Travel #2 2006: Kota Tinggi

I'm back! Invigorating trip. Short trips to M'sia are always enjoyable...especially with a huge dose of nature injected into the travel. Though it was overtly a school trip, I wasn't focused on work at all (almost all work done in school already!) but rather on the beautiful Kota Tinggi Waterfalls. Not my first trip there since it was the place I went to nurse my broken heart a few years back (on an SDU trip no less, but no love on the rebound, haha)... The photo on the left was taken on the last trip:

As you can see, my world was in topsy-turvy then..... or is it due to the damage inflicted by rebonding my hair (first & last time!)?

but of course nothing can get me down... or upside down, when I go travelling.

Glad to report some wonderful 'dos' & 'sees' at the Kota Tinggi Waterfalls Resort:

The Fireflies
If the first trip is a blast, the second is a reminder to appreciate beauty in nature.... sad to say, some overused the flash to photograph the busily-matefinding-but-interrupted fireflies. The best way, I feel, to appreciate their beauty is just to look at them.... it was a wonderful sight to behold (& hold)...fireflies clicking on their luminous touches at will to decorate a Christmas tree-like shrub...especially near the surface of the river...
5 stars out of 5

The Waterfalls:
The obvious entry here...Although far from the league of the Niagara Falls, it is the pride of people here.... and the raison d'etre for the resort. Although meetings are not everyone's (or anybody's?) favourite, at least our nerves were soothed by the therepeutic melody of the cascading water... It might not look too impressive but the relentless beat of the waterfall, day and night, shows that this guy has got something up there....

..... and we just have to visit it at the top ....

....not quite.... but we got a good morning workout trekking to where the bridge is. I was glad that so many people help this clumsy gal up the hill...it's not even one-third of the mountain Gunung Panti ... So this is the one Aileen had talked about! The one that's tougher than Lambak... After the rains of the previous day, the damp leaves overran whatever trails there was in the first place. Our footsteps did not once put any imprint on it. The others were alright with the trek but I was left panting 15 minutes into it... anyway, never understood why people had to walk so fast... But as with Lambak, everything was forgotten at the top (I mean of our climb... the entire trek to the top would take something like 5 hours?!):

More rewards as we came down....

Nice trees, but pity there were no birds, or none that I can see, though there was a melodious, unidentified bird at the rest point but my bino couldn't help.... I wonder why? Always thought tall trees should attract raptors like insects to food (as we discovered during dinner near the waterfalls...)

But it's an ideal place to call home.... the little chalets by the forests were like the cottages I dreamt I would live when I can afford it. Imagine waking up to the lovely views of mist shrouding the hills..... so nice..... life would be so nice....