Introduction

In the heart of the Titiwangsa Mountain Range, which makes up the central spine of Peninsular Malaysia, lies the country's most important protected area called Taman Negara (which means 'National Park'). The park comprises over 4,000 square kilometres of primary forest, mountain peaks, swift-flowing rivers and cascades.

Parts of the area were first protected in 1925 as the Gunung Tahan Game Reserve, named after the area's highest peak. In 1939, while under British jurisdiction, the protected area was expanded to encompass parts of the states of Pahang, Trengganu and Kelantan and was renamed King George V National Park. After Malaysia's independence, in 1957, the area assumed its current title of Taman Negara

River Trips
The easiest and most popular way to see Taman Negara is to hire a boat and crew at Kuala Tahan, the entry point to the park and the area zoned for accommodation. The 8 kilometre boat ride to the cascades at Lata Berkoh passes through some of the most magnificent tropical rainforest in Southeast Asia. Huge forest giants line the river banks, their massive trunks leaning over the river at a remarkable angle in an effort to reach the sunlight. In places these huge trees have crashed into the river where the strong current has undercut the river bank. Festooned with epiphytic ferns, mosses and orchids, the age of these wonderful trees can only be guessed at.

Other river trips easily arranged at the park headquarters include visits to Sungai Melantai and Sungai Keniam further north. Unless recent rains and landslides have muddied the waters upstream, many of the rivers of Taman Negara are invariably crystal clear and refreshingly cool. Fishing is allowed in the park, but it takes a skilled angler to catch the famed Sebarau fish which inhabit these waters.

Walking the Forests

Walking trails lead to a number of mountain peaks. Serious trekkers can attempt the 55-kilometre trail to Gunung Tahan, which needs a good deal of commitment and stamina. Day walkers can aim for the nearby peak of Bukit Teresek, just 2 kilometres from the headquarters, and a longer return trail taking about 4 hours may be attempted. Walking along the forest trails should not be taken lightly - the paths are criss-crossed by numerous tree roots and are often muddy and slippery.

Walkers and hikers invariably fail to see the detail in the rainforest; it is better to walk slowly and quietly and to keep an eye out for the smaller forms of nature.
Night Hides

Those who visit Southeast Asia's tropical rainforest for the first time are often disappointed by the apparent lack of large mammals such as Tiger, Leopard, Rhinoceros, Sun Bear etc. These larger species are extremely difficult to locate on account of their sensitivity to disturbance. However an overnight stay at one of Taman Negara's hides, strategically located close to natural salt licks, is often rewarded by the sight of such mammals as the Malayan Tapir or the Asian Elephant. Even if such species are not seen, simply to hear the incessant calls of nocturnal insects, frogs and birds in the heart of the forest is an experience in itself.

Insect Life
The diversity of insects in tropical forests is huge ... species probably number in the millions. Most easily seen are butterfly species such as the Five-bar Swordtail, which congregate at areas such as campsites, banks of streams, or along paths where foodstuffs have been dropped.

Perhaps the most numerous insects are the ants and termites. These form extensive colonies located underground or in rotten tree trunks. Witness the millions of busy termites which follow trails snaking across the forest floor, and you will then grasp how key these species are to rainforest ecology. Their role is to digest rotting wood and to return the nutrients to the soil; without this function it is probable that the forests would not survive, for each new tree needs the nutrients of fallen, rotten trees in order to grow.
The Giant Forest Ant Camponotus gigas is a rather solitary species which prefers to scavenge the forest floor. Some specimens can reach over one inch in length, but despite this huge size they are harmless and will not bite humans.

At night the loud, reverberating call of the Oriental Mole Cricket Gryllotalpa orientalis may be heard. This species inhabit burrows excavated in sandy soils from where they make quick attacks on passing prey
 

Exotic Birds - Great Argus, Masked Finfoot, Rhinoceros Hornbill
For many the attraction of Taman Negara is the abundant bird life, reckoned to comprise over 350 species. Though many forest species live secretive lives, either foraging in the undergrowth or hiding up in the canopy, at times these species may visit more open areas when there are flowering or fruiting trees. Perhaps the easiest place to spot a diversity of birds is right at your resort, where trees attractive to birds may have been planted; birds will be active at these sites early in the morning.

The lucky and observant visitor may encounter such exotic species as the Crested Fireback (a type of pheasant) and the Great Argus as it performs in its dancing ground. Hornbills are often seen, including the Wreathed, Great and Indian Pied Hornbill; the Rhinoceros Hornbill is perhaps the most dramatic of all, with its huge red, orange and yellow casque. During the winter migration season, when birds from North Asia move south to warmer climes, the rare and unusual Masked Finfoot may be sighted along the banks of Taman Negara's rivers. Keep an eye out too for the attractive Black and Red Broadbill, and other Southeast Asian forest birds including Leafbirds, Trogons, the Asian Fairy Bluebird, Barbets, Minivets and Woodpeckers.
 

Other features
Taman Negara is also home to one of Malaysia's aboriginal groups, the Batek. As with other Orang Asli (or 'Original People') they traditionally led a nomadic lifestyle in the forests, hunting game with blowpipes. In recent years they have been settled by the government in villages, and visits to these settlements can be arranged.

The park also has a number of caves, some of which are open to the public. Many species of bat roost in these caves and these secretive mammals are easily disturbed, so excessive numbers of visitors should not be encouraged.

Near the park headquarters there is also a canopy walkway allowing a closer look at the ecology of the treetops. At 400 metres in length this is reputedly the longest in the world, though in recent years it has suffered through lack of proper maintenance. A good deal of concentration is needed to keep one's focus on the flora at canopy level, and not be distracted by the swaying walkway.

A 3-hour boat ride from the Kuala Tembeling landing jetty near Temerloh was once needed to reach the park headquarters at Kuala Tahan. Recently, however, a new road has opened to Kuala Tahan, but this cannot compare to a relaxing boat ride. Visitors can stay at the Taman Negara Resort at Kuala Tahan, which has over 100 comfortable chalets. Across the river, budget accommodation is available.

Lodges are also available at Kuala Terenggan and Kuala Kenyam deeper in the park, however these are badly maintained and not recommended. The office of the Department of Wildlife and National Parks is located at the Taman Negara Resort; check there for fishing permits and other requirements.

 Links to Hotels & Apartments By Alphabetical Order

Mother Nature's Treasure Trove
Spread out over 4,343 sq. km. of the formidable Titiwangsa Mountain Range is Taman Negara - One of the world's oldest tropical rainforest. A sanctuary to hundreds of species of birds, butterflies, insects, fish and plants. Home to Malaysia's friendly aborigines, the Orang Asli. A shy yet gentle race, they continue to live the nomadic way they've lived for centuries although fully aware of the country's fast-paced progress.
Come discover the living treasures Mother Nature has to offer. Whether it's shooting thrilling rapids, exploring spectacular caves, tackling a 20-pound fish, scaling up Peninsular Malaysia's highest mountain, trekking through dense, tricky forest pathways or swimming in crystal clear pools, Malaysia's National Park is a natural paradise you must experience. An adventure of a lifetime awaits you here
130 Million Year Old Park

Taman Negara straddles the interior border regions of Kelantan, Pahang and Terengganu, boasting a continuous evolutionary history that spans 130 million years. Owing to a state legislation in 1925, about 1,300 sq. km. of tropical jungle in its natural state was designated the Gunung Tahan Game Reserve. In 1939, the three sultans of the above-mentioned states declared the area a national park. It was renamed King George V National Park. Following the nation's independence from the British in 1957, the park was officially given the name it goes by now.

Over the years, although Malaysia has promoted Taman Negara as a popular tourist destination, the government has taken careful steps to ensure the conservation of the park's flora and fauna. All developments or upgrading programmes to cater for tourists are carried out only after consultation with environmental experts.

Spanning 4,343 sq. km and sprawled across the mountainous interiors of Kelantan, Pahang, and Terengganu is Taman Negara, Malaysia's premier national park. Formerly known as King George V National Park, the area was declared a national park by the three sultans of the above mentioned states as early as 1939 for the sole purpose of protecting and preserving the flora and fauna indigenous to this area.
This is seen as a natural move as Taman Negara is thought to be one of earth's oldest rain forest, with a history that stretches back to 130 million years ago. Undisturbed for a millennia, it maintains a natural habitat for a variety of flora and fauna, many of which have become highly specialized and are inter-linked with other species in both parasitic and symbolic ways. Although Malaysia has promoted Taman Negara as a popular tourist destination, the government has, over the years, taken careful steps to ensure its continuous conservation.

Lush riverine vegetation and trees that form a giant canopy above you plays a warm welcome to the start of a great adventure into an unknown and mysterious world that is reputably older than that of the Congo and Amazon.

Within this area, around the central masif of Gunung Tahan (the Peninsula's highest peak at 2,187 meters), there are countless limestone hills covered in thick forest, fast running streams, and abundant wildlife. Mind you, the rain forest is not a quiet place. In some respects it is as noisy as any big city with a cacophony of insect noises, bird calls, and animal cries that goes on night and day. This makes it a particularly favorable destination for trekking as the park's biodiversity is matched by a good network of jungle trails and the availability of expert guides.

Malaysian place names are fairly uninspired. From Muddy Confluence I went to National Park; yes, Taman Negara literally means 'Park National', a whoppingly original name for a National Park, don't you think? I wondered if I'd soon be crossing River Sungai on my way up Mt Gunung on beautiful Pulau Island...

The bus journey from KL to the jetty at Kuala Temering was fairly uneventful; I slept through most of it, thankfully. The only way to get into Taman Negara is by a three-hour boat trip up the Sungai Temering, as there are no roads, a pretty far-sighted move by the environmental department, one of the few nods in the direction of conservation that you'll see in Malaysia. On arrival I sorted out the business of a permit and booking nights in the relevant huts – wading through reams of bureaucratically nonsensical paperwork in the process – rented a cooker and pot, and packed my bag. For some reason it felt heavier than normal, by a long way; I've been on walks much longer than six days, and I swear I didn't need this much junk. Perhaps packing two long novels (Vikram Seth's A Suitable Boy and Nicholas Evans' The Horse Whisperer), a computer and lots of food was the reason, but I needed my recreation out there in the jungle...

Kuala Tahan, home to Park HQ, with Wan's Floating Restaurant on the left
I dined at Wan's Floating Restaurant, recommended to me by an American called John whom I'd befriended in Melaka. Indeed, it proved to be the hotspot of Kuala Tahan (the home to Park HQ and the fancy Taman Negara Resort, the Malaysian answer to Kakadu's Jabiru) and before long I was surrounded by warbling Germans, Dutch, Indians and locals. I chatted to Wan for a bit, but something in me didn't want conversation; it was time I buggered off into the jungle for a bit of solitude among the flora and fauna. Sod the people; I wanted Mother Nature.

And I got her. Because central Peninsula Malaysia has been free of such excitements as seismic activity, ice ages or man's never-ending quest for wood, Taman Negara contains the oldest tropical jungle1 in the world, some 130 million years old, and it looks like it. After 130 million years the trees, vines, shrubs and bush bastards have evolved into something quite, quite different, and a whole lot nastier.
Into the Jungle

The luxurious hide at Bumbun Kumbang
The trek into the jungle was pure hell. I'd set my sights on the lodge at Kuala Perkai, some 28km from park headquarters, as a good place to get away from it all, and reckoned that two days' walking, one of 11km (staying the night in a hide called Bumbun Kumbang) and one of 17km, would be fairly acceptable. How little I knew of the rigours of hardcore tropical jungle; the first day took a little over five-and-a-half hours of hard slog, and the second a whopping nine hours.

It's not all unpleasantries in the jungle, though. Despite the fact that the going was tough, it was a unique and quite fascinating walk. My destination, a fishing lodge on the confluence of Sungai Keniam and Sungai Perkai called Kuala Perkai (see the logic of Malaysian place names?), had been described as an isolated paradise by the ever-effusive John, and although I felt that was a bit of an overstatement, it certainly was pretty. Actually, he'd said it would be a perfect place for a honeymoon, but seeing the lodge and remembering that John was from a country whose divorce rate is among the highest in the western world (if not the highest), I remembered too late that objectivity is always subjective when it comes to the opinions of travelers.

Enjoying a solitary cup of tea in spooky out-of-season Keniam Lodge
The journey was not without its interesting parts. My stay in the hide2 at Bumbun Kembang was considerably enlivened by the presence of a white cat, who had obviously decided he was living there and that was that. As I stomped up the stairs to the hide and dumped my dripping pack on the floor, the cat shot me the look of a superior being, as if to say, 'I live here, so don't get any ideas, buster.'
'Yeah, well I've paid my five ringgit to stay here, which is more than you have, cat,' I replied. 'And don't get any ideas about stealing my food in the middle of the night.'
'Who, me?' yawned the cat, wide-eyed and innocent. 'I'm a cat of the jungle, my friend, and I catch my own food. So there.'

'And no pissing in the corner, either,' I said, noticing an unpleasantly familiar smell coming from the corner where it sat.
'Harrumph,' said the cat, scratching his neck and studiously turning away from me, staring out of the window as if I didn't exist. Not surprisingly he came and went as he pleased, and I hid my food in the mattress locker, which he obviously hadn't mastered yet.

Sungai Trenggan from Keniam Lodge
The only tourists I saw were a young couple, fleetingly, whom I met just five minutes from the hide, and a Kuala Lumpur man called Pati who also stayed the night in Bumbun Kembang. I did come across a good example of the tourist trade at Keniam Lodge, a decent-sized collection of luxury huts and central eating areas that looked amazingly tranquil in this, the closed season. All that was left of the tourists was a menu board showing overpriced standard meals, and a sign tacked up saying, 'Closed from 1.11.97 to 31.12.97.' I dumped my pack, discovered flowing water in the toilets, and had a cup of tea, overlooking a picturesque bend in the Sungai Trenggan. It felt like something out of The Shining, this ghost town of a resort, normally bubbling with life but now silent and home only to spiders and piles of leaves. It was strangely moving.

The Fishing Lodge
The fishing lodge at Kuala Perkai
I was soon back on the trail, getting hopelessly lost and having to ask for help from the locals, but I soon arrived at Kuala Perkai. I spent two full days at the fishing lodge, and it rained for almost all of that time. I found myself writing a lot (luckily I'd packed my computer) and reading a lot (fortunately A Suitable Boy is a monster of a novel). My clothes and pack steadfastly refused to dry out, I ate noodles and pasta in various unexciting combinations, and it wasn't long before I was bored out of my tiny skull.
It takes a special kind of person to really enjoy having nothing to do. Take sitting on the beach, for example; even if it's a two-week holiday between executive stresses, I still get frustrated and bored, and end up getting drunk or going out of my mind, often at the same time. The jungle wasn't quite this bad, but sitting on a verandah, watching the river flow by while the wildlife chorused around me, was only pleasant, not exactly riveting. Despite the fact that I knew I was going to have to go through hell again, I was keen to get back on the track.

Relaxing by the river at Kuala Perkai
On Friday 5th December I hauled out from the lodge, packing my still-wet belongings into my still-damp pack, squelching into my still-sodden boots and starting off down the still-drenched track. The trek back to Bumbun Kumbang was distinctly easier the second time round; it always goes more smoothly when you're fitter, have a lighter pack and know the route, and this time I didn't bother to explore the ancient limestone caves I'd checked out on the way in, so I arrived at the hide with plenty of daylight to spare. This was fortuitous; the leeches had obviously learned a few new tricks, because when I took off my socks, there were maybe five on each foot, merrily sucking away. During the trek I'd had the usual problems, and one had even managed to climb up my leg and suck where the sun doesn't shine3. I needed the extra time to burn them off and tend to my wounds.

Reading a book on the fishing lodge verandah at Kuala Perkai
There was one more thing that drove me mad, though, mad enough to make me stick my earplugs in when I arrived at the hide. All day – I swear, there was no break – I had something buzzing round my left ear. I have no idea why my left ear was singled out for such attention, or what kind of buzzing insect it was, but however energetically I waved my arms around and swatted the air, I couldn't connect with anything, and instead developed a sympathetic buzzing in my brain that kept going well after the walking had stopped. The earplugs helped, but I couldn't help being reminded of a particularly persistent blowfly that did the same thing as I hauled my way up Katherine Gorge in Australia's Northern Territory. My left side must smell more divine than my right... or is it the other way around for flies? Not surprisingly, the resident cat was no help at all; all he did was look me up and down, sneer and tell me, in no uncertain terms, to buzz off.
Luxury in the wilderness, at the rather pleasant Taman Negara Resort
I returned to civilisation on Saturday 6th to find that after paying for my cooker and locker rental, I was broke. Whoops. Luckily the local glossy resort cashed a cheque for me – at a rate which had shot up considerably in my favour in the six days I'd been in the jungle due to the developing currency crisis – so it wasn't long before I was able to kick back, relax and enjoy the jungle from a safe distance. There are no leeches in Wan's Floating Restaurant, and I spent a very pleasant evening there with a couple from Perth whom I'd met while cashing up; we whiled away the night chatting about Kalgoorlie and Western Australia, and dreaming wistfully of the dry night air in the Australian desert.

Typically, the weather cleared up for my return, enabling me to see the moon and stars for the first time in ages. I sat by the river, gazing at the constellations, and to my amazement spotted the distinctive w-shape of Cassiopeia, a constellation I hadn't seen since October 1995. I used to know where all the various pointers in Cassiopeia led to, but all I could think of was how much I missed the sky when I couldn't see it. Which now, of course, I could.

1 Although Taman Negara is properly referred to as a rainforest – as in tropical rainforest, semi-tropical rainforest and temperate rainforest – I think 'jungle' sums it up better. The word jungle is defined in the dictionary as 'thick, tropical forest', and so it applies perfectly to Taman Negara. It's probably less scientific than rainforest, but I want to emphasise how different this place is to the other rainforests I've explored. Taman Negara truly is a jungle.

2 Hides are so called because they are perched high up on stilts, affording a good view of a grassy patch which wildlife frequents only when nobody is in the hide, of course. It wasn't as pleasant as the fishing lodge, but it served its purpose as a break in the walk, and it did have a pretty view.

3 A bit higher up and he'd have been performing a service that desperate men pay for. Walking can be such a thrill!