The flight from Singapore to Malaysia is only about 30 minutes. You can actually take a five hour bus ride from Singapore, but the price is nearly the same. On this section of our trip it was only the girls: Amanda, our two German friends, and myself. It was much easier to just make decisions with four people.... traveling with more than a few is an insanely difficult challenge and I do not recommend it.
We arrived in Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia. We had heard rumors about the lack of tourist attractions in KL and were quite bored for the few days we spent there. The first day we decided to take the tourist bus around the city, stopping at all of the hot spots. Similar to other large Asian cities, there was a market, Chinatown, Little India, palaces, temples etc etc etc. However, after being to such huge cities before, we weren't too impressed. The largest icon of KL is the Petronas Towers. They truly are a beauty.
We were so lucky to have stayed in a bustling area of KL, filled with shopping malls, unique restaurants, quaint hostels and hotels. We spent an entire half day shopping in our own little area to pass the time. The next afternoon we hopped in a cab to go see an elephant sanctuary. This area was located closer to the rain forest and about two hours away from KL. The elephants were rescued, trained and taken care of at the sanctuary. We had arrived so early to the sanctuary that we decided to drive a few miles away to see "Deerland". And deer land it was... there were about 30 deer free roaming in forest. This was the closest I had ever been in my life to a deer, and they were all so friendly. The workers even let us into the area with the deer, scary! We even held a snake AND took a picture right next to a black bear. That's gotta be illegal.
Heading back to the elephant farm, we watched a cute little show put on by the elephants while feeding them peanuts and fruit. Then we took a ride and even swam with the elephants. The water was muddy and gross, but who can say they have swam with an elephant? It was awesome.
After two days we headed just west about an hour to Kuala Selangor. This area is famous for it's fireflies and we weren't about to miss the show. We stayed at some huts on the water, which was mosquito heaven for me (yuck). The resort advertised a boat trip around the lake to see the fireflies, free with your stay. We hopped on the boat and rode a ways down the river to find many flashing lights in the trees. At first we each looked at eachother in disbelief thinking we had been majorly scammed. The fireflies were nothing like the ones from the US or from Germany, they flickered in unison as they sat still on the branches of the trees - similar to flashing Christmas lights. But our driver took us closer and we could see that they were real, and really magnificent. I wish I could have snagged a picture or video, but it was just way too dark for that. We rode around for about an hour, gawking and gasping as a new tree would light up with these creatures.
We spent the night playing Uno and screaming at the cockroaches that would sneakily crawl under the door before resting up for our next trip. We headed off to Cameron Highlands, the main tea plantation area of Malaysia. The drive was about 5 hours through windy roads, but the view was worth the car sickness. Once you enter Cameron Highlands you can see beautiful green mountains filled with tea plantations. This was the most vibrant green of rolling fields that I have ever seen. We drove through the small tourist town of Cameron Highlands to our guest house that was filled with backpackers.
The first day in Cameron Highlands, we took a hike to see the famous Raffelasia flower - the largest flower in the world!! This flower was not actually a flower, but a fungus that grew on a vine and took about 9 months to grow. The flower only lasts about 5-7 days and the tour guides must hike to through the forest to find a new bloom for the new travelers. We went four wheeling in a Land Rover through the muck and the mud to begin our trek into the forest. It had been raining for a few months solid and the ground was extremely slippery and wet, almost crumbling underneath your feet. Each of the hikers was knee high in mud by the time they were done with the tour. We hiked for about 1.5 hours through the forest, many times in areas with no trail, until we reached the flower. It was quite gorgeous and surrounded by younger buds. It was interesting to be able to see the flower at it's many different lifecycles, but the most exciting part of the excursion was trekking through the muddy, muddy jungle.
The last day of our trip we took another tour to the tea plantations. As we drove up the second highest mountain in Malaysia, we could see an even more beautiful view of the rolling green hills. We learned that the tea plantations were about 100 years old and would easily last 100 more. The tour even taught us how the tea was harvested, rolled, and packaged to become this famous drink. Did you know that you're only supposed to leave your tea bag in hot water for 3 minutes, otherwise too much tannin will be released? Needless to say, we drank a LOT of tea on this trip. I might have a new addiction.
Cameron Highlands was an extremely relaxing trip and was truly a girls vacation. We headed back to KL to catch an early morning flight to Cambodia while saying "good-bye" (even though it won't be for long) to the German girls. It was so sad to leave them, not knowing the next time we will meet in life. But it was on to Cambodia.
Malaysia Photo Album 1
Malaysia Photo Album 2
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