James' Site

It is our final day in Thailand and almost the end of our trip. It is almost unbelievable that we have been away for five months and covered such a huge distance. Right now it seems almost as unbelievable that this time tomorrow we will be back in England finding our way to Hastings. It has always been strange crossing from one country to another as they have been so different but I’m not sure that anything will compare with the shock of being back home. I’m sure that there are many great reasons to go back but if I’m honest another five months wouldn’t be too hard to bear!

We have spent the last two days scouring Bangkok for clothing bargains and we have had some success. In fact we have had so much success I’m not sure that I am going to be able to fit everything in my bag. It has been good fun but also a bit tiring. I’m not a great shopper at the best of times and the temperature doesn’t help my patience at all. Tash on the other hand has been in a state of pure bliss and mostly oblivious to my ever changing moods. It has certainly been interesting travelling around Bangkok. This is the third time we have been here and it is really odd to be so familiar with a place, especially considering the size of the city. I guess that tomorrow I will be back in totally familiar surroundings. What an odd prospect.

Leaving Ko Tao was pretty tough because it was the first time that we had no choice about where we wanted to go. For the first time in five months our destination was decided for us. Bangkok and back to Hastings. We caught the high speed ferry off the island and then enjoyed a six hour bus ride that turned into an eight and a half hour ride due to engine problems. It would have been worse if we had had difficulty finding a room in Bangkok but things turned out very well. We are back in the same place we stayed in last time and the room is spotlessly clean plus we forked out an extra dollar to get a room with a hot shower, the first one since Siem Reap in Cambodia.

We collected our plane tickets from the travel agent and discovered that we are flying a day earlier than we had thought. Something to do with midnight being the start of a new day and me being a bit daft! It works out very well for us becasue an extra day back home will be more useful than in Bangkok where I can’t get the car MOT’d or the phone reconnected. The discovery leant a little extra urgency to Tash’s carefully planned shopping spree but things got off to a good start at the weekend market. I managed to last out for about four hours which was enough time for Tash to make a good go at buying everything she saw. If it wasn’t for the heat and all the other people shopping I would have happily stayed all day. The clothes were fantastic and ridiculously cheap. I now own more t-shirts than ever before which should be very useful for the approaching English winter.

Tonight we are going to go and find a decent palce for dinner and a couple of beers. We are staying by the river and there are a few quite trendy looking bars and cafes so Tash should be able to wear some of her new clothes. Tomorrow we are going to visit the shopping centres of Siam Square and part with some more baht!

Our final days on Ko Tao where the perfect beach holiday to end our already lengthy break. After the slight dissapointment with the diving company we had chosen we took a break and spent two very enjoyable days doing nothing much except trying to burn beautiful images into my mind to see me through an English winter. I decided that without the most pleasing sight to me is pal trees. There is something incredibly beautiful about them. I think it is because they tend to grow in a bit of space on their own and many are very tall. It means that when you look at them they are often framed by a stunning blue sky. Closely following the palm trees is bamboo. It is also very pleasing to look at and is also responsible for the most amazing sounds. Depending on how hard the wind is blowing the banging of the stems together can sound like eeire groaning or a beautiful musical instrument.

On our last day on the island we went on a diving trip to a site called Sail Rock. The company we went with were very well run and the boat had a very friendly and relaxed atmosphere. It took about two hours to get to the dive site and we soaked up the early morning sun on the way there. We did two dives both of which I enjoyed very much. Unfortunately on the first dive Tash realised (once we had descended) that although she had matching fins one was a size seven and the other a size four. As we went deeper and the pressure increased so did the squeeze on her foot. By the time we got to thirty metres she was in agony. She didn’t want to ruin everyones dive by ascending and changing the fin so she carried on. I thought she was in a mood with me as I pointed out fish and she ignored me. In fact it was taking all her energy to fin with one foot. A valuable lesson though in checking all your kit before you dive. The second dive saw Tash in a pair of fins that fitted properly and it was one of the best we have done. We started by ascending down a chimney in the rock. We entred at about five metres and emerged around sixteen. It was pretty wide and there was plenty of light which made it great fun. We then descended to about twenty five metres and swam around the rock gradually getting shallower. The water visibility was about twenty five metres (which is very good) and we found a huge variety of life. There were all the usual reef fish but becasue we were so far out at sea and in deep water many of them were much bigger than we normally see. I also found a Moray Eel and Blue Spotted Ray and Tash spotted a shoal of Giant Baracuda. They were in the open sea to the side of us and at first I thought they were sharks they were so big. They mostly hung about twenty metres away but one drifted in to look at us. He wasn’t the biggest but you could clearly see the rows of teeth in his mouth. It was a great trip and really made me sad that we won’t be able to dive again for a long time. Unless of course I can persuade Tash that the English Channel is just as nice!

Ko Tao has once again proved to be a very pleasant place to stay. When we arrived we were told that the weather had been very unsetteld with lots of storms and a choppy sea but it seems that we are in luck. We have been treated to one gloriously sunny day after another so far. In the evening a gentle sea breeze has picked up which keeps things cool, perfect for a beer on our balcony.

Earlier in the week we arranged some diving with a well established dive centre but it turned into a bit of a fiasco. Before committing ourselves we asked if each day we would go to different sites and we were assured that we would. That isn’t exaclty how it panned out though and we spent two days visiting the same sites. It was still fun to be diving but a bit disappointing to go back to the same places. Our divemaster was a very nice German guy but the rest of the staff were a pretty unfriendly lot. We decided to give it a break for a couple of days and maybe not dive again until I spotted a sign outside a dive shop announcing a trip to sail rock. This is the one site I really wanted to go to. It is a large rock rising off the seabed abuot two hours from Ko Tao. Apart from the marine life the highlight is an enormous chimney running through the middle of the rock that is big enough to swim through. It sounds like a lot of fun to me!

Yesterday was my birthday and in way of celebration we decided to go to a posh restaurant for dinner. The lace we chose was on the beach front and looked very fancy. It seemed reasonably priced (by Thai standards) each dish was around three dollars. When we arrived the waiter asked if we had reservations and made a big show about consulting a book. He found us a table and I noticed that anyone who came in without a reservation also had to go through the little ritual. It seemed to work though beause people looked grateful for finding a seat. On closer inspection of the menu we realsied that it was in fact a Tapas restaurant and the waiter told us that normally one person would eat three or four dishes. Now as it was my birthday we were happy to pay for a decent dinner. Some customers however didn’t realise what Tapas was. A couple next to us ordered a dish each and when three prawns arrived on one plate and two spare ribs on another they burst out laughing, ate up and left. The food was great and we had a very good meal. You could watch the chef cooking in an open plan kitchen and he came to enquire that everything was okay. After dinner we went to a bar on the beach where we sat on cushions looking out to sea. Having splurged on dinner we decided to continue with the drinks and tucked away a few cocktails each. It was a great night out and although a splurge for Thailand it cost us less than twenty five dollars. A pretty cheap birthday!

We left the Perenthians at 8:00 yesterday morning and arrived on Ko Tao at 7:30 this morning. It is the second longest journey we have undertaken, the first being that awful trip from Vientianne to Hanoi. We began by catching a speedboat to the mainland in which we got thoroughly soaked. Then a taxi took us to the Thai border where we easily negotiated immigration. It was then a one kilometre hike to the train station where we caught a train to Surat Thani. It took nine hours and was incredibly boring. The windows had a kind of sun reflecting mesh over them so you couln’t even see out properly. A pick up truck then took us to the night ferry pier where we caught a cargo boat to Ko Tao. Despite the distance and time involved it seemed pretty painless and we arrived having had a decent amount of sleep on the boat.

We have got a room at the place we stayed when we were last here. It is a wooden cabin in a well maintained garden next to the beach. Whilst we were waiting for the room to be cleaned for us we went and arranged some more diving. The company we have chosen is a PADI Gold Palm resort which means that it won’t tolerate incredibly hung over dive masters which is what we got last time we were here. They seem very professional and we can dive as much or as little as we want. Today is going to be a rest day after all that travelling.

The journey from Georgetown to the Perenthians was a long and uncomfortable one but we had a bit of luk in Kota Bharu where we found a connecting bus in the middle of the night. It meant that we didn’t have to wait for hours for a taxi and sit around rat infested Kota Bharu. We caught the first speedboat to the small islan where we had stayed before.

From here things went very wrong. We knew that it was peak season and that accommodation could be hard to find but we didn’t know that it was a bank holiday in Singapore. Every room on the island was taken and people were sleeping on the beach. I went back to the place where we had dived before and they didn’t even have any room on their dive trips for us. Luckily we had been in contact with Heather and Strahan who we did the dive course with in Vietnam. They had recently stayed on the small and big island and had told us that the big island was just as good as the small one. Not wanting to spend the night on the beach waiting for a room we caught a boat over to the big island and were very pleased with what we found. The Lonely Planet had told me that the larger island was the reserve of posh resrots and lacked the atmosphere of the small island. On the plus side it wasn’t full of people scurrying around looking for rooms. It turned out to be no more expensive than the small island and we had a very nice room with a large balcony and a sea view.

The one problem with the Perenthian islands is that alcohol is extremely expensive there and well out of our budget. To remedy this small problem we had bought a duty free bottle of whisky at the airport in Penang and we spent our first evening on the island sipping whisky and coke on our balcony. Not just the first evening either!

The main reason we had come back to the Perenthians was to dive again and we found a small dive centre on the beach. There were only two instructors and it was a very small operation but this suited us fine. They were extremely flexible and took us to some great sites. Diving has become so much more fun than when we were on the PADI course. We have both mastered our buoyancy control and can now float effortlessly along a reef. We did vive dives and all of them were great. We spotted our first turtle at one site and it was amazing. There is a huge range of marine life and some very odd looking fish but the turtle definetly stood out. It seemed so odd to see this large swimming tortoise glide around the reef right next to me. Probably the best dive we did was on Sugar Wreck. It is a cargo ship that was transporting sugar when it sank four years ago. Becasue it is new it is relativels intact. We swam between the cranes on the deck which still had ropes dangling from them and round the enormous propellor. The visibilty at the bottom of the wreck was appaling, as bad as one metre in places but on the top it was twenty five plus. The contrast was incredible. The whole site had an eerie magic quality about it. Definitely one of the best dives we have done so far.

The only problem with our six night stay was that I managed to fry the battery charger for my camera using the hotels electricity supply. Their is no mains electricity and they use generators. I left the charger plugged in and when I came back it was too hot to pick up and smelt really bad. Somehow I managed to make the two fully charged batteries I had last for the dives we did and right now I’m chargin it using the USB connection on this computer. Having bought the underwater housing for it I hope that I’ll be able to get enough charge in the battery to use it.

Getting back to Malaysia from Indonesia turned into a bit of a strange journey and getting away from Georgetown isn’t proving any easier. We left a virtually tourist free Sumatra and have arrived in the peak of Malaysias holiday season. Yesterday we went and tried to buy bus tickets to Kota Bahru which is the main town close to the Perenthian islands. The first place we tried told us the coaches were fully booked until Tuesday and it didn’t get much better from there. Everywehere we went told us a similar thing. In one agency there was a very nice lady and on my fifth visit with yet another load of questions she made a phonecall to her friend. She hastily scribbled his name on a piece of paper and told us to go to the bus station, find the number nine and ask for Karim. I felt as though I was a spy on a covert mission. At the bus station we found the number nine and I waved the piece of paper around with “Karim” scrawled on it and someone eventually pointed us in the direction of an Indian version of Del Boy. He had a fold up table for a desk and a stack of tatty loking boks of bus tickets. We told him what we wanted and he got straight on the phone and miraculously seats were available. So tonight we leave Georgetown on an overnight bus that should deposit us at Kota Bharu around 5:00 tomorrow. From there we need to get to another smaller town called Kuala Besut where we hope very much to catch the first boat to the islands.

Georgetown has been a strange place to visit. After the relief of escaping Medan I would have been happy to arrive anywhere on earth and that feeling has made me very glad to be here. Malaysia is such a diverse country it is often hard to remember where you are in the world. Before dinner last night we walked up to the sea front where there is the old British built fort and other imposing colonial buildings. Then we walked to little India where bhangra blared out of record shops and I ate the best tandoori chicken I have ever tried. For lunch today we went to a chinese canteen and helped ourselves to a plateful of extraordinary cheap food, including deep fried prawns.

The plan for the rest of our trip is to do as little as possible. The main draw of the Perentians is the excellent diving, gorgeous beach and complete lack of long distance bus journeys. Hopefully we will stay there for about a week before heading back to Thailand where we will visit Ko Tao for four or five days for some more beach and diving. Then it will be a final trip back to Bangkok where we will spend three or four days before flying back home.

This morning we left Bukit Lawang at the ungodly hour of four in the morning. We chartered a car to take us to Medan where we wanted to catch the ferry to Malaysia. We made it in time to the ferry office only to be told that there were no tickets available for today. We were bitterly disappointed and had absolutely no desire to stay in Medan overnight. One small problem was that we had no idea where we were in the city or any real idea of our options. I decided to go and find our bearings and see if there was another ferry company.

Tash waited with our bags and when I returned half an hour later I was in possession of a pair of plane tickets to Penang in Malaysia. It was an impulse purchase but not one that I regret making. We are running out of time and I had no desire to spend an extra night in one of the most unpleasant cities in Indonesia.

I went and found Tash and she was as pleased as me to be getting out of Medan. Now all we had to do was find a taxi to get us to the airport. I tried in vain to flag one down. A guy parked in a small van was watching me and he said he would phone me a cab. He tried but didn’t have any luck. At this point his friend returned and climbed into the van. I thanked him for his help and he said he would take us to the airport. I asked how much money it would cost but he laughed and said no problem. Tash and I jumped in. Him and his friend spoke broken English and on the way they asked me if all people in Indonesia were bad. I hoped not seeing as I was sitting in the back of a van with two I didn’t know. Anyway they certainly seemed to be of the opinion that everyone in Medan was evil.

For me that kind of sums up Indonesia. Everywhere we have been we have met people who have put themselves out to help us but who at the same time have warned us about the dangers around every corner. Indonesia has produced some of the highlights of the trip but has also been a very hard country to travel around. It has been pretty stressful at times and that has surprised me. It may have something to do with the fact we are getting used to the idea of going back home and taking it easy sounds very tempting which is pretty hard to do in Indonesia.

It seems that most of this blog has been about the journeys we have been on and less about the destination. However once again it was the journey from Berastagi to Bukit Lawang that has to be mentioned first. We climbed onto a packed local bus to get from Berastagi to Medan. It was a real bone shaker and was full to bursting. The road from Berastagi descends around a thousand metres through a series of hairpin bends. It was on one of these bends that a guyin a 4x4 decided that he should overtake us. Coming the other way was a large lorry and the road wasn’t big enough to fit all three vehicles on. I caught sight of the 4x4 as he tried to overtake and I watched in disbelief as he rammed the side of the bus to avoid hitting the lorry head on. The bus veered towards the verge and the driver slammed on the breaks which seemed to take an age to work. Ity occured to me that there was a large ditch bext to us and we were headed straight for it. I grabbed Tash who had banged her head on the metal window frame and waited for the bus to overturn. Thankfully the 4x4 braked harder than the bus and it stopped pushing us towards the ditch. We finally rolled to a stop very shaken but otherwise unhurt.

The road quickly filled with swarms of people and other vehicles continued to scream round the corner threatening to hit us. The mob that had gathered then inevitably began fighting and lots of rather wayward punches and kicks were thrown. Not the moment to get the camera out. All of a sudden a small guy in a black shirt was shoved to the floor and he cowered as it looked like he was going to get a good kicking. Fortunately for him a couple of friends dragged him away from serious injury. Now with wounded pride and too much testosterone he decided he needed to make up for his public humiliation. From the other side of the road and being shielded by his two rather nervous looking friends he began shouting a string of obscenities at the mob. Luckily for him they seemed to view his pathetic display with the derision that it deserved and laughed it off. I have no idea who was even driving the vehicles involved or how the matter was finally resolved but after a short delay we were back on our way.

It had occured to me before how long you could travel in South East Asia without being involved in a road accident. Obviously about four months was our limit. I hope now that having had our turn in a not too serious accident we will avoid any further bumps. Fingers crossed.

On arrival in Medan we were greeted by possibly the most depressing bus station in the world. It was full of very undesirable looking characters. We found the connecting bus to Bukit Lawang and sat down to wait for it to leave. We waited and waited and were then told that it wasn’t going to leave today. We had been befriended by a guy called Bob. So named becasue he smoked as much dope as Bob Marley. He explained that he was a guide in Bukit Lawang and he could get us there if we didn’t mind spending three hours in a string of minibuses with a capacity of twelve and a cargo of twenty. He seemed honest enough and with little other option we tried to leave the bus station. The local mafia didn’t want two rich Westerners to depart without paying for the privilige. At first I thought it was a bit odd and wondered if Bob had anything to do with it. One look at his face though convinced me that he was very frightened. He was sweating buckets and visibly shaking. I wasn’t sure why I was still wearing a stupid grin. The tax to leave was a whopping ten thousand Ruphia. That is the same as one US dollar. I almost laughed at the tiny profit they were making.

After all the excitment it was a huge relief to arrive in Bukit Lawang home of some amazing jungle and the Orang-Utan rehabiliation centre. Bob showed us to his friends hotel. It was run by a guy called Aldi and used to be his uncles house. A flood destroyed nearly all the tourist infrastructure in Bukit Lawang a couple of years ago and the river shifted its path and now runs past the house. His uncle was too scared to return to the house so Aldi had turned it into a guest house. And what a guesthouse. We had an enormous room with access to two balconies. One facing the river, jungle and setting sun and the other overlooking rice paddies and palm trees. The rest of the house was simply amazing with huge downstairs terraces and living spaces.

We employed Bob to take us on a jungle trek to look for Orang-Utan. It was an unbelievable day and worth every penny. The jungle was the best we had seen anywhere. Full of life and the terrain was very hard going at times. We saw a group of monkeys who circled round us for a while and Bob explained all about their behaviour and habits. Later on we came across a gibbon fighting with another group of monkeys which according to Bob is a very rare experience. Then towards the end of the trek we came to a steep descent with a small stream and open area at the bottom. In the trees ahead was some movement and a huge male Orang-Utan came out to investigate us. It was incredible to see so much in one day in the jungle and a fantastic experience.

The final part of the trek saw us descend an incredibly steep slope for around five hundred metres. At the bottom was the Bohorok river where we swam and cleaned off the grime of the jungle. Then to get home we sat on top of car innertubes and rafted back to Bukit Lawang.

In the evening we got quietly drunk on palm wine and sat around with Bob, Aldi and a few of their friends. Indonesians seem to be a very musical race and lots of them play the guitar. So Tash and I sat and listened as they sang old Karo songs and more contempoary Bob Marley ones. Sadly my only contribution on the musical front was to sing Drunken Sailor. The applasue at the end was absolutely deafening. I wasn’t invited to contribute further on the musical side of things.

The journey from Lake Toba to Berastagi has left me more confused than ever about Indonesia. It is so hard to say whether I love or hate this place. On the one hand we were warned of the dangers of travelling on local transport and that we should keep our eyes on our bags at all times. On the other hand minibus drivers went out of their way to help us and get us on the connecting bus. The journey took about five hours and involved numerous stops and starts but we arrived safely and with our bags intact. The worst thing was the smoking on the buses which is a pass time that all Indonesians seem to partake in.

Finding our way to Berastagi was no mean acheivement. All tourist buses have stopped running and our route took us through towns that didn’t appear on our map and place names that I had never heard of. Berastagi itself could easily have been missed and I was greatly relieved to spot a hotel sign that I had heard of or we could have ended up anywhere. The driver of the minibus stopped when I screamed and let us off.

Berastagi itself is a very uninspiring place and could best be described as bleak. It is between the wet and dry seasons at the moment and the town is being attacked by a ferocious wind. The glass slats that constitute a window in our hotel room do little to fend it off and Tash is once again cold. However the town is dwarfed by two volcanoes and that is why we came here. Today I got my wish and climbed one.

We hired a guide and trekked five kilometres through the jungle before beginning the ascent. It was hard going and at times we were crawling on our hands and knees. Our path switchbacked up and down the sides of hills and we caught the occasional glimpse of the volcano in front of us and jungle clad hills around. After what seemed like a lifetime the jungle thinned out and we began the two kilomtres to the volcanoes summit and crater. All the way there were stunning views.

As we came close to the summit the going got even tougher. I’m no great lover of heights and the last thirty metres were pretty terrifying. Once at the top though it was well worth it. The crater appeared in front of us and I was lost for words. After the lush richness of the jungle the boulder clad crater covered in sulphur was a stark contrast. Huge jets of steam shot into the air and sounded like aeroplanes taking off. It was eeire to say the least. We sat on the highest point sheltered from the wind and ate a meal of cold fried rice. After the climb it tasted delicious.

After lunch we climbed down into the crater and got covered in steam and sulphur. It was an amazing experience to feel the earth venting it’s power under your feet. As the smell got too much and pictures of erptions entered my head we decided it was time to head down.

We arrived at the foot of the volcano and some hot springs at 14:00, seven hours after we left Berastagi. The hot water in the spa pools was a welcome reflief to our aching limbs. Unfortunately on returning to Berastagi we were greeted by the freezing wind whistling though our room. It has blown down a huge metal notice board that was across the main road. It is now hanging by a few wires several metres above the ground.

After the over night bus journey arriving at Lake Toba was quite a pleasant experience. The lake was formed when a volcanic crater collapsed and filled with water. It is over seventeen miles long and apparently as deep as four hundred and eighty metres. In the lake is a large island with a smaller bit of land sticking out into the lake and it is on this piece of land called Tuk-Tuk that loads of hotels can be found.

We took a ferry from Parapat to Tuk-Tuk and after the bus ride the ferry was a pleasure. We didn’t know where we wanted to stay but some people had given us some suggestions. The first place we considered didn’t look great so we gambled and stayed on the boat as it went round Tuk-Tuk. It was definetly worth the wait as we ended up in a gorgeous resort like place on the waters edge facing across the lake.

As with everywhere in Indonesia Lake Toba is suffering from a complete lack of tourists. It is desperately sad to see so many people suffering becasue of this and only makes it worse that the Indoensian Tourism Minister recently announced that he doesn’t like Westerners. On the other hand it meant that we paid less than six dollars for a room with a baclony and stunning view across the lake. Not to mention the fact that the hotel had free pool, table tennis, DVD player, satellite TV and a great diving board.

The down side to the lack of toursits is that some places tend to lack a bit of atmosphere. On arrival we discovered that the hotel with sixty rooms was only occupuied by us and a pair of middle aged Dutch Lesbians. They were friendly enough but not really great conversation.

The following day we hired a motorbike and drove around Tuk-Tuk and part of the main island. The roads were near deserted and it was enormous fun. ON one side was Lake Toba and the other a huge wall of rock that was one edge of the former crater. The views were amazing and the weather just perfect. We finally arrived at some hot springs and we decided to stop for a dip in one of the swimming pools full of hot sulphurous water. There were five or six places with pools stretching up the hill side and all looked run down and empty. We spyed an alright looking place and drove in. The proprieter was the worlds most miserable man who was married to the worlds most miserable woman. To use the pool you had to eat in the attached cafe so we sat down to the safest sounding thing on the menu. A banana pancake. As we ate in the half dark of the cafe I noticed a chicken pecking away at crumbs on the floor.

The hot spring itself was great fun. It was very smelly but the water was incredibly soft and of course hot. After the bumpy bike ride it was very relaxing. After a long soak we drove back to our hotel after a thoroughly good fun day.

Earlier I commented about the lack of atmospehere becasue of not having enough tourists but things were set to change. That is beacuse Philip had arrived at the hotel. Philip was a blonde haired blue eyed twenty nine year old German man who earned his living as a proffessional dancer (contemporary NOT classical). He was as strange as his description and we first came across him teaching one of the hotel bar staff a dance move and within two beers had offered Tash a massage (for free) and told me I had beautiful eyes.

Philip accompanied us on a trek up the hill behind Tuk-Tuk where we were treated to magnificent views of the lake. It took a couple of hours to get to the top and the walk was great. On the way we passed loads of shops selling wood carvings and other locally produced things. As we passed each shop we were greeted by the same pleas to spend some money. It really was a desperate sight. Tash and I did our bit and bought a hand carved mask and a pair of wooden lizards for the stupidly cheap price of ten dollars. I didn’t even have the heart to haggle too much. Philip managed to spend money in about three different shops. The only problem was that he didn’t have any money with him and instead invited the craftsmen to come and collect it from the hotel. Which they duly did.

That evening our merry little group was bolstered further by the arrival of Paul. Paul was a middle aged rotund fellow with a big bristly beard. He reluctantly confessed to being a seismologist at the university of East Anglia and was on his way to Jakarta for work. I happened to find his profession fascinating and before we knew it we were the only patrons of a small bar. Paul and I discussed the finer points of seismic activity around the world, some of which I understood and Tash and Philip danced the night away to the worlds worst German techno. All in all a very satisfying evening.

The next morning I awoke in time to witness a brilliant sunrise and drink enough water to avoid a serious hangover. I eventually persuaded Tash that we did have to leave Lake Toba and move on again. It was a great place to stay and we were lucky enough to share it with some really interesting characters but there was a volcano that needed climbing and we had to leave for Berastagi.

The road that runs from the north of Sumatra to the south is known as the Trans Sumatran Highway. It’s the sort of name that made me imagine an enormous road that would cut through the dense jungle and push the volcanoes out the way.

As we waited for the bus that would take us from Bukittinggi to Parapat and Lake Toba I settled into the idea that our bus which was equipped with a toilet and air con would whisk us through the night and we would arrive at our destination ready for more adventures. The hour and a half we waited for the bus to arrive did nothing to dampen my spirits. It was only when it finally arrived that I began to worry. The bus did indeed have a toilet and air con but it was also being held together by parcel tape. The seats were recliners but were either stuck up or down. With a sense of dread we climbed aboard and found two incredibly dirty seats. We were then moved on by their rightful owner and settled into the seats we had been allocated. No problem excpet for a large wooden box where my feet should have been. The bus hadn’t moved yet as the crew were still eating dinner so Tash marched back into the bus office to demand different seats or at least the removal of the offending box. Despite our best efforts the huge man who worked in the office couldn’t understand our protests. There were quite a few other men in the office and the man was obviously saying some fairly funny things becasue everyone was in hysterics, except us. Having run out of options I looked at Tash. She took the huge man by the arm and beckoned him to follow. The sight of a small western woman ordering this enormous bloke about was too much for the audience in the office and the literally fell about laughing. With the wind totally out of his sails he meekly followed Tash on the bus and was introduced to the box. He immediately ordered it to be put in someone elses place. Luckily the owners of the new seats soon to have no leg room had incredibly short legs and didn’t mind the box being there.

With the hilarity of the bus office out the way and the Trans Sumatran Highway ahead I settled into the journey. The only problem was that our driver must have got lost. Instead of the enormous highway, well lit by street lamps and surfaced with the latest sound dampening tarmac he took a tiny winding road that in places was not surfaced at all. In fact in some places the road had been washed away and we had to wait three hours for the blockages to be bulldozed clear. Instead of twenty four hour service areas we had to settle for decaying road side shacks with the worst toilets I could ever imagine let alone use. We were however befriended by a very nice Indonesian man on his way to visit his father. Unfortunately I also had a very disturbing conversation with a young man at a breakfast stop. He approached me and said hello to which I replied in my friendliest and smiliest way despite having just spent a night on a bus from hell. He then proceeded to talk in a whisper and stand much too close to me. I could only hear half of what he said but I managed to smile and nod in the right places. I did definelty hear him ask me what the meaning of free sex was in Europe. I took a closer look at him and decided he was either a pervert or a religious nutter. I dismissed the first idea as too much to entertain in my current state and asked him what religion he was. He explained that he was a Protestant and that he would pray for me wherever I was. I contemplated asking him not to bother but decided against it. This little sidestep hadn’t avoided the original question though. The bus driver was climbing back into the cab and soon the old engine roared back into life so with a dead straight face I told him that sex in Europe was very expensive and most men can’t afford it. Without waiting for a reply I jumped aboard the bus and we set off on the final leg of the journey.

We arrived in Parapat, the jumoing off point for Lake Toba seventeen hours after leaving Bukittinggi and I never did get to ride on the wonderful Trans Sumatran Highway. As always though it was a thoroughly entertaining and of course uncomfortable journey.

Bukittinngi is nine hundred and thirty metres above sea level and is surrounded by two volcanoes, one of which is still active. To one side of the town is a canyon reputedly one hundred and twenty metres deep. After writing yesterday’s blog Tash and I decided to wander to the edge of the canyon to admire the view and try and find a way to reach the floor and have a wander around.

The views from the top were spectacular. The canyon looked deep and very green with a small river trickling along the bottom of it. After feeding some monkeys we found a rather steep set of steps leading down towards the bottom of the canyon. They joined onto a road that wound it’s way down the canyon side. We were looking for a way onto the canyon floor and weren’t to sure of the way, apart from down of course. Luckily a young chap in front of us offered to show us a path through the rice paddies. He was around my age and spoke pretty decent English. I was canny enough to realise that he would want paying for his guiding services but we decided to go with the flow.

The tourist industry here has been hit by a series of rather nasty events from nightclub bombings to tsunamis and earthquakes. This has meant that there are a huge number of young people who used to work in guesthouses or as guides and are now unemployed. The guy leading us belonged to this group. He lead us through the rice fields where the harvest was being collected and then down a small track into the canyon. At this point I asked what he charged for his guiding and we settled on a fee which amounted to all the cash in my wallet, about four dollars. And so our gentle stroll turned into a half day trek.

On the way through the canyon floor we saw wild orchids, giant beetles, cinammon trees and the highlight for me, the geology. Two rivers feed into the canyon. One brings with it igneous rock and the other sedimentary rocks and sediment. At places where they joined there was a stunning variety of rocks and soils all mingling together and the beds on the side of the canyon were equally as interesting. Not to mention the effect the river was having on the canyon sides. All of this was unfolding in the bottom of a canyon with two volcanoes towering over it. Quite spectacular.

I have steered well clear of using the word beautiful though and that is thanks to the plastic. Further up the river villages throw all their rubbish into the canyon and the river scoops it up and seemingly whisks it away. The whole canyon floor was covered in a thin layer of multicoloured plastics. There were places where it was half covered in sediment and was on it’s way to becoming rock. I’m not sure what geologists will make of it in a few thousand years. I guess it will make some rather odd fossils. There was so much of it it was almost attracive in a rather unsettling way.

As we progressed further up the canyon floor we had to take our shoes and socks off and wade across the river. The further we went the wetter it got and I ended up bare fut for a couple of kilometres. The canyon became narrower and suddenly in the trees hanging over the edge of the canyon flying foxes began swooping around. Standing on the canyon floor looking up made me feel as if I was in Jurassic Park. The flying foxes were enormous and great flocks of them swept through the sky.

On the way back we climbed up the other side of the canyon. The path was near vertical in places and it had been raining. In one place it was about a shoulder width wide and to the left of me I realised that the vegetation I could see was the tops of trees. That made the drop next to me rather too large to contemplate. We survived thougfh and were treated to stunning views of one of the volcanoes from the top. Then we wandered into a village which was apparently reknowned for it’s silver work. It was an old dutch colonial village and was absolutely beautiful. Full of wooden houses with intricate carvings and large windows covered in net curtains. I could really imagine Dutch ladies pottering around in old colonial dress.

Getting back to Bukittinngi was a lot easier than I imagined thanks to a creaky old bridge across the canyon. Despite it’s faded pink colour it really resembled something from Indiana Jones. Fortunately the planks groaned but held firm and we made it back to town feeling pretty exhausted but very pleased with an excellent day.

After a decent meal last night and some very tasty beer a good nights sleep was guaranteed. We woke in time for breakfast which was included in the price of the hotel and went out in search of some excitement. We didn’t have to look far. Today is market day and Bukkittingi’s normal market swells to an enormous size. The town is built on a steep hill and the market spreads all down one side of it. We started at the top by sitting on a bench by the clock tower and admiring the view. After a couple of minutes a local barber came and started a convdersation with us and invited me for a free hair cut. Just for the sake of socialising he said. The encounter reminded me very much of India where people would often approach you just for the sake of socialising.

Once our new friend had left and with my hair still intact we went to explore the market. The upper part was full of clothes stalls many of which where selling second hand stuff. It crossed my mind that this may be where all the things donated to less than honest charities in the UK gets sold. There were also lots of stalls selling plastic stuff and cheap electrical goods. The alleyways were compact but relatively clean and swept. As we moved down the side of the hill things began to change. We descended into the food section and it got darker and a whole lot smellier. First there were the fishmongers who had piles of alive and recently dead fish and buckets full of writhing eels. A lady was buying fish and the fishmonger was buisly descaling it and chopping bits off. Fins were flying all over the place and landing on peoples clothing. I dodged my way through hoping for some escape only to come across the bird flu section. The alleyway was now too small for one person to walk down so it was rather tricky when two people wanted to pass. Avoiding the heads of chickens sticking out of cages or the headless birds on table tops was a challenge but we just about made it. An incredibly steep and narrow flight of stairs appeared in front of me with a speck of daylight at the end. We climbed up them and out into some fresh air. It has to win the “Best Market” award for me and we only saw a fraction of it.

Tomorrow evening we are catching a night bus to Parapat and from there will go to lake Toba. It leaves us with a day and a half to wander around and enjoy the rest of Bukkitingi. Not sure anything will live up to the excitment of the market though.

After a decent meal last night and some very tasty beer a good nights sleep was guaranteed. We woke in time for breakfast which was included in the price of the hotel and went out in search of some excitement. We didn’t have to look far. Today is market day and Bukkittingi’s normal market swells to an enormous size. The town is built on a steep hill and the market spreads all down one side of it. We started at the top by sitting on a bench by the clock tower and admiring the view. After a couple of minutes a local barber came and started a convdersation with us and invited me for a free hair cut. Just for the sake of socialising he said. The encounter reminded me very much of India where people would often approach you just for the sake of socialising.

Once our new friend had left and with my hair still intact we went to explore the market. The upper part was full of clothes stalls many of which where selling second hand stuff. It crossed my mind that this may be where all the things donated to less than honest charities in the UK gets sold. There were also lots of stalls selling plastic stuff and cheap electrical goods. The alleyways were compact but relatively clean and swept. As we moved down the side of the hill things began to change. We descended into the food section and it got darker and a whole lot smellier. First there were the fishmongers who had piles of alive and recently dead fish and buckets full of writhing eels. A lady was buying fish and the fishmonger was buisly descaling it and chopping bits off. Fins were flying all over the place and landing on peoples clothing. I dodged my way through hoping for some escape only to come across the bird flu section. The alleyway was now too small for one person to walk down so it was rather tricky when two people wanted to pass. Avoiding the heads of chickens sticking out of cages or the headless birds on table tops was a challenge but we just about made it. An incredibly steep and narrow flight of stairs appeared in front of me with a speck of daylight at the end. We climbed up them and out into some fresh air. It has to win the “Best Market” award for me and we only saw a fraction of it.

Tomorrow evening we are catching a night bus to Parapat and from there will go to lake Toba. It leaves us with a day and a half to wander around and enjoy the rest of Bukkitingi. Not sure anything will live up to the excitment of the market though.

This afternoon we arrived at our desired destination of Bukkittingi in Sumatra. It was a fairly unpleasant journey but we have arrived in one piece. The Singapore side of things was so comfortable and easy it was untrue. We got the underground from next to our hotel and it delivered us direct to the ferry terminal where we caught the boat to Indonesia. It took forty five minutes and as soon as we set off I fell asleep waking just in time to step off in Indonesia. We passed through the customs and visa check easily enough and raced to catch the onward ferry to Pekanbaru on Sumatra.

The minute I stepped out of the internaitonal terminal and walked towards the domestic one I was grabbed by a tout and whisked along at a hundred miles an hour. I’ll give the guy his due, he was one of the best I’ve come up against and he did alright out of us. We ended up paying six dollars more for our tickets than we should have done but he did barge us through security checks and deliver us to seats in the ferry. I felt a bit of a mug but it was a pretty professional bit of hustling.

Once on the boat and away from the tout I took stock of our surroundings. We were seated in the bow of the boat (which was a catamaran) just above the waterline in upright but padded seats. There was a small window which was impossible to see out of and someone had brought durians aboard. As we began to move off I sincerely doubted my ability to survive the next seven hours. As it turned out I needn’t have worried because the seven hours were not too bad it was the three extra ones that made the trip ten hours that nearly killed me. Why we took so much longer than expected I don’t know but I was mighty relieved to get off the boat. I even didn’t mind the scruffy children at the dock taking the mickey out of me.

Now we had to decide whether we would stay in Pekanbaru or push on to Bukkitingi the same night. Tash wanted to stay the night and I wasn’t going to argue so we took a taxi to a hotel near the bus station. Except the taxi driver took us to a massively expensive hotel somewhere else. Fortunately it was full and we just realised in time to stop him driving off. He then took us where we wanted to go and we checked in to a seemingly decent room. There was no shower instead they have a large tank of water which you through over yourself using a plastic scoop. Fine in principle and more effective than many showers I have used. The one small problem was that I arranged my vast array of bathing products on the lip of the tank with the water in. With shampoo in my eyes trying to scoop more water over my head I managed to knock just about everything except my towel into the water tank. Luckily it wasn’t too hard to retrieve.

This morning we were up at six looking for a bus to take us to Bukkitingi. We didn’t have to look far and were soon aboard a rattle trap old thing with a crew of three interesting souls. We’d been going for about ten minutes when we stopped for about an hour for something. Not sure what but I was glad to get going again. The journey was pretty bad. It took eight hours and the road was paved but twisty and full of pot holes. The driving was also incredibly bad. Easily as bad as India and my position just behind and to the side of the driver meant that I could see everything that was coming straight at us. Anyway we arrived safely with nothing but the unpleasant aroma of a long bus journey to complain about.

Once we had checked into a hotel I went to open my bag to discover that the padlock on the top half was broken. I was terrified of opening it and seeing all my dirty clothes missing. Luckily everything was still there. The lock was a cheap one I bought in Bangkok and could easily have broken with a bang or if someone stood on it. Or it did enough to put someone off. I guess I’ll never know I’m just glad I still have my filthy bed sheet to snuggle up under tonight.

It is hard to be sure about Indonesia on our current experiences. Yesterday in Pekanbaru we were a long way from the tourist trail and it was a pretty uncomfortable experience trying to find a room and food without knowing any Indonesian. There are also lots of similarities between here and India in the way the palce looks. It isn’t clean. The road we travelled on today was littered with plastic and other rubbish. Having said that some of the views were incredible. People are friendly and smile a lot which is good and hopefully tonight we will find some decent food. A dollar fifty packet of peanuts we bought in Singapore has kept us alive for the last two days!

Today we went to an absolutley brilliant museum in the colonial district of Singapore. It was by far the bet we have visited and was so full of exhibits that we didn’t even try and see it all. It was called the Museum of Asian Civilisation and covered all the countries we have visited and Singapore itself.

Unfortunately that is just about the only thing in Singapore that I have really warmed to. The city is spotlessly clean and well organised but also utterly sterile. Little India bears almost no resemblence to real India (which may not be a bad thing) and the central part of town is like an effecient London. Not really to my taste.

The other thing that may be influencing my opinion of Singapore is that tomorrow we face the prospect of a two or three day journey to the Indonesian island of Sumatra. We are catching the first ferry from Singapore tomorrow mornign which will get u to an Indoneian island off the south of Singapore within about an hour. From there we need to catch another ferry to the Sumatran mainland however there is a fair chance that we won’t be there in time so may have to spend a day and night kicking our heels waiting for the next boat. On arrival in Sumatra depending on where we get the ferry to it is a five or ten hour bus journey to our desired destination of Bukkitingi.

The fact that we chose to stay another day in Kulua Lumpur proved to be the right decision for lots of reasons. We decided that we would visit the lake gardens and the national museum and on consulting the map we figured that we could make a big walking tour through the city. Kulua Lumpur is a great city for walking in. It’s relatively flat and there are plenty of landmarks like the Petronas Towers that stop you from getting lost. The pavements are also all very wide and traffic free. The only drawback is the complete diregard town planners had for pedestrians. It seems odd that they built great pavements dotted with small parks, fountains and other attractions but forgot to put in any pedestrian crossings. There was the odd traffic light but I think you would have to wait a few days for them to change in the favour of a walker.

Our route took us through some of Kuala Lumpurs main sites and we arrived in the Lake Gardens having gained an even more positive impression of the city. The gardens themsleves are pretty huge and beautifuly tended. On the way through we saw the entrance to the giant aviary and decided to pay a visit. The area is covered by an enormous net (the worlds largest) and many birds are free to fly around inside being fed Pringles by silly visitors who can’t read the “DO NOT FEED THE BIRDS” signs. Despite the flagrant rule breaking that was going on the bird park was pretty good. There were certainly lots of very interesting and colourful birds to look at. It was also interesting to see all the Malaysian visitors. It really brought home how incredibly diverse the country and especially Kuala Lumpur is.

After some lunch we continued on our way and eventually found the National Museum which was said to home a good exhibition on the history of Malaysia. When we entered there were no signs or labels for the galleries so we went left into one of two large downstairs rooms. I was greeted by the sight of three different displays. One was about Javanese shadow puppetry, one was a Malaysian wedding display and the third was about the Muslim curcumcision ceremony. A rather eclectic choice to portray Malaysia I thought. It didn’t really get much better either. The exhibits were well labelled and looked good but there was no apparent order to anything. In the section about flora and fauna we discovered that the animal we had seen in Taman Negara was a mouse deer. Possibly the most useful bit of information I gathered.

After the museum we walked back to the hostel and sat on the bed reading. I felt quite tired after the walking and rather satisfied at what had been a very successful day. Now under normal circumstances we would have had more than enough excitement for one day but this was not an ordinary day. Tash had stood up and was looking out the window when she announced that she could see Heather and Strahan walking down the road. They are the couple we learnt to dive with in Vietnam. I rushed to the window and sure enough even with my poor visual memory I could recognise them and whats more they were walking right up to our hotel. Tash pulled on some shoes and went and trapped them in the curry house next door where they were about to have some dinner. My fatigue was quickly forgotten and we made new plans for the evening. First we went and had some dinner, then we went and drunk some beer, then we drunk more beer, then we got in a taxi and ended up at a night club where we drunk some more beer,then we got in a taxi and I woke up the following day at 14:30 feeling as though a large animal had chosen my mouth for it’s home. Despite the sad ending to this story it was a great night out and good fun was had by all, as far as I know.

Waking up in the middle of the afternoon meant that we wouldn’t be leaving for Singapore after all and as luck would have it it turned out to allow us to fall even more in love with Kuala Lumpur. After a mid-afternoon breakfast we began to feel somewhere near normal again and decided that we would like to go to the cinema. We checked the paper and saw that War of the Worlds was showing. Only problem was that it started in forty five minutes and the cinema was the other side of town. Of course this was no problem becasue we jumped on the light rail and were deposited at the cinema in less than twenty minutes. The cinema was in a shopping centre the size of Wales at the foot of the Petronas Towers. The film was a bit rubbish really but seeing the size and scale of the shopping centre with the towers literally towering over it was incredible. When we came out from the film it was dark and all the skyscrapers were lit up, all dwarfed by the Petronas Towers. We sat in a cafe by an ornamental lake outside the shopping centre drinking delicious coffee and tucking into disgustingly rich cakes falling even more in love with the city.

And so it was finally time to leave and head on to Singapore where we are now. Getting here was a breeze. The coach was a luxury model with just twenty five seats in it. It took about six hours to get here but felt like nothing at all. We are safely installed in another new home that fortunately seems to be free from gutiar playing hippies so we should get a good nights sleep.

We arrived in Kuala Lumpur yesterday afternoon in the middle of some fairly persistent rain. The hostel we had in mind proved a little hard to find but we located it in the end and accepted the last room they had left. The guide book told me that it was located in a gorgeous colonial building full of ethnic chic and bohemian charm. The building itself is great and full of character. The rooms are windowless boxes with flimsy walls and suspended ceilings made of black cloth. The real attraction are the compfy seating areas where like minded travellers can hang out and exchange stories. Now a couple of days ago my good friend Julie reminded me that diversity is the spice of life and I should be more accepting so I thought I’d make a special effort for my fellow backpackers. Unfortunately the flimsy walls of my room couldn’t prevent me from over hearing the saddest conversation of my journey so far. It was being dominated by a bead wearing tye dye clad girl somewhere in her early twenties. She was telling her male American friend a story about how stoned her friend got and that he couldn’t open his eyes. I have told the story in less than three seconds but it took this unfotunate soul over ten minutes to communicate the same twenty words. The problem was that she couldn’t finish a sentence. Instead she would use the word ‘like’ and ‘you know what I mean’. Her version went something like this. “And…like I saw him and…he’d been smoking and his eyes like…they were really erm…like…you know what I mean…like…red and kind of closed…but like…erm…” Incredibly boring and horrendously painful to listen to (especially as she spoke in a rasping nasal voice), in fact I’d be surprised if you were still reading this. Anyway the ear plugs were inserted which was fine umtil 12:30 last night when some other hippy twat decided to play his guitar. Luckily this morning a room upstairs became vacant so we are now safe from the sounds of people “finding themsleves".

Today we went on a shopping spree and also did a spot of sightseeing. We went to Kuala Lumpur’s biggest shopping plaza and it was quite simply amazing. The building was enormous and the variety and range of goods was staggering. Not to mention the fact that things were incredibly cheap. I splashed out and bought myself two mew t-shirts for less than five pounds. I also splashed out in a much bigger way and bought the underwater housing for my digital camera. At eighty pounds cheaper than the UK I couldn’t really afford not to! All I need to do now is go somwhere where I can use it.

After the shopping spree had ended we had lunch in a noodle shop and I was so relieved to get a delicious bowl of duck noodles. Kulala Lumpur is supposed to be famous for it’s fabulous cuisine but so far we had been very unlcuky and only managed the greasiest plate of rice and tofu in a chinese kitchen and a bowl of stodgy rice and vegetables in an Indian. Luckily today things seem to be looking up. We’ll have to choose our dinner location carefully.

Feeling full and satisfied we set off in search of the telecom tower where there was a viewing platform. It wasn’t hard to find as it towered over four hundred metres above the city, next to the Petronas Towers. It cost about five dollars to go to the viewing platform and I wasn’t sure it was going to be worth it but I’m so glad we did. I had begun to love Kuala Lumpur before we went up the tower but the views from the top cemented the feeling. The city is littered with the most stunning buildings and amazing parks. Plus in the distance it is surrounded by a range of hills giving it a really comfortable feel. The price of admission also included an excellent audio tour of what we were looking at.

This morning we weren’t sure if we would leave for Singapore tomorrow or stay another day. After today’s experiences though we are definetly going to stay longer. People always ask what your favourite place is and it’s a bit of a daft question becasue everywhere is so different and good for different reasons. The thing that strikes me about Kuala Lumpar though is that I could actually picture myself living here quite happily and I haven’t felt that about anywhere else. The mixture of people and cultures is great and it is all played out on the backdrop of a beautiful city.

From Kota Bharu we took the jungle train to a town called Jerantut where we could get a lift onto the edge of Taman Negara, Malaysias top rainforest destination. The train was supposed to be an engineering marvel and I suppose it was really. It cut a pretty much straight line through the jungle and anything else in its way. However after ten hours of staring at green jungle I was ready to get off. We thought that we would have to spend the night in Jerantut and travel to the jungle the following morning but we found a bus organised by one of the hotels that would take us straight there. Well actually they took us there at about 17:45 which meant we didn’t reach Taman Negara until well after dark. We had barely eaten all day and had been up since 4:30. Needless to say we were not on top form and still had the problem of finding a room. In Jerantut we tried to pre book a room something we hadn’t done anywhere up until now. I guess it was a measure of how tired we felt. Unfortunately the only place we new about and could afford was fully booked. Not a great sign. Things normally have a way of working themselves out thought and this time was no exception. As Tash waited with the bags in a cafe listening to the sales pitch from a tout I went in search of a room. It was tipping it down in true rainforest style and I was soaked through but luck was on my side. The first place I found had a room on the river bank with a bathroom and mosquito net for about eight dollars a night. I didn’t even bother haggling over the price. The design was a little odd though. The back wall was lower than the front so the roof sloped up at quite an angle. Nothing odd in that except the front wall didn’t reach the roof. Instead there was a large length of chicken wire but even that didn’t reach the ceiling. Now it was raining hard outside and the two foot gap at the top of our roof provided an ideal refuge for most of the insects that didn’t fancy getting wet.

Taman Negara is the worlds oldest jungle. It has been around since Malaysia emerged from under the sea one hundred and thirty million years ago. Today it has to be one of the worlds best national parks. It is over four thousand square kilometres and needless to say Tash and I didn’t cover the whole thing but in the two days we were there we had a pretty good go. Just to get in you have to catch a boat across the river which is exciting enough and gets the adventurous spirit in me going. The whole park has fairly well marked trails all over it and with a map you can take yourself off to wherever you want. The area closest to the entrance is well trodden and on the first day we explored around here. We walked about two kilometres to the top of a hill where there were views of the canopy roof. It was hard going and we were pretty tired by the time we reached the summit. The heat was intense. The minute the sun came out the wet ground underneath us started steaming and we were slowly cooked as we went along. The odd slip and slide also ensured that our trousers were caked in mud pretty quickly. In the afternoon we visited the canopy walkway which is a five hundred metre rope bridge that is suspended up to forty metres off the ground in the jungle canopy. At first it felt a little like a theme park but the higher we went the more I enjoyed it. It was so odd to be forty metres up but in places not be able to see the sky or the ground because the foilage was so thick. We were also incredibly lucky because we had the whole thing pretty much to ourselves. As we finsihed about five tour groups all arrived at once and it wouldn’t have been the same with hundreds of people on. Back at our hut we had the coldest shower imaginable and tried to dry out our clothes which in the humidity was an impossible task.

The second day Tash managed to get up at a very reasonable 7:30 and despite protestations about living in a concentration camp we were in the jungle by 8:30. I wanted to go a bit further afield away from the tour group crowds so we chose a path out to a cave. It was a bit drier than the previous day but the path was much more undulating. Had my map shown me the contours I may have opted for a different route. Our tired legs carried us to the cave entrance and we had a nose around inside where there were lots of very awake bats. Possibly due to the maglite I was shining at them. So far in the jungle we had seen plenty of insects, a giant squirrel or civet cat, some monkeys and a few birds. We had heard a lot more but it was proving pretty elusive. That’s why I was incredibly surprised when two small deer like animals crossed the path in front of us. I guess they were following their mother but she was nowhere to be seen.

It is possible to stay in the hides in the jungle free of charge which would have been great but unfortunately the jungle is home to a large number of rats who are rather partial to the food people bring with them to the hides. There was no way I was going to ask Tash to go and spend a night in the jungle with rats crawling around us. Instead we opted for a night safari through a palm fruit plantation that bordered the jungle. We sat in the back of a pick up truck with a guide who had am incredibly powerful torch which he used to spot things. We saw two palm civets, a scorpion, snake and wild cat. The highlight was probably when our enthusiastic guide decided to pick up the snake, something that he had clearly never managed before. Unsurprisingly he didn’t manage this time either but nearly fell down a steep bank trying.

The jungle was amazing and given more time and less rats there would have been even more exploring to do. There are load of places I would like to revisit one day and Taman Negara is definetly one of them. Anyway we had to leave and today we took a couple of buses that got us safely to Kuala Lumpar where we are now.