S2L77: Taman Negara

Taman Negara, Malaysia
February 4-8, 1977

At dusk, thousands upon thousands of swallows line the wires outside the hotel in Jerantut.
We saw a few Samba Deer at the Tahan Hide in Taman Negara.
I took a three hour walk up to the top of Bukit Teresek. Four or five hornbills were the only wildlife.
The Swiss tourists have left, leaving only a dozen or so people.
I spent today sleeping late, reading "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" and writing letters.
We came back down river in a drizzling rain, walked two miles to the train station in the rain.

Source: Personal travel notes.

From 1977 02 02 Malaysia

From Kuala Lumpur, we headed east. At the fattest point of the Malay peninsula, we switched buses at Temerloh and headed north to Jerantut, our jumping off spot for our trip into the Malaysian rain forest. Our means of travel was a long, wide, motorized canoe (I call it a canoe because that's what its shape resembled, but it was bigger than any canoe I was used to). We traveled upriver for an hour or more to Taman Negara, a national park in the heart of the Malaysian forest.

Our stay in Taman Negara was more R&R than "Heart of Darkness." My biggest discovery was a can of A&W Root Beer (or maybe it was Dad's Old Fashioned) in the guest dormitory's refrigerator -- the first I had seen since leaving the US two years earlier. Deer, hornbills, even tigers (which I didn't see), I was prepared to see all of these in the Malaysian jungle. I wasn't prepared to find A&W Root Beer. Sweet.

More photos after the jump.

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From 1977 02 02 Malaysia

From 1977 02 02 Malaysia

One of a continuing series.
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