Nazri and Zarina Travelogue: Cameron Highlands November 2013

It was way back in 2008 when we last visited Cameron Highlands. My youngest daughter Izara had not been there and experience the cool climate of the high lands. As such my wife and I decided to bring her for a 3D2N vacation to Cameron Highlands.

We had made prior booking online for the Equatorial Hotel. The room costs us about RM600 + for 2 nights. A day before our check in date, we received a message from Equatorial offering us several "Early bird" promotion and one of them is a late check out up to 3pm for only RM25.00. We thought this will give us some extra time and so we accepted this offer. The room was quite big and just nice for us. We had a view of the hills with vegetable farms adorning the slopes. Next to Equatorial is the newly completed (but still under construction) Nova Resorts Cameron Highlands. More and more hotels and resorts are coming up and vegetable farming seems to be "out of control" with the hill slopes turning earth red instead of the greens of the rainforest. This "not under control" development would need to stop at certain point up here in Cameron as the deforestation is too much. In fact when I was here during my school days, "smoke" would come out of our mouth when we speak as it was really cold but now even at night I can just stroll along with jeans and t-shirt on without jackets. This is the price people have to pay in the name of development.

Day 1
Started from our house at 10.00 am and headed north along the North South Highway and exited Simpang Pulai Toll exit. My wife did not want to go through the Tapah access to Cameron as she could not stand the narrow winding road. Simpang Pulai-Cameron Highlands highway is a better choice if any member of your family are prone to motion sickness.

The "not so winding" road from Simpang Pulai..

The higher you go..the road is shrouded in mist..and the air becomes cooler..

The road is not as winding as the Tapah-Cameron Highlands access and after a 4 hours (including pit-stops) drive along "not so much" winding road, we reached Kea Farm where Equatorial Hotel is located. Check in was smooth and we proceeded to our room.

The entrance to Cameron Highland's Equatorial..

The room is spacious and very nicely furnished...

The Nova Resorts still under final stage of constructions...

Some of the "uncontrollable" clearing of the slopes in Cameron Highlands can be seen here..

Some of the views from our room

After a good rest and lunch, we went to the night market in Brinchang town. The night market is avalable on Fridays to Sundays and daily during public holidays or school holidays. So if you aim to visit the night market, do plan out your timing. Word of caution, I was told that the road can get highly congested during the peak season.

We were lucky as eventhough it was a weekend and an upcoming public holiday, the night market nor the roads were not as congested as we expected it to be...

Strawberry chocolate is said to be Datuk Siti Nurhaliza's favorite... and my wife too... :)

Everything in Cameron Highlands revolves around strawberries. It should be nicknamed " Strawberry Town of Malaysia"..or has it???

These are bottles of various types of honey....

Other than strawberries, fresh vegetables, cactus and pickled fruits are a "must buy" when you are in Cameron Highlands..

These are Jambu Epal (Guava Apple) which has 2 flavors - Apple and Strawberry

Day 2

After breakfast at the hotel, we headed to the row of shops along the Kea Farm - Brinchang road and stopped by at a place aptly called The Time Tunnel Galleria. Why is it called such? - because here you may find paraphernalia and stuffs dated back to the 1950s and also the history of Cameron Highlands itself. It's an educational trip down the old days for my boy. Hope he learns to appreciate the old times as much as I do.

A collections of mugs and collectibles..

Coin boxes and piggy banks...

An old black and white TV...

Chemical warfare? No worries....

An old coffee shop replica..

You don't see mobile phones like these anymore...

"Specials" or "Speshuls" ???

Milo Tonic Food Drink.. which many of us would remember...

All these reminds me of my younger days...

We find that there's just not many malay food selling around our area and we had to drive down to Brinchang town for lunch. A lot of steamboats restaurants but they are mainly operated by Chinese. There are a few mamak restaurants selling Nasi Kandar and Beryani but we prefer normal Malay restaurants.There's one called Pok Nik Ikan Bakar and Tom Yam but during the daytime, they do not have nasi campur but you can order the various dishes on the menu. I had the so called " Nasi Goreng Cameron Highlands" which was said to have extra fresh vegetables..- "extra" vegetable indeed ! and the rice is coloured red !!

If you are ever in Cameron Highlands and do not visit Kea Farm then your visit would not be complete. Kea Farm has permanent shops (unlike the Night Market) where you can find anything from live plants, souvenirs, fruits and vegetables, strawberries and flowers..lots and lots of flowers. Just in case you are in Cameron on weekdays (not during the school holidays or public holidays), this is where you would be doing your shopping for souvenirs, vegetables and strwaberrries... (you can't talk about Cameron Highlands without the word "strawberry") !!!

You'd go crazy over flowers..levenders, roses, carnations....

The highland forest view from Kea Farm

A view of Equatorial Hotel from Kea Farm. It is actually a walking distance from each other. If you're staying at Equatorial during the peak season, you may want to walk as the parking is very limited (or almost none at all ) at Kea Farm....

Parking is all along the road (with yellow lines) and be on a watch because you may be summoned for parking along the road. On our 3rd day, a whole row of cars were summoned by the traffic police. One question comes to mind, where should all those people park their cars? Maybe the authority have to come up with alternative parking spaces...

We then proceeded to the S'Corner Strawberry Centre where you can find all sorts of strawberry based products. Here you can also pluck your own strawberries and there is also a mushroom farm where they had various species of colourful mushrooms for visitors to see.

We were joined by our auntie on our 2nd day... They were on a daytrip to Cameron Highlands.

A myriad of mushroom species...

A closer view of a yellow mushroom.. Too bad they did not include any information on the species of the mushrooms here..

Could this be Ling Zhi ???

Strawberries for the pluckings....

From there we proceeded to the Boh Tea Plantation at Sunngai Palas. This is a must visit venue for tea lovers. he drive along the narrow winding road is also treacherous if you're not an experienced driver.However, the drive is a pleasant one with tea bushes stretching out as far as the eye could see. The parking area is somewhat a bit far down the slope leading up. Take a slow walk instead of a fast one or you'll be exhausted when you reach a cafe up on top. Alternately you can also take a 200 meter tea shrubs walk up the tea center. With the cool mountain and fresh air, your stroll up the top should be a wonderful experience. Up on top of the tea center, there's a cafe and a shop or you can also tour the tea factory where you can see first hand on how tea are processed. Unfortunately on the day that we went the factory was closed due to public holiday. If you do want to visit the factory, do come on a normal day and note that the place is closed at 4.30 am. The last time we were here, we already had the opportunity to visit the factory so it does not matter much that it was closed this time around.

Acres and acres of tea shrubs at the Sungai Palas BOH Tea Plantation

The shop selling various types and flavors of tea..unfortunately tea is not my "cup of tea"..

The parking area is about 200 meters down this slope..

Do take the walk down through the tea shrubbery to experience what the tea workers had to do to earn a living as so you can sit aorund and sip a cup of tea. Makes you appreciate your tea more....

Our next stop for the day was to the Lavender Garden. This is a fairly new place for us as it was not around when we were in Cameron before. Layers of lavender, red and yellow flowers (can't remember their names) adorn the slope. The petunia bed along the slope are also spectacular. Here there is also a strawberry farm where you can pluck your own.

Yellow, red and purple (lavenders) planted in layers along the slope..

"Bed of Petunias"

My cute little daughter just loves the cool fresh air...

One word is that, as you go up the slope the official photographer will offer you "free" photography for your family BUT as you exit, they would offer to print your "free" photo at a price of RM25 with a free photo holder cum calender. That's how business is done here and a few other places I know. However, we obliged to the RM25 fee as my wife and I wanted something for us to remember our visit by.

Day 3

On our last day in Cameron, we visited to one of my favourite place - The Butterfly Garden. here you can look at free flying butterflies and complemented by several species of snakes, invertebrates and other animals. There are 2 Butterfly Garden which is side by side. The last time we were in Cameron we visited the one on our right. This time around we wanted to see what the "other" one has to offer. Well. they are mostly the same but I guess my vote would go to the bigger one on the right (assuming you are facing the front of the two places).