a foot long...but really I was at least expecting a flaming teridactyl! And oh...how we laughed at our fear!!

Back home...as it really was a home...we happily peeled away the layers of sweat drenched clothes to shower and change for the round of "lets see how many ways to start a conversion with the staff" game over diner. What I really wanted to ask the girls was what it felt like to be a muslim woman and what they thought of women in the west but that was never going to be considering the language barrier and shower of giggles and nods that accompanied any utterances we made. The owners are a Swedish (surprise!) and Malaysian combo and have a great sense of family with the staff they've hired to look after the guests and house....I really liked the way we ate together but wished I could have got further than "This fish head curry is lovely..were they caught in the river locally?" I imagined my revenge on the knee nibblers.

That evening after dins we embarked on a night trek with a local guide....fabulous. Again the best thing for me was the experience of being in the forest at night...luckily for us it was a full moon and the light was incredible...looking up there were clear shafts of it streaking through the foliage. This stuff you can never capture on camera and I don't mind..the memories are more magical in my head. We did see some animals although mainly insects...a large spider myself and Tom took closeups of and when we asked if it was poisonous the answer was "Very"...this as I was about 6inches away. Cheers mate! We looked at some wild deer by moonlight from a hide with lots of other people...saw night moths as big as your hand and nearly saw a slow loris before the guide shone his torch on it and it shuffled off. All in all a good night and gently marvelous experience.

Back at the house Tom and I compared amusing travel stories...I told him about the horse in the boat and he beat the hell out of me with his "Frogs on a Truck" tale. It seems he was in South America on said truck, packed like sardines with locals, westerners and two large bags of frogs. Of course one of the bags burst and the frogs went astray....leaving the travelers to pull them out of uncomfortable places and hand them back to the unbotherd owner for the rest of the 5hr journey. This tickled me as Tom did a marvelous impression of removing a frog from down his pants!

Dec 7th

The following day we hired a tiny little boat to take us further up river to some rapids, reportedly some great swimming and this journey will remain one of the best moments of my travels....the sun twinkled through foliage overhead, the monkeys danced in the trees, the boat bumped over gentle rapids, the scenery incredible with lianas stretching their tendrils into the water as we navigated between them. The swim after a short hike was fabulous. You could literally stay still as you swam hard against the current, narrowly missing the rocks that shone in incredible dazzling colors.

Lying on the rocks after the swim the skies began to darken...we legged it back to the boat and just made it out into the river as the rainforesty heavens opened....well and truly opened for business!! Doing what comes naturally in a rainforest I guess, man it poured so hard I thought it must be hail! We'd brought waterproofs that pretty much proved to be ineffectual in this torrential drenching but possibly saved the life of my camera. Incidently some of you will not be surprised to know that I've only just discovered my camera takes movies! How long have I had this piece of equipment I hear you ask? Far too long to have only just discovered this of course! Great film of the boat trip though mind.

The rest of the afternoon was spent messing up the putting of pics on to the blog...2hrs wasted. And then a moped ride into the surrounding villages and palm plantations. Kids along the way waving frantically, (close eyes mother) Tom going way too fast and me struggling to keep up without falling off (open eyes mother) and the spectacle of a very large and thankfully very dead snake. As the sun went through it's final setting motions over the jungle, I felt more free and happy than a bird on the wing, we made our way back to the homestead and some dodgy durian curry. (Durian is the fabled stinky fruit that smells like rotting flesh but apparently tastes real nice...this is also a fable.)