Into the Jungle

Day 5 (04/04/09): Kuala Tahan, Taman Negara National Park, Malaysia

Had an early start in the town of Gemas, although there was still plenty of traffic in the early hours. Caught the Jungle Train at 7am. There are plenty of other express trains going to where I want to go, but the daytime slow Jungle Train comes highly recommended, as you slowly cruise through the rainforest jungle of Peninsular Malaysia. The train stops at all the little villages to let the locals on and off, and sometimes seemed to just stop in the middle of the jungle where people were waiting. The jungle itself is pretty interesting to watch, at least for the first hour or two, after that its all the same. It is really impressive just how thick it is, sometimes the jungle was mere metres away from the train, an impenetrable wall of green. The journey to Jerantut was about 4 hours, and after watching the jungle, I read my book and studied the Lonely Planet guidebook.

There isn't much in Jerantut, it is a fairly large town, but is mainly used by tourists as a transit hub and gateway to Taman Negara National Park. To get into the park, you need to catch a boat from Kuala Tembeling, a small jetty outpost, about 15km from Jerantut. The last boat for the day left at 2pm, so I need to be there by then. Unfortunately, none of the local buses were going before then. The local bus left Jerantut at 1.45pm, so would miss the boat by about 5 minutes. Pretty silly if you ask me.

I wandered around a lot of the centre part of town investigating ways to get to Kuala Tembeling, asking at a few backpacker places. This was pretty difficult though, because no one seemed to speak english. The only recommendation people could make to me was to take a taxi to the jetty, or a local bus directly to the park. The local bus was really cheap, however you would miss out on the boat trip up the river, which comes highly recommended. So after eating some curry for lunch, I took a 30min taxi ride for only RM20 ($8NZ) to the jetty and got a boat ticket.

The boat ride was very cool. About 20 of us (almost all tourists) got into a long wooden boat (basically a big canoe or waka), with our luggage precariously strapped to the front. For the next three hours we wound our way up the river through the jungle. Besides the jungle there wasn't much to see, although we did spot quite a few birds, and the odd cattle and water buffalo. Some of the people in the boat claimed they saw a snake in the water, but I didn't see anything.

The boat arrives in the small village of Kuala Tahan. This tiny village houses a lot of the locals who work in the park, and also has a large number of backpackers and cheap hostels. Across the river from the village, lies the entrance to the park itself, as well as a fancy resort where all the fat american tourist went to stay. Along the riverbank of the village are a number of floating restaurants offering cheap meals and selling guided walks and tours into the jungle. Each restaurant also has a small boat or two that will ferry you across the river to the park for a RM1, which takes all of about 30 seconds.

I walked up the bank and found a cheap backpackers overlooking the river. It was so laid back I just asked for a room and the guy just pointed me to one. I didn't even have to fill anything in or pay for it yet! It was a pretty basic room with 4 beds, a fan and some mosquito nets. Outside there was a pretty basic shower and toilet block, with one sink. And you had to provide your own toilet paper, but it was cheap! There were a bunch of other young backpackers around, a bunch of english, an irishman and a canadian. So I spent the early part of the evening doing the typical backpacker thing of swapping travel stories and recommendations for where to go. Everyone it seems has either come from the Perhentian islands, or is heading there next.

That evening I went on a guided night walk. It was only about an hour and half, and it was mainly for the guide to explain a bit about the forest to us and find insect. We saw quite a few large spiders, large crickets, scorpions, huge stick insects (like 20cm long stick insects!) and some really big ants. Basically, all the insects here are huge! We also managed to see a Lesser Mousedeer (which I had seen at Singapore Zoo, a very small deer), and a number of large deer in the distance at the salt lick, as well as a couple of snakes.

I got back to the village and spent the rest of the evening playing cards with the same group of people as before, with the addition of a Portugese surfer.