Cameron Highlands

My one week's break is officially over at the stroke of the midnite! How depressing! So let me recapitulate how I spent three days of my precious semester break... if the title hadn't gave it away, I was in Cameron Highlands. Driving up Cameron was easy-peasy provided you don't follow the Malaysian roadsign.

The conventional way is to exit at Tapah and endure the vomit-inducing winding trunk road up Cameron. Being the smarty-pants I am, I did a little googling and found out the Simpang Pulai exit is a better alternative albeit farther. The journey took us about 4 hours, including a 30-minute break at Tapah R&R.

Rachel booked a room in Equatorial Hotel for two days. Since it's weekdays, the room was priced at RM250++ with RM88 credit per night for hotel food, of which RM44 is deductable from the hotel rate if none of the RM88 is used. Since it was so bloody confusing, we went ahead and used up all the RM176 worth of credit. More on that later.

Equatorial Cameron Highlands - viewed from Kea Farm.

The room.

Panoramic view from the balcony - click to enlarge.

Hotel gym and swimming pool.

The room was okay; my only gripe is that the bathtub outlet is half blocked, resulting in flash flood whenever one takes a shower. We headed to Brinchang town for lunch after checking-in. It was a cut-throat lunch.

Omelette.

King's Pork-ribs (pai quat wong).

Flied lice.

Three simple, inexpensive dishes totalling RM41! Bloody hell. If any of you guys decides to go to this Chinese restaurant called Silverstar or something (which also serves steamboat), better go elsewhere.

Later that night, we went back to the same place at Brinchang, but a few restaurants down the road. Restaurant You Hoo was packed with customers, so we headed straight into it.

Restaurant You Hoo.

Tao miu - not sure what it is called in Enggerish. This dish no pork!

Sweet and sour pork.

Guinness pork ribs (hak beh quat).

Steamed tofu with minced pork.

Our dinner here totalled RM40, inclusive of two glasses of herbal tea. Now you say Silverstar Restaurant cut-throat anot? Cut leh... told ya! We walked around the area after dinner, and bought 1kg of dukong langsat and mangosteen each. Both are priced at RM3 per kg. Cheap cheap!

Fruit stall at Brinchang.

Although hotel regulations state that no mangosteens (and durian, jack fruits, and pets) are allowed into the room, we didn't care. We were on holiday! Heheh...

But we did take extra precautions so that the bed sheets are not stained with mangosteen juice, else the hotel staff might think of something naughty. The mangosteens were fantastic! They are 100% sweet, all 1kg of them. I downed the whole 1kg worth of mangosteens into helpless empty pericaps within the same night!

The rest of the night was spent watching TV and snacking.

Here's our personal mini-bar!

Equatorial is situated just next to Kea Farm, which sells fresh vegetables, fruits, flowers, food, plants, etc etc. It's like a pasar malam (night market), just that it opens only in the day.

Strawberry plantsCactuses

We also visited the Time Tunnel, which is essentially a mini-museum.

Here's a video of koi fishes taken in the Time Tunnel. The swimming pattern of koi fishes is simply majestic:

Rachel insisted we visit the tea plantation, so we took a 20 minutes drive to the Bharat Tea Plantation at Tanah Rata.

Bharat Tea Plantation.

Lunch at Bharat - Lemon tea and scones. Two glasses of lemon tea cost RM6.

Scones - RM12 for two.

On the way back from Bharat Tea Plantation, I noticed a sign board that says Hospital Cameron Highland. Decided to have a peek, who knows there might be a job oppurtunity! Haha!


We had lunch at T Cafe, located above Marrybrown at Tanah Rata. This place is easy to miss as you drive pass the busy road.

Mushroom soup.

Sirloin steak for me.

Chicken chop for her.

On our way back, we dropped by Strawberry Park Resort, and snapped loads of photos. Some are rated XX and thus are not published here. Hehe...


We decided it was enough for the day until we discovered our hotel is also next to the Butterfly Park. The bed just had to wait... one more destination to go!

The first creatures that greet you at the Butterfly Park are not a butterflies or moths, they are these:

Clockwise: Scorpion, centipede, gecko, milipede.

Clockwise: Tortoises, leaf-like insect, stick-like insect, three-horned beetle.

A variety of frogs and toads. But the one that caught my attention was the one at bottom right. Can you make out the larger brown-coloured frog? It's labelled as the Malayan Hored Frog (or is it Malayan Horned-Frog)?

Iguanas! Jurassic creatures! Still no signs of butterflies...

A variety of slimy snakes.

And then, come the butterflies...

And more flowers...

This is called the bird of paradise. Exotic eh?!

We had hotel food for dinner; at the main restaurant called the Coffee Shop.

Beef bacon salad with shredded eggs.

Rib-eye steak for me.

Nasi Bumbu Hijau for her - very tasty.

And another helping of Chicken Kebab for us! I feel fat!

The next morning's breakfast was also at the Coffee Shop - buffet style. Actually hor, the buffet breakfast here cannot make it lah, but since we have remaining hotel credits, we gasak only la.

Nasi Lemak with beef rendang.

We checked-out after breakfast, visited the Kea Farm again and bought loads and loads of fresh veggies, and 2kgs of dukong and mangosteen each! I'm fully recharged for Batu Pahat already! Hahaha... who am I kidding?!