Have been too busy with washing the stuff from the camp. So no time to blog.
Sorry to those who are worried whether I'm still alive from the camp coz I didnt update my whereabout right after the camp. Just realized it's already 3 days after the camp.
Time flies. Grab it when you are capable to.
18 of us departed from KL central to Brinchang in 5 cars. Ngam ngam hou 9 girls 9 guys. lol. We went to the Restaurant Jejantas at the highway there for our breakfast and toilet. Then after that drive all the way to Cameron Highland there, using old road, reached Tanah Rata and had our lunch at T Cafe.
18 of us departed from KL central to Brinchang in 5 cars. Ngam ngam hou 9 girls 9 guys. lol. We went to the Restaurant Jejantas at the highway there for our breakfast and toilet. Then after that drive all the way to Cameron Highland there, using old road, reached Tanah Rata and had our lunch at T Cafe.
The long table at T Cafe
Dino's Strawberry fruity scone and highland tea. I had Spaghetti bologneise. I needed more calories for keeping warm. hehe.
After that, we drove to buy vege at Brinchang to bring up to cook at the peak. We already have the rest. The vege is just as side dishes. lol. Credits goes to Christal, Karlye and Amy already marinated the ku lou yok style chicken (de-boned one to reduce the weight), ZhiYong who didnt go Irau but help cut the onion and garlic and Christal's mum's ku lou yok chicken recipe. The ku lou yok chicken was nice!! And we had bread, sausages, eggs (yes we brought eggs up, luckily din break).
Oops! Out of topic already. Later only show the food pictures. Back to the story.
Amy's first time at Cameron Highland. Take a picture with the famous strawberry. Good choice.
Drove to a dead end road pula. Wrong way already. Have to gostan. This place is seriously very very smelly with shitty smell fertilizers and flies flying around at the roadside. Summore we opened our car window for the chilled air to come in. We let the shitty air came flowing in at the same time.
On the way to the kaki Gunung I took this dreamy picture.
And we saw tea plantation too. And two workers harvesting the leaves with machine.
(This is picture from Yeap)
Finally reached Gunung Brinchang. Parked our cars here, distribute the food to carry and getting ready to trek up. We started trekking up at 2.30pm. A bit later than as planned.
Starting of the trail got construction site which uglify my beloved Irau trek. And also makes it dangerous to walk. Have to be careful with the sharp sharp steels lo. I dun like mountains or hills with cemented trails. Sigh. Just leave it alone la. Trekking in and kacau the plants and soils is already quite bad already, summore go and destroy the nature with man-made stuff. Why?
(Picture from Yeap)
I would rather walk on the muddy trail with moldy and soft branches jutting out than walking on the concrete with sharp metals jutting out.
(Picture from Yeap)
Then started to choose the muddy trek when it's available.
Din took many photo when going up because I got serious back pain before going to Irau for 3 weeks already. When trekking up my back was very pain until I kept adjusting the straps on my rucksack.
Mani and me (picture from Vincent)
And then in the end Emily helped me carry one 1.5L bottle of water and I carry her garlic in return (coz nobody wanna carry the smelly garlic. hehe. everyone keep passing away the garlic). Which left me only two 1.5L bottles, one 500ml bottle, 2 messtins, 1 cup, sleeping bag, clothes (2 T-shirts, 1 short and 1 pant), snacks, a pair of slippers, camera, handphone, purse, swiss knife, torchlight, a set of rain coat, a tiny first aid bag, tent (excluding the pole and pacak), a package of garlic and a packages of sausage. I dunno what was the exact weight la. But after taking off the 1.5L bottle I'm ok with the weight of the rucksack already and have no more back pain until now. I think maybe because my rucksack is only 40L which lead to nasty weight distribution when I stuff too many things in? Dunno la. Or maybe the way I arrange the stuff in my rucksack.
This is the only nice scenery I took while going up the mountain. Actually this Gunung is a bit special. When I say going up, it doesn't mean all the way up. At the beginning it's all the way down. Then we go up again. Then down again. Up and down several times then only can reach the peak. Like roller coaster.
And this mountain is very tall (2100m). So when we were trekking we were actually walking in the mist. Very nice!
(picture from Vincent)
The trail was tricky with mud, some fast mud (meaning when you step in you will sink into the mud. The worst can be until knee level), tweaks and weird looking branches that block the way and you have to either crawl underneath or climb on top of them.
Can see ah? The footprints. Very, very muddy.
This is a medium deep mud. The first thing I did after accidentally stepped into the mud was to take out my camera. lol. Not my leg. No worries folks. I'd already secured myself from further sinking by securing my butt to a big tree root (sitting on a root), plus actually this mud is not deep also. This is the deepest it could go already, on a non-rainy day la.
I din have the chance and the gut to take a picture with the deep one. Those deep ones can be easily seen coz on top got water one. Normally when we see watery one we already dun step on it la. Unless you're dreaming la. lol.
When I saw this roadsign beside our trek I wanna pengsan lo. We only trekked 0.8km and there's loads more to trek! And it was already 4 something in the afternoon and the trek will be harsher when it gets dark. So after seeing this sign we started to push ourselves walk faster.
Luckily I had Dino's Cloud 9 and also my Mars chocolate bar. Without them I dunno whether I can have enough energy to continue walking.
Finally we (Me, Emily, Dino, William and Vincent Lim) reached the peak at 7.30pm before it turned dark. Some of them were already at the peak and some were behind us including the sweepers Adrian, Mani and Geraldine.
(Picture taken from PeiTing)
Eminem style. lol. The first picture taken when I reached the peak. We queued up for this picture before entering the platform of the peak. lol.
Signboard at the peak
When everyone reached the peak, we started to cook our dinner. Marinated chicken with onion and garlic, rice and vege we bought from Brinchang.
(picture from Yeap)
The oil still looks normal here. Wait until the next day. It gets all creamy and sticky.
(picture from Yeap)
Cooking dinner with Bunsen burners and frying pan or mess tin
This is Christal's ku lou yok chicken served with BBQ sauce. Yum! Nice one.
Then we all chit chat a bit (10 people squeezed in a 4 men tent!), then go sleep at 11 something. lol. Very tired ma.
This is the tent I borrow from Madam Yul my swimming coach. Pretty warm inside. Except during late night when the wind blow like crazy.
I woke up feeling cold at 4 something am and with my eyes shut I heard whushing sound. Sounds like sea waves. I was wondering where I was that time. Then only realized that it was the wind blow sound.
The next morning we woke up and checked the temperature.
(picture from Mani)
It was 12.2 degree celcius! I belief late night it was even colder.
Damn cold with wind blowing and the weak shielding of the tent and sleeping bag. Summore hor, some of the times I walk around bare footed coz I lend my slippers to Dino and my shoes to Christal. The chill from the stone is like stepping on ice. Damn 'syok'.
So now everyone was awake.
Waiting for breakfast.
Sausauge and cheese with bread or fried eggs anyone?
The boiling water section for tea/coffee/milo
Cover one messtin with another hoping it can boil faster
Peiting with her concentrated tea. lol.
Magnificent morning view
I look very unfeminine here. Please ignore this picture. lol
Dino and me. She stood on a stone la. She not so tall la. lol =P (I still look very un-fem here with my hair tied up. Please ignore me in the picture)
Emily and me. (ok. This one no need ignore.)
Then after that we trek down at around 9 something. We brought 3 guni of rubbish down including the dinner, breakfast and some rubbish some scouts left at the peak. That's the difference between Raleigh and scouts they say. Scouts chop down the trees or branches and throw rubbish everywhere in the jungle. In contrast, Raleigh try to minimize the impact of trek and camping on the jungle. We din even set up campfire at the peak coz we duwan to create too much smoke which will pollute the environment and might affect the plantations there. Coz we are jungle's friends! Woo-hoo!
Save the environment.
Take nothing but photographs.
Leave nothing but footsteps.
(Picture from Yeap)
Emily carrying a guni of rubbish down the mountain
When going down mountain I already have 2 bottles of water less. Which means 3 kg less! So it was a leisure trek down the mountain. So I started to stop whenever I saw something worth photographing. Summore the lighting was better than late afternoon.
The famous mossy forest in Gunung Irau:
I like how the branches twist. See the bottom right branch.
Mossy giant
The ghostly mossy trees
The famous photographic spot. You can easily find photos of this spot in Google when you type Gunung Irau or Mount Irau. This is not the trail la. Just a side view from the trail.
(picture from Yeap)
Like the forest in Lord of the Ring . Everyone says so.
Some creatures and plants:
Millipede. I used branch to poke it and it curled. So it's definitely not centipede la. But it's huge! Thicker than my index finger.
Red mushrooms. Very pretty. But I dun dare to touch. Scare later they shoot some toxic to me then I die.
Tiny little mushrooms. About 3mm tall only. There were plenty on a rock.
All the white white things are the mushrooms
Another mushroom. Cute!
Another mushroom. Image a bit blur. Hehe. I tried my best to keep my hands less shaky already. Shaky from the climbs and crawls.
Plants entangled on a tree trunk
Quite a common mushroom that we can see in normal forests
White flowers which looks like a kind of biscuit (my childhood favourite biscuit) when it is not blossomed yet
Roots (or branches?) entangling with each other. What an art!
Another type of white flower. There's another type with purple colour inside one. But the wind kept blowing until the flower kept moving. I cant take a good picture of the flower.
A red flower waiting to blossom
Pitcher plant! There were plenty up there! Summore got nice pattern on it one.
See the bug inside? At the top right corner.
Pink flower
Another type of pink flower
The rest are random pictures during trekking back:
It's a slanting tree trunk with moss on the trunk. I'm supposed to lie down on the trunk. But this picture makes it looks like I'm standing. Maybe the rucksack pillowing underneath.
A spider corpse stuck on my shoes. I think I din kill it. It was dead before I stepped on the mud. But I still feel bad though. Coz spider is one of my favourite animal.
Monkey in action!
I purposely ask Addy to take this picture for me. I went to lie on the trunk head down and then turn around. But unluckily both my feet ter-stepped into the watery mud when I turned coz I forgot to lock my leg on the trunk. Dirty my shoes even more. lol.
Can see the mud at the right hand side? It's the watery mud I mentioned. If you stepped in, you will sink down to knee level. The safe way is stepping on roots or branches. I had a lot of feet massage from stepping on branches and roots during the trek. lol.
Yeap taking a picture of me when I taking picture of the very steep slope
Nice view
Another steep slope
Nice branches.
(Picture from Yeap)
Snake-like branches
(Picture from Yeap)
Snake-like roots also
After that, we waited for the rest to come down at a hut. So ngam when I reached the hut it started to rain heavily. I used the rainwater and some grasses to brush away the mud on my shoes. hehe. Sorry, I had to sacrifice you poor grass. But no worries, the grass is those strong wild weeds we see everywhere here. It will grow back to its population soon one.
(picture from Yeap)
William, Emily and Karlye the unlucky one who got soaked in the rain when trekking down.
After cleaning up and changed our dirty clothes, we headed for our lunch at Brinchang town. Lunch. But it was already 3 something pm.
Steamboat! Fresh vege and mushroom!
Thanks Vincent for serving.
Dino posing hard. =P
Then hor after that the boss of the restaurant gave strawberry ice stalks free of charge
Christal eating her strawberry ice stalk
Then we took the new route back. Safer and faster.
Luckily it didnt rain during the camp. Otherwise the temperature will be very interesting. And the temperature there made us feel refreshed and din feel out of breath or tired at all when climbing. =) Nice trek with the mud and tricky branches and roots (I like!!)Nice scenery with the mossy trees and nice temperature.
Do check on other blogs on this Irau trip
http://madamedexterous.blogspot.com/2008/07/roller-coaster-ride.html
http://bikenuts.blogspot.com/2008/07/gunung-irau-2110m.html
p/s: When we were eating steamboat only I realised I lost a camera rechargeable battery. Argh. Kek Sei. Must be when I keep taking out the camera pouch for photographing during the trek.
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