I decided to jump into my old jalopy after work and head on to an unknown region in the East Coast for the sake of not getting trapped in the city. Trapped in the city means walking aimlessly in malls, watching repeated programs on satellite TV and having ridiculously expensive pretentious drinks in clubs. Although I don't mind some salsa moves during the weekends but the salsa fever will hit me when I'm ready.
Before reaching my destination, I stopped by a road side stall to indulge myself in a durian feast. Eight durians for RM5.00 and the bunch were just plucked a few minutes ago from the owner's backyard.
It was simple and pure durian and not the mix and match durians strains like D24 and D25. I had 3 durians and was full to the brim and told the owner he could keep the rest. I wasn't going to lug 5 thorny fruits through the jungle.
The first part of the trek was rough as I had to climb up a narrow ledge and one wrong move or a slipped footing will plunge you down into the depths of a raging river. The harrowing climb was over in 10 minutes and I was rewarded with one of the most beautiful scenes I could remember. There lay in front of me, one side - fine powdery sand and the other side - deep emerald like flowing river.
There and then, I decided that place would be my camping ground.
I put aside my camping stuff and continued ahead to see what other natural landscape lay in front of me. As I trekked more and more, I realized that the landscape looks like Berkelah Waterfalls - the No.1 ranking waterfall in Malaysia (in my opinion) in terms of beauty and exquisiteness.
As I was walking by the ledge of the mini gorge and appreciating the surroundings, I noticed a whirlpool just by the edge of a mini fall. It looked like the whirlpool will always be permanently there. Check it out :
I trekked deeper and found huge boulders, boulders as big as a 2 storey building and there were all stacked up horizontally like a fort blocking any human penetration.
I tried to find my way over but I wasn't determined enough to do so as I was looking forward to turn back and set up camp at my shangri-la. Along the way, I looked up and saw a pair of hornbills flying above me and this was my second time sighting hornbills in the wild. Oh how I love this place.
I took a couple of dips in the mini lagoon and it was just heavenly. The whole area had no rubbish of any sort. Maybe this is due to the harrowing ledge in the earlier part that deterred people from coming in.
I gathered some firewood, dried leaves and other stuff to make a campfire
and I managed to get a fire going during twilight. That night, stars were aplenty and the sound of the insects were deafening that it became pretty hard for me to fall asleep. There were of also flashes of lighting and it got me pretty worried about a banjir kilat.
I am definitely coming back to find the waterfall that I'm sure is just after the huge boulders. This place is just awesome!
5 comments:
nice write up! what waterfall is this?
Say, Teoh.. How much did you pay for life straw? I am interested in getting one..also trekking pole..Any good suggestions on where to get them cheaper perhaps? I am trying to be the low cost super hero too just like you hehe. Rgds, Nicholas Tan (in your FB)
Teoh,
This is a reciprocal visit. I love the outdoors too. Camping out the way you did would have been Shangrila to me especially on sucha clean sandy beach along pristine clear rivers. Such rivers are hard to come by these days in Malaysia.
I will be coming back to your side more often as I enjoy reading your posts too.
A little late, but I couldn't resist. Those durians are called 'home durians' (thurien baan) in Thai, as opposed to... um... commercial durians. Or something. Right now, there are so many of them here in Narathiwat that most are being boiled down for preserves so they won't go to waste!
How do you take those pictures of yourself?
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