Much needed road trip with the girls-! Destination... Sungai Lembing, Pahang. Population... Almost non existent. Not only did it served as a getaway trip after our Sem5 finals, but it was also a farewell trip for dear Bob, since she pretty much made it a compulsory trip. We reached Kuantan after an approximate 3.5 hour drive and went to hunt for lunch.
It took us quite long to locate this pao shop, Thong Kuok. Seriously, the best pao's I've ever had in my 21 years. Don't really know the history behind this place but there are a few branches all over town. There's also one in Sri Jaya, which is a place located an hour away from Kuantan. You'll pass by it on the way or on the way back.
This is Andrea's char siew pao. I ordered the butter kaya pao which was absolutely delicious-! Much better than any kaya or lotus pao. Normal pao's like read bean and kaya butter are priced at RM1.40 per pao whereas more fanciful ones such as cheese or char siew are priced at RM1.60. They're "choi pao" *huge ass vege pao* are pretty popular too.
We settled at a neighbouring coffee shop for lunch because we were too hungry to go hunt for food somewhere else. Majority of the eateries were closed due to bulan puasa so we had to take what we could find. I sometimes forget how cheap it is to eat in small towns. A bowl of curry noodles + barley ice only costs RM5.30. Eating the exact same thing in KL would set you back to RM10, if you had it in... lets say Old Town?
That was also my first bowl of curry noodles I consumed ON MY OWN. I know, such a pussy right. I've always hated spicy food since young because I couldn't stand the spiciness. But I'm slowly finding it an essential whenever I eat now. Then again, it would be quite embarrassing for a Malaysian to not be able to consume spicy food wouldn't it -.-"
Stopped by a temple by a lake because it was still too early to check into the dorm. Forgotten what was the name of the temple but the view of the lake was simply breathtaking. The weather was perfect as well, sunny but it was accompanied with a slight breeze. I think after a few decades of living a sinful life, the only way for me to even consider as a good human being would be for me to work on the temple grounds for the remaining of my retirement @.@ actually, no. I think it would still be too late by then.
Finally checked into our dorm, which is located in Sungai Lembing, Pahang... Approximately a 45min journey from Kuantan town. Its actually more like a home stay/dorm because a family runs it and they're living on the same land as well. The green building on the right is the family's house and the beige building on the left is the common restroom. The dorms are located on a hill right at the back of these two buildings.
It was an uber cheap trip. RM220 per person which includes 2night 1 day accommodation, 2 breakfast's, 2 dinner's and transportation to the foot of the rainbow waterfall (1hr journey by jeep).
This is what the inside of the dorm looks like. It fits 10, 5 below and 5 above and one bathroom. Its pretty decent in size but the mosquitoes that resides in the dorm is HELL. I didn't really get bitten much because I spammed the mosquito repellent, but I did get bed bug bites after the entire trip :/
We lazed around and slept for about 2 hours, mainly because there's nothing much to do in the village because it was practically deserted due to bulan puasa.
We had dinner at one of the more popular restaurant's in the village. Actually, come to think of it, it was the only chinese restaurant I've seen in the town. The place is called Restaurant Hoover and its about 3min away from the dorm by car, 10-15min if you walk. Best part about this town is that you can just about walk to anywhere you want because its THAT small.
Dinner was ookkaayy. We tried their speciality, which was ketchup noodles. Its like yee mee, but with ketchup sauce sorta thing. Wasn't a big fan of it because of its, erm, exquisite taste. Other dishes were ying yong tou fu, fried fish, honey lemon fried chicken, kangkung, louts soup and steamed white rice. Didn't take a picture of dinner on our second night because we all thought we'd be having the same dishes. When in fact, it was much better than the first night URGH.
We stopped by a small kedai runcit after dinner because some of the girls needed to get new slipper/sandals for the hike up to the rainbow waterfall the next day. And instead of buying normal sandals, they decided to purchase eye catching, ridiculously glittering purple flats that costs RM11? Ahahahhaa the sight of the four of them wearing those still cracks me up.
JC also bought this bubble things that comes in gel form in a tube where you put them on a small straw and blow? Yeah super nostalgic night :3 I wish I could say we all stayed up talking about nonsensical and girly stuff but as usual, I was one of the earliest to sleep wtf. But we did catch up and bond about other rubbish stuff.
All of us *except Bob* goes to the same campus, are in the same course but we seldom get to really sit and chat. I can't imagine how it'll be like a year from now because we'll be graduating soon and going to different countries for our internship and all :'(
Got up at 5am the next morning, gathered at 5.30am then headed off to breakfast at a food court nearby the dorm. I really despise having heavy meals during breakfast, like rice and noodle etc but owh well, this was the only stall that was opened. This breakfast was provided as well. You get to pick 5 choices and have it with either the lembing mee, mee hoon or kuey teow noodles served with curry soup, clear broth or dry.
Went with the dry lembing mee with spring onions and a glass of teh ais because I was afraid the tummy wouldn't agree with the curry. Don't wanna risk having to do my business in the middle of the jungle, with buddha knows what horrid creatures staring at my bare arse and risk having it bitten ahahahahaha.
This is the jeep that transported us all the way to the foot of the hill. Journey was more agonising then enjoyable. Well, it was quite fun in the beginning, but then the condition of the path worsened. It was sooooo bumpy that half of the time, my arse was in the air -.-" It was somewhat bearable on the way back because no one could be bothered as we were all too tired too care.
The view half way up. Also, if you do decide to go, bringing a jacket wouldn't hurt because it is COLD AS FUCK in the morning @.@ Seriously, don't be like me, thinking that an extra jacket would be a burden but trust me, it'll potentially save your life. I had to tuck my arms in my jersey almost the whole way and had no choice but to let my bare legs be.
We've arrived at our destination after an excruciating hour-! But the journey had only begun. We had to first cross this river. Bear in mind, cross from right to left ah, not back to front. Also, it is advisable to wear sandals and not slippers or shoes. Slipper because its extremely slippery, especially when you're climbing up the rocks that leads to the waterfall and it might wash away when you're crossing the river. That was what happened to me FML, but I did manage to catch it back before it really got washed away.
The view after you've crossed the river and heading into the jungle. Again, I have to stress on the importance of NOT WEARING SLIPPERS when you hike. As small as the rocks seem in the picture, its actually pretty huge and it hurts your feet like hell. That, and its hard ass to keep balancing on the rocks because of it being not even and all. But if you think that you can manage, so be it. This rocky road only lasts to the dark end of the picture. Up till there, its all even ground for you to hike up.
I've forgotten how long the hike up took, wasn't too long and it was relatively easy if you WEAR SANDALS, otherwise you'd be clinging on to anything for your dear life. We were soon greeted with this amazing view of the waterfall-! Ahh I'd hike back up once every month if I lived there. Regret not bringing a change of clothes so that I could've swam :/
The rainbow waterfall doesn't appear after sun rise though, so you have to wait for a good hour before you'll finally be able to see it. Luck was most definitely on our side that day for we got the chance to witness the formation of not one, but TWO rainbows-! How awesome was that?! The first rainbow can be seen at the bottom of the waterfall. But in order to see the second one, you gotta climb up more rocks to get a better view of the second one from a higher point.
I'm so glad I got to chance to experience and enjoy this place with this bunch of insane yet wonderful people. Couldn't have asked for a better company =) Initially, I wasn't even suppose to go on this trip, but I'm glad someone convinced me in the end. Needed a recreational break like this to get my mind off of things that has been happening for the past few weeks *le sigh*.
These are the rocks that we had to climb up leading to the waterfall. This would have to be the hardest part for anyone because the rocks aren't set in stone. Most of them are still wobbly and you can't really judge whether they are or they aren't. Avoiding them are pretty hard as well, because the dry rocks that seems safer to step on are wobbly, but the secure ones are the slippery ones.
The guide that brought us up prepared Maggi cups, milo and nescafe (also included in the RM220) for us to consume at the site as well. He used the cool and refreshing water from the waterfall to prepare our meals. The empty cups we all brought back down to the foot with us, there was no littering involved =)
We started to hike back down around 11.30am. Significantly earlier than the other groups but it gave us a head start advantage because it was much harder to hike down than up... especially WITH SLIPPERS.
Showered, rest and headed for lunch at the same food court because it was they only place with foooood.
Went to visit the Sungai Lembing museum and the abandoned mine tunnels after lunch. Entrance for the museum is free but its RM30 for the museum. After reading the history of Sungai Lembing, which was once considered as the most modern and promising town before the country's independence, its so sad to see it as it is today :/
The town folk survived on mining and after the entire operation was shut down due to the huge economic recession, everyone started leaving the village one by one in search of other opportunities. What was once a town with a population of 10,000 is now left dwindling with senior citizens.
But it is great to see that they put the abandoned mines to good use. To me, it is an extremely beneficial tourist attraction, or maybe just for jakun's like me. They only recently installed lights and air drafts in the tunnels. A few years ago, one would have to wander in humid and pitch black darkness of the tunnels.
Our next destination was Gua Cheras, similar to Batu Caves but not nearly as many steps THANK GOD.
Nothing special about the caves. The numerous donation boxes located beside each deity was quite a turnoff because they're like making you feel obligated to donate? And they even ask you to donate a specific amount of money before entering the caves. Like what?! I'm not THAT immoral, in a sense I'll still donate whenever I see a donation box at the entrance of every temple but ASKING you do make a donation? And a specific amount at that?! URGH seriously -.-"
Woke up even earlier the next day to hike up Panorama Hill, which was located directly up a hill away from the restaurant that we had eaten for the past 2 nights. Okay so it wasn't exactly a hike, we had to climb up freaking stairs which was much worse. Our guide said we did a pretty good job. Took us around 40minutes to climb up when the average time taken was more than an hour *so much win*.
The suckiest part was that Wen and I climbed down 5 minutes to early and MISSED THE SUNRISE. Urgh how pathetic. But it was okay I suppose because we got to talk a lot more on the way down =)
The journey down was quite unbearable because our legs were shaking continuously, and gotten worse every time we stopped. I'd rather climb up than down because it felt like I could tumble and roll down at any second.
We went straight to a noodle factory, which was actually a more of a shop lot after the climb, in all of our sour sweating glory lol.
This particular factory supplies all of the noodles to the entire Sungai Lembing village and to Kuantan as well. They're called Lembing Noodles, slightly different from the normal yellow noodles we get from around here and it tastes much better too.
The whole shop lot as a authentic rusty feel to it. Its a family business that was brought back from China and the grandson is in charge of manufacturing the noodles now. They wake up as early as 2am every single day just to deliver 500kg worth of noodles to Kuantan @.@
This is the grandson, who has been an exceptionally good host to us and was super patient while explaining every single thing to all of us. Well he was speaking in Hokkien/Hakka most of the time? Not too sure ahaha.
Went back to the dorm, showered, slept for 2 hours and was then on our way back to KL. I should really learn how to end a blog post properly next time. In the mean time, here's a picture of me puking rainbows.
