Our adventures in Taman Negara

The weekend arrived, and we started Saturday by waking up half an hour later than usual, had breakfast and proceeded to the office to work for half a day, in line with the rest of the Taman Negara resort staff…. Ah well, no fun I know, but the day ended quite well with Manchester United taking all 3 points at Anfield, leaving Liverpool and their fans stunned at the Kop, thanks to John O’Shea’s late strike…..

But back to my adventures here, we had to wake up early on Sunday, because the client had arranged for a full day of activities…. We had our breakfast at 830am, and we started just after 9.30am, for the Canopy Walk, which has been given recognition as the longest hanging bridge in the world. However, we could only walk across 200m instead of the usual 500m of the bridge as the remaining 300m was closed due to maintenance work…. Not that I would complain either, because of my fear of heights, I questioned my wisdom, and my misplaced sense of adventure in agreeing to have a go at this suspended bridge…. The bridge is held together by rope, planks of woods and an aluminium ladder at the base of the bridge. Each section would be between 5m to 10m long before you reach a checkpoint on a tree…. Here, you can take pictures, catch your breath, and gather your courage for the next 5m to 10m of bridge….. You would tend to look forward rather than downwards, and the sight of the drop should your bridge fail is quite frightening…. I wasn’t quite sure whether I was perspiring profusely due to the heat or from the fear….. or maybe it was from both, I would never know…. Though I eventually did get the hang of it, and started to relax after about 20m or so…. It was a crowning achievement indeed when we reached the end of the suspended bridge :)

Canopy walk from the front and bottom views respectively

Up next was the shooting rapids, where we travelled upstream along the Tembeling River from Kuala Tahan…. Undoubtedly, we did get wet as the boat negotiated seven set of rapids during the 45 minute ride…. I was disappointed though at the relatively pedestrian pace of the rapids, as I was expecting much much more…. Yet, it was a pleasant ride, and due to the breeze in our faces, we didn’t really feel the strong rays of sunshine…. Not that it stopped us from getting sunburnt though….. We didn’t realise how wet we were until we arrived back at the resort, and after a change of clothes and a nap, I felt much better….

After lunch, we proceeded along the Tahan River in order to make our way to Lata Berkoh, a popular waterfall spot among tourists and locals alike located approximately 8 km from our resort…. The journey up the river proved to be picturesque with overhanging trees forming a shaded avenue…. We saw a lot of wildlife along the way, including birds, fishes and even monkeys hanging on the branches over the water…. The water was clear, despite its blackish appearance…. Its cool water was also refreshing as we dipped our hands over the side of the boat, to cause splashes of water to fall onto the person sitting behind us in the boat :) We arrived downstream where it became too shallow for our boat to proceed any further, and NMS and I proceeded to trek for 20 minutes into the forest, alongside the river…. Along the way, we saw many types of trees, heard different sounds which resembled a siren as well as a bark like sound coming from across the river…. We also saw many different of plants, including mushrooms on rotting logs, and posed for pictures next to huge trees….

The trek was all worth it, when we finally reached Lata Berkoh….. There were huge rock formations there, with many people having arrived earlier and just sitting there, soaking the sounds and atmosphere of the waterfalls…. Soaking our feet after the trek felt really good…. One by one, the other people started leaving, with us being the last ones to leave…. We also thought that we shouldn’t stay too long, or AMRRA and the client who accompanied us would start to worry about us…..

We arrived back at the resort at about 6pm, very much tired from our adventures, but I must say it was loads of fun…. I’m glad we did it all, I’m glad I ignored my fear of heights, I’m glad we braved the hot weather, and most of all, I’m glad I forgot about work for a day!!!