Taman Negara

Okay, here it is - the long awaited jungle episode.

For a little background info on the Taman Negara take a look at the link. Most people have to enter the national park via a 2 hour river boat ride, but we came in the back door on a mini bus from the highlands (coincidentally meeting our 4th Edmontonian on the trip). We got off at the small town of Kaula Tahan which exists just to support the tourists and trekkers preparing to enter the park. This town, bordering the river has a few guesthouses, stores and equipment rental places while the restaurants are actually floating barges right on the river. Makes for beautiful scenery with your meal, but takes a bit of getting used to for those of us prone to motion sickness. The national park begins on the other side of the river and requires a ferry to get across.


Breakfast on a floating restaurant. You can see the park entrance on the other side of the river.




We were actually really impressed with the park and how well it is set up. (Though we did get a chuckle out of the wording at the bottom of this sign that was set up in front of the unofficial guide shops. tee hee.)

Only about a tenth of the park is accessible to the public via hiking trails. Combined with the incredibly thick vegetation, this means that it is virtually impossible to spot any creatures as they usually stay well away from the paths. But it makes a lot of sense in terms of providing a good wildlife sanctuary. That said, walking back along a pitch dark road to our guesthouse on the first night in town, a large black creature jumped out of the bush and crossed the path right in front of us.

Right here. This is where we are absolutely sure that we possibly could have seen a tiger...or a wild boar...or something else with four legs.

The other creature we did see a lot of were giant lizards (monitor lizards?) sunning themselves on the path. The picture is a bit dark - but you get the idea.



We spent the next two days hiking through the park. And how do I even begin to explain what that feels like?!? Like nothing I have ever experienced before. The second you cross the river and walk into the jungle you are hit by a wall of heavy, wet heat. You can feel the oppressive weight of the air on you, and almost have to struggle to breathe it in. Imagine sitting in a hot hot steam room. Do you know the feeling? Now imagine hiking in it - for hours - much of it uphill. We ran into a few others hiking and wondered where they had gone swimming. In another 15 min we understood. We were swimming in air, and the combined effects of the air and our walking (ie. sweat). Suffice to say that under these conditions what would normally seem like a simple walk becomes quite difficult. And you soon begin to look a little like this.


The other striking feature of the jungle was the sound. It is so loud! Most of it high pitched squealing insect sounds. Like a cross between speaker feedback and distant power tools. After a while, you begin to tune it out and don't notice, but at first it is a bit alarming.

We did the world's longest canopy walk, which takes a bit of nerve at first as the bridges really
sway. If you are anything like me you spend a significant amount of time eyeing the ropes visualizing yourself plummeting 40 m to the ground. But once this becomes a bit dull, you really enjoy having a bird's eye view at the top of the canopy.

Here are a few pictures from our hikes:

And suddenly camouflage made so much more sense.

Huge Trees!

Some guys working on the park trail show us their pet scorpion.

Scott tests the Tarzan theory. There are vines everywhere.

And then there are the bugs which are truly vicious. You will die without mosquito repellent. Lucky for us, it was drier than usual when we where there, which meant the leeches were not too bad. Here is one that I spotted just as it was about to make a lunge for my shoe.

The most interesting part of our hiking was coming across an Orang Asli settlement, one of the indigenous people groups that still live in the park area. This particular tribe is nomadic, so by settlement I mean a couple tarps tied to the trees, a fire and 3 or 4 pots. There were about 20 people there at the time, mostly women and children sitting under the trees chatting. It was a bit like turning the corner and walking into a national geographic page. The children especially were looked pretty "wild." Most were pretty much naked, had crazy frizzy hair, huge smiles and machetes. Even the little ones (ie 2/3 year olds) had a big knife in their hands. Sorry - no pictures. Somehow it felt a little voyeuristic to do so and we had heard a bit about the negative effects of tourism on these settlements. So we just said hi and continued on our way without disturbing them too much. It really got us thinking about their lifestyle though. Especially dealing with all the snakes/scorpions/spiders/giant ants/mosquitoes/flies/leeches 24 hours a day, not to mention the whole hunting and gathering predicament. I was quite fascinated by this little glimpse and have since tried to get my hands on some literature about this group, but haven't found much yet. Apparently a thorough study was done in 1937 and according to one website the information is not yet dated. Hm.

We rounded off the trip with one guided hike (having heard great things about the well educated guides). We opted for the night trek. because a) it sounds like a good thrill and b) when do you get to hike in a jungle at night? Turns out the park only allows night "treks" on one little path that borders the river, which would have been fine if everyone else in the area didn't also sign up. I think it was especially bad that night as there were 2 high school field trips participating. So we pretty much just walked in a straight line with 100 others, everyone shining their flashlights around, talking loudly. So much for being at one with nature. It was actually pretty funny. The saving grace was that in our particular group there were only 4 people and we had an excellent guide, who managed to spot all sorts of interesting bugs and plants and fill our minds with facts. So we saw lots of walking sticks, a baby tarantula the size of my hand (did you know they eat birds?), luminescent mushrooms, giant ants, cicadas, and a family of deer at a natural salt lick. Not too bad considering.

The final picture here is of the 2 hour boat trip we took to get back to civilization.