Road Tripping Jerantut-K. Gelanggi-Tmn Negara Pahang

Bismillahirrahmanirrahim.
Assalamualaikum :)

Tibe2 mood menulis datang :P

I have always wanting to go to Taman Negara Pahang since FOREVER! The idea of going to the wild excite me eventho most of the creatures there saye takut :| . There were several plans/attempts to go but very hard to get it worked out tapi AKHIRNYE I went last weekend alhamdulillah. It started with Groupon publishing a deal on caving in Kota Gelanggi. M bought the deal and asked me and Z to join. Then it hit me. This is the chance to go to Tmn Neg! So I asked them whether they were ok with going to Taman Negara after the caving. I am glad they agreed so I came up with our own itenerary.
The initial plan with them was to go before Ramadhan. But we can only plan, Allah indeed has planned everything for us. After several changes of the plans and many more people to join, we went last weekend :D There were 8 of us. Yerp! I saw a good package with really affordable price but the requirement is to have minimum of 8 people. I tell ya, it was not easy to get these 8 people but I am glad we managed. Wee!!

Friday
So we started the journey on Friday night. Planned to reach Jerantut before 12am but we actually left KL around 1130pm :| Reached the hotel at 2am. Everybody was tired. We stayed at Hotel Inderapura. Cheap and comfy, I like :D Walking distance to the bus station (good recommendation to those travelling by bus). We however drove ourselves :)

Saturday
The next morning, woke up, check out, had breakfast and off we go to Kota Gelanggi. There were 4 caves. I must say the activity wasn't challenging at all. Even kids can do it I suppose. At first I thought it will be wet but we were dry as dry leaves :| We saw bats, a dead centipede, spiders, and a cricket. The cave forms are beautiful. There was 1 incident with A. While climbing down the cave, she misstep, ran backward and almost fell down a hole that used to be the grave of Japanese soldiers :| We laughed about it because it sure was funny watching her but I know we shouldn't :| She was scared as hell. Sorry A! You know we love you no matter what :D

L-@ Gua Sanding

UR-Where they buried all the soldiers then

BR-@ Wind Cave

After the caving, we hunt (chewah) for lunch. Ended up with nasi lemak and char kueyteow :| Along the way, we saw cows, goats, sheep, squirrels, an otter crossed the road..ok what else? It was definitely a countryside. Pemandangan hanyalah mountains and trees and oil palm trees, and nothing more.  I enjoyed it. The air was great too (durgh! ).  Reached Taman Negara around 4pm. I must say, eventho the caving wasn't tough, we were tired. Probably lack of sleep the night before. Luckily our next activity started later at night so we managed to get some good rest. At night, after the BIG dinner (yes, we had 3 big bowls of rice with plenty of dishes, 3 big jars of fresh orange alhamdulillah) we started our night jungle trekking.

Agoh Chalet

To go to Taman Negara, we had to cross Sg Tembeling. No crocodiles ever found there no worries :) As soon as we stepped on Taman Negara, we saw a wild tapir!!! Everyone was excited. Took a lot of pictures. Many tried to touch it. After several minutes, I was convinced by Z to touch it too and so I did. The skin feels like er..rough with fur :| Then when I tried to take picture with the tapir, it suddenly turned around and attacked me! I ran. All of us ran. I didn't dare to look back. 1 of our friends did and saw the tapir lift up its trunk, showed the teeth, sprayed me and ran away. Now how wild can that be ey? I was in the wild, got sprayed by a wild tapir on the face some more! 1 crazy experience hehe. Worth to tell anak cucu later? :P
We also saw a porcupine and many insects. It was full moon. The guide said animals don't go out from their place when the sky is bright. Too bad but it was still a good experience :) We shared some good stories with the guide (some are quite scary). We were asked to go out from the jungle before 12am. Later that night, the boys decided to lepak at 1 gerai to watch football. The girls went straight to bed.

Nite Jungle walk

Sunday
It was hard to wake everybody up. Chilly morning, body ache all over and lack of sleep were major contributions. The morning activity was delayed by 1 hour :|
We walked through the canopy walkway, the longest in the world! Jyeah! Some of us were afraid of heights but got hang of it after several checkpoints. Then we headed for the Rapid Shooting. We were on a boat, try to go against the river's rapid. Wet and fun!!

Visited the Batek (aborigines) afterwards. Learnt their culture, tried the blowpipes, visited the whole village, tried to make fire from scratch (I managed to get smoke but no amber. Survivor candidate failed!). Later we went to a cool place near the river for a swim. We were like budak kampung. The boat man found us some bamboos and we tried to invent games. Most of the games were stupid but super fun! Haha. He also taught us a cool way to make paint. Many faces got painted forcefully haha. At that time, no one wants to go back. Everyone wish to stay, away from the hectic city life, having not to think about everything. Such bliss! :P But only for a moment. :(
We headed back to our chalet. Check out at 4pm. Luckily the owner was nice and I managed to kawtim with him :P We still need to pay him some (of course!). Sent off Z @ Temerloh. Reached home 1ish in the morning.

@ Orang Asli Village

All in all, everyone had fun alhamdulillah. We had some sunburnt. Don't dare think that there will be no sun in the forest. This is Malaysia not Antartica :| Learnt my lesson :( Just put on the sunblock whenever wherever :|

I prayed that I will be healthy to go to this kind of adventures again insyaAllah.