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*Tue
7.11
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*This day
doesn't exist.:-)
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Surprisingly
enough, despite baking in a non-air conditioned - ceiling fan - only room,
I got a decent night's sleep. I woke up at 7:00 and went looking for some
breakfast before departure for the national park at 8:30AM. I was able
to go next door and pick up some nan and curry for cheap. I ate it as
well as a mushroom omelet I ordered from the hostel. But in the midst
of it I had a sudden urge to visit the bathroom. It was a very efficient
visit with the meeting of a squat toilet. It burned a little (must have
been the curry) and I thought I had some kind of hemorrhoid episode coming.
Fortunately my intestines settled and I was fine for the rest of the day.
On
the way to the park, the mini van took us to a cacao plantation and explained
the many used of this fruit. From it comes chocolate and many other things.
It can also be eaten (the seeds' meat that is). It tastes like a mangosteen,
but if you have not tasted mangosteen, then you should go to a country
with a tropical climate and try one. Then later we went to a rubber tree
farm, where latex was being harvested by "tapping" the trees. It was kind
of strange to see a milky white substance flowing from a tree. Lastly
we stopped by a palm oil plantation where they harvest the fruit (which
is nasty to eat), boil out the oil, and use it for a variety of purposes.
By
11:30AM, we made it to Taman Negara National Park. I checked myself into
the nearby guesthouse, had lunch, then we were on our own. To get to the
park, you have to pay RM.50 to have a boat take you across the river.
From here I decided to take a 4-hour loop hike. At the park's entrance
which was filled with out-of-place upscale bungalows, I walked awhile
before finding a real dirt trail, as opposed to a cement sidewalk. In
the mid-80 degree heat, but a sweltering humidity, I was drenched in my
own sweat after about an hour's walk. I hadn't sweat so much since Hawaii
the year before, but this was worse because I was only carrying a daypack
and there was no rain.
I
made it to the Canopy Walk, a raised walk of up to about 100ft. It was
a very unstable, sometimes downright scary, pathway from tree to tree.
It's just a gimmick as all it does is go in a circle, however it does
give a good view of the river. In continuing on this loop trail, I was
hoping to hit some peaks to see some views. So either I missed them or
got lost as I tried to find them. It turned out I was on the right trail
as I soon ended up at a river where people fish and swim, but I didn't
see either. I took a short break and wrung out my shirt from all of the
sweat. It probably made me 5 pounds lighter. Coming to the conclusion
of this sweaty trek, I came to a small village of aboriginal Malaysia.
Many of the children were just standing inching their way closer out of
curiosity and to see what they could get from another foreigner. I took
my pictures and wanted to give them something other than my balloons seeing
that it would spoil them, but looking at their living environment - seeing
grass huts and modern tents, I gave them the balloons. When they took
them, they scurried off rather quickly.
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These
people were black with afros, living only a few hundred feet from the
well developed tourist huts of modern Malaysia. I wondered how they exist,
other than getting handouts from tourists. It is possible they get paid
by the government to live there.
I returned to Agoh's Guesthouse and took a much needed shower. Not having the luxury of hot water wasn't much of a concern. I needed to be chilled. Upon leaving this shower/toilet room, I soon started sweating. It's very difficult to stay dry there. I often had to reposition myself as I wrote to stay dry in that two-fan room with 3 Hollanders.
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