Waterfalls

Quite a few times, on my waterfall hikes, I have met Eddie Yap, a nature guide. We became friendly, exchanged emails and agreed that we should try to make a trip together. But it never happened, until last week. It was a nice meeting, although the actual reason was not a happy one. Recently a nature guide drowned at a remote waterfall near Bentong, after he had first saved the life of one of his clients.

We had both visited this waterfall and did not really understand why it could be dangerous. So we decided to make Lata Hammers the target of our trip. Aric joined, as I have made it a rule now, to have at least three people on jungle hikes. Here is the upper fall, where the tragic accident happened.Upper Lata Hammersw

As you see, the water flow was huge, because there had been heavy rain the night before. At the trail head you have to cross the Perting Pandak river, and that was NOT easy. After that it is an easy, although muddy logging road, leading in about 45 minutes to the fall. Here you have to cross the river again, and it was good that a “bridge” consisting of trees had been constructed, otherwise crossing would have been very problematic. The waterfall was intimidating, turbulent waters, strong currents, we thought it wise not to swim. It is only a short walk to the upper fall, equally strong and turbulent. Here is a short video clip of the upper fall.

Although the target of this trip was a sad one, it was really a pleasure to finally make a trip with Eddie. We had a lot to talk about, and a lot in common, for example that we both like skinny dipping, haha. And good food, on our way back we stopped in Bukit Tinggi and had a delicious lunch at the 126 restaurant . Value for money too, we paid only RM 26 for the three of us!  Here are more pictures. Looking forward to a next meeting.

I took a few more videos at Lata Hammers. Here are the links: Crossing the tree bridge , The lower fall (notice the turbulence and the currents) and one more of the Upper fall

A few days later I went again to a waterfall. This time with my friends Richard and Gabriel, to the Chiling waterfall, near Kuala Kubu Baharu. This waterfall, the most popular in Malaysia, is only open to the public during weekends, you will not be the only visitor. As it is the rainy season now, I was expecting a large flow of water, so I had taken a rope for the (several) river crossings. But it had not been raining the night before, the crossings were passable, with some care. Here is the main fall , impressive, with a thunderous roar and a mist of water.

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It takes about 45 minutes from the ranger station (Chiling is a fish sanctuary) to the main fall. But first we climbed up to the upper fall, where it was quiet. Here is a video of the upper fall.

As the weather looked good, we decided to go the top fall, which I had explored in 2010 , We found the trail, it looked good, but unfortunately  it petered out halfway and as we were not in the mood to chop our way, we returned and went down to the main fall. We were surprised to find no visitors there, which caused Richard and Gabriel to do a joyful little dance.

Later new hikers arrived, but still it was not the crowd I had expected…:-) We had our lunch before we hiked back. I have visited this waterfall numerous times, it never gets boring! Here are more pictures.

Let me end this blog the same way as the waterfall pages on my website end:

Waterfalls can be dangerous ! Always take care about your safety

 

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