A Day in the Cameron Highlands… Part 1.

There are many things to see and do up here in the Cameron Highlands…

Hikers and backpackers spend hours and even days trekking through the mountains on the many carefully laid out walks and trails that are draped along the contours and ridges of the hills and valleys surrounding the towns of Terinkap, Brinchang, Tanah Rata and Ringlet…

This area is famous not only for it’s tea plantations, but also for the many strawberry and vegetable farms that can be found on the mountains and in literally every valley… The vast majority of the fruit and vegetables grown here are in greenhouses, and trucks travel the roads carrying fresh produce to markets as far away as the capital, Kuala Lumpur…

We booked a half-day tour with one of the many local operators, and left Tanah Rata early in the morning, heading for our first stop at a tea plantation on the northern edge of Brinchang. The four of us were squeezed into the back of a long-wheel base Landrover, while a Chinese couple sat in the long seat behind our guide and driver…

We left the main road and climbed up a very steep and narrow tarred track, that led out of the valley and up into the mountains…

Early morning up in the mountains... We stopped to get a view of the tea plantations...

Chenty points to the top of the trees where the best tea leaves come from...

...while I try and convince her that the lower leaves are just as good...!!

Trevor was about to get a much closer look at the tea leaves than he had initially anticipated...

Our guide had the unsettling ability to keep an eye on both Philip and I simultaneously... Getting up to mischief was going to prove difficult...!!

Our guide explained that the trees we were looking at had been planted in 1929, and would go on producing quality leaves as long as they were properly looked after…

He informed us that there are only 16 species of tea tree in the world, from which all varieties of tea are manufactured…

The first recorded use of tea in the form of a drink, came from Burma, and then spread to China and the rest of South East Asia…

A tea tree left to grow without pruning, could reach a height of over six metres…!! He pointed out one such specimen in the valley across from where we were standing, that towered above the shed it was growing next to…!!

We were disappointed to hear that the tea farm we were on was closed on Mondays, and we would therefore not get an opportunity to visit the factory and see how the leaves were sorted and prepared for export from the region…

We discovered that it takes roughly six to seven months from when the leaves are picked, to the point where they are packaged and ready for use…

Our guide proved to be a very knowledgeable fellow, and had been guiding tourists in the area for the past nine years… He knew all about the fauna and flora in the area and imparted this knowledge freely…

He did have one little drawback though…

I had on many occasions in the past, come into contact with people afflicted by what is commonly known as “a lazy eye”, but had never seen anybody with TWO “lazy eyes”…!! He seemed to be able to focus on you with either eye, at any time, and I was never quite sure which of the two to concentrate on…

Just when I thought his right was looking at me, it would dart off and focus on somebody else, while his left eye swiveled around and took up from where his right eye had left off…!!

Mount Brinchang, the highest point in the Cameron Highlands, and the 6th highest in Malaysia...

It seemed to be a classic case of the left eye not knowing what the right was doing…!!

When he wasn’t pointing at what he was talking about, I had no idea where to look, and stared at the ground between his feet instead, rather than be caught looking in the completely opposite direction…!!

The man made me dizzy…!! It was like trying to look at two people at the same time…!! I felt a slight headache begin to build with the effort of focusing on his darting orbs…

Fearful that my own eyes would begin to misbehave, I stopped looking into his face altogether and chose to stay at the back of our group instead…!!

Back in the Landrover, we climbed to the very top of the mountains surrounding us, on the highest navigable road in Malaysia…

There was barely enough room for our vehicle, let alone any coming back down the mountain…!! Luckily we did not meet with any “opposition” on our way to the top…

Once there, we joined another small group of visitors, and made our way to the top of a viewing platform from where we could see down into the valleys far below… A weather station had been erected on the ridge at the very top of the mountain, and seemed to be off limits to visitors…

High up on the viewing platform, the three goons pondered the teachings of Sir Isaac Newton...

We were being led down the Mossy Path...

Once back on terra firma, we inched our way slowly back down the mountain, and stopped in a lay-by where our guide informed us we would be taking a “secret path” down into the Mossy Forest”…

We followed him through the thick undergrowth, along a muddy path that led to an area where moss grew on almost every tree and bush…

It covered the upper branches of the trees, grew down their trunks and onto the rocks and thick bush through which we walked…

It was like being in a scene from one of the Lords of the Rings movies… It would not have surprised me to see Golem scurrying around the bearded tree trunks and mumbling, “Come to me, my precioussssss…!!”

The phrase “Enchanted Forest” kept rolling around in my mind as we stepped over broken branches, crouched through “mossy caves” and marveled at the scenes around us…

The going was spongy, made so by years of leaf litter that had built up around the bases of the indigenous trees, growing up on the mountainside…

From time to time we would stop and drink in the silence surrounding us… No bird song, no insects droning…just the wind sighing amongst the fern-like bunches of moss that festooned everything…

It was difficult to capture what I was seeing with my camera, and looking at the photos I did take, made me think that I had been holding my camera upside down at times…!!

GB takes a short break from the hike to record his position in the Mossy Forest...

"Pssst...!! Don't look now Philip, its that pesky photographer again...!!"

There are two species of insectivorous Pitcher Plant in the Highlands... This is the lighter variety which is found out in the open...

The once plentiful Pitcher Plant grew up here on the mountain… Over the years, many of the “Pitchers” had been plucked from the ends of the leaves they were attached to, and taken away as souvenirs… As a result, the plants are now not nearly as common as they used to be…

Philip holds the other variety, which grows in the darker reaches of the forest...

Insects attracted to the sweet nectar in the bottom of the Pitcher, find themselves stuck in the sticky liquid and eventually drown… They are then “broken down” by the enzymes in the liquid, and absorbed through the leaf, on the end of which the Pitcher grows…

We spent only a short while clambering around the mossy wonderland, before hiking back to the Landrover and making our way further down the mountain…

The sun had burned away the early morning cloud, and in the full light of day, the tea plantations we had earlier stopped at, looked very different… The emerald green of the new shoots on top of the rows of trees was starkly highlighted against the darker background of the older growth…

The sun breaks through the clouds and bathes the valley in light...

It was a beautiful sight, and we insisted that our guide stop and allow us to take more photographs…

The brilliant green had us mesmerized...!!

We stood pointing out the scenes below us to each other, as if seeing them for the first time… This was a spot I could have sat at for the longest of times… Looking out over a view that I would never tire of…

All too soon we were reminded that we still had the butterfly and insect farm to visit, as well a strawberry farm in Brinchang…

We bumped our way further down the hill and back onto the main road to continue our tour…

©GBWT 2011