S is for Sweat, L is for Leeches ...

Taman Negara, Malaysia

I could probably do the whole alphabet like this, e.g. A is for Animals, B is for Boats (or Bats), C is for Caves, D is for Disappointment, E is for Expectations, etc., and so describe my entire visit here but I'm sure people would be bored out of their wits. So, I'll do it in prose instead.
I'll start with E above: Expectations. I arrived at Malaysia's number 1 forest reserve ("Taman Negara" literally means "National Park") with certain plans and hopes. Since this is the world's oldest virgin jungle I wanted to spend as much time in it as I could. Reading up in advance I had spotted the possibility of doing a jungle trek all the way to Gunung Tahan (Mount Tahan), with 2000-something meters height the park's highest peak. This trek would take around seven days there and back and was the longest you could do. So, the first thing I did when I arrived was to start asking the local agencies for this. I was referred to the park headquarters. There I was met only with astounded looks. Gunung Tahan? They consulted their big book of - visitors maybe? Nobody for this month. Nobody for next month. Last month there had been a group. Which brings us very smoothly to D. Alternatives were short "Real Inner Jungle" experience treks. There were two day, three day and four day treks. So, I began asking for the longest, a four day trek. More apologetic looks. They only offered two-day treks. As it turned out only very few people spend more than a few days here, especially now during low season. Would I be interested in a two-day trek? Teeth grinding I considered my options. I could see the length of my stay reducing drastically. I had planned up to ten days but now it looked more like less than half that. After annoying people with repeated questions about extending and other options I finally settled on a two-day trek. Make the best of it and smile.
I started my stay with a guided night walk of one and a half hours through the jungle near the headquarters. This walk had, I would like to think, a Russian commentary. There were four Russians of who only one woman spoke English, so she would translate and comment everything to the others. I'm not actually sure. Only that they were constantly talking about something. Drove me nuts! What was more: we didn't actually see much (except some big spiders). Makes me wonder even more what they were talking about. Of course, there's the darker side of me that blames them for the animals not coming out.
Then came the "inner jungle" trek. I won't go into too much detail to avoid boredom. We'll start with S. I've rarely sweated that much. I believe part of it was due to natural moisture in the air (the place is not called "rain forest" for moot). The rest was pure sweat from marching, climbing up and down hills and over roots and rivers. The terrain was muddy and treacherous, so I didn't actually pay that much attention to the scenery. It consisted of trees mostly anyway. That's why it's called "inner jungle", right? Water and mud seeped into my shoes, splashed onto my trousers. After about an hour of this I was soaked in every possible sense of the word and every possibly imaginable place. Then there's of course L. When they hear jungle people always worry about mosquitoes. Malaria is the buzz word (no pun intended). What they forget to worry about it the little worms sticking out of the muddy ground, lashing around frantically, sniffing for something alive, trying to latch on, then climbing stealthily up your leg until they find a bare spot, then dig in and draw blood until they are full. This can take ten minutes or you can pluck them off first. You'll then bleed for some time until the effects of their saliva that stops blood from clotting wear off. Some guys in the group got spectacular blood stains in their socks like that. I pulled my socks over my trousers and avoided all but one bite (little bastard hit when I had taken my socks off).
We explored a bat cave where bat sh- excrement was almost ankle deep and more seemed to be dripping from the ceiling. "When you look up close your mouth", our guide advised. We slept in a large cavern that reminded me strongly of the mines of Moria in Lord of the Rings. There were no bats but a room that had been used as the human toilet and smelt like that. And we got to swing on a vine across a little stream. A French girl in the group let go to early and crashed into the slope rather than landing on it. Maybe because of that I completely forgot to do the Tarzan yell. Coming back on the second day I've rarely wanted (or required) a shower that badly. Sadly, we saw lots of green and little (read: no) wildlife.
On my third day, after a long rest, I went on the famous canopy walk, apparently the highlight of the park. You walk along rope-bridge-like walkways built into the tree tops. I was surprised that my fear of heights never kicked in. Maybe because most of the time you don't see the ground - only leaves and more leaves.
Finally, on the last evening I wanted to stay overnight in one of the observation hides and try to spot some animals at last. That also fell prey to the letter D when park rangers upped the time it would take me to get to the hide and when I set off it turned out to be too late. So, I went on the "night safari" (not to be confused with the one offered at Singapore Zoo). This is driving around palm oil plantations in a 4x4 pickup with the guide on the roof using a mega-strong search light to spot animals. The theory is that he'll then use that light to blind animals, so that the buggers will stand still while everyone takes a photo. We successfully did that with a sleeping bird and a tiny, harmless (and probably scared shitless) snake. People's cameras flashed duly. Other animals wouldn't come out to be blinded. The bird remained the biggest thing we saw. If I were an animal in that plantation I wouldn't come out either. That light was seriously strong! But I discovered that I have the same musical taste as our driver Faisal. Even his mobile phone ring tone was by Slipknot. Rock on!
So, after too much of D, I finally gave up on animals and activities and headed back to Jerantut after only three days. At least that leaves time for me to head to some islands and lie in the sun some more.