Perak - Malaysia

KUL – GUA TEMPURUNG – TELUK BATIK - KUL



I went to Perak recently with friends and my husband where we stayed for 2 days. Truthfully the first day was great but the second day was what I would call a mini disaster.

First day :- Gua Tempurung

The idea to visit perak was a last minute decision made by all of us with the idea of doing a small adventure trip. Anyway, our quest to conquer Gua Tempurung started with a mini search on what Gua Tempurung has to offer… thus I visited this website http://www.guatempurung.com/ which provided a thorough explanation on what to do, what to bring and a contact number to make reservations.



After browsing the website we uniformly agreed to take tour number 4 (The grand tour) which took us at 3 1/2 – 4 hours of adventure in the cave. For adventure crazy people I would suggest you go for this tour because it encompasses everything, the first stage is climb some steps where the guide will show you some rock formations, second as I vaguely can remember is a trail which has water up to your knee, thirdly you need to duck, then you need to crawl, you will also need to slide and finally enter a small hole which will soak you up to your chest.





We went there on a weekend and the crowd is somewhat appealing thus at some stops we had to wait a little longer for another group to clear till we can move over. Nevertheless I think the whole experience was splendid.

Anyway, back to the start, we woke up at 6am, got our bags packed the night before including our tents and sleeping back for the night, did a final check and started our 2 hours journey to destination. Had a morning stop and had Nasi lemak at R&R Tapah. The idea was to let our tummy digest the food for fear that any of us might need to go to the toilet before entering the cave … there is no toilet in the cave



You have to arrive latest by 9.30am at Gua Tempurung for registration purposes and a brief introduction. Use a plastic bag to wrap your valuables (car keys, camera) and it would be best to bring a water bottle to quench your thirst and PLEASE don’t leave your empty bottles in the cave like what some irresponsible and immature people did.

Anyway, what made the caving exciting was to take it easy, you don’t have to rush in and be the first person inline trying to reach every stop first because at every stop the guide will wait for the last person. So, we were among the last person in the group and because of that we had the chance to take as many pictures as we want along the way….



After our 4 hours of darkness we finally found civilization and came out wet up to our chests. Of course our first destination had to be the cafeteria. Had our shower right after, paid RM1.00 per entry to shower or RM0.40 cents to use the toilet. We brought our own soap and but soap can also be purchased at the toilet for RM0.50 cents. Well, there’s no such thing as free lunch here in Malaysia.

Gua Tempurung – Perak – Malaysia
RM 22 for adults
About 2 hours drive from KL
http://www.guatempurung.com/

Day 2 :- Teluk Batik



All ready for our next adventure, we then continued our journey to Teluk Batik which was about an hour drive from Gua Tempurung, beautiful beach but sad to say its not properly maintained…. How do you expect to attract visitors when rubbish can be seen everywhere, toilets are not properly maintained and empty shop lots are now turned into an unofficial dump site. Oh Malaysians, a simple act of throwing your rubbish in the bin makes a huge different to your surroundings. If only you knew!



Coming back to what happened. We figured to camp at the beach but were perturbed by the whole atmosphere of a big dump site and spotted a fenced camping site where we could bring our car in and make our tent right next to the car… Paid RM8 per head, per night, sounds good but the camping site was a little dirty nevertheless we managed to find a not so bad spot to camp.



It’s a shame that this place is not properly maintained as I see great potential in it. Anyway, We parked our car, found a spot and we build our tent. Everything went lovely till I had to use the toilet… urghhhhhh why didn’t I check on that earlier!! Shower was dirty, one of the toilet had leftover human waste as i can call it since the pump was not working but luckily we found a shower and a toilet that was usable.



When it came for dinner, we brought out our cooker, canister, sardine in the tin, and bread. Although we actually had a choice to buy food at a food stall nearby, we suggested to have a real camping experience… thus our meal was a little dull and my husband’s friend who lived in Perak came and saved our day. He brought in fresh fish, his mom cooked some rice, made some sauce for the fish and because of that the whole toilet incident didn’t bother me until the time came where we had to sleep.



A nearby food stall had a karaoke competition (as it seems) till 1am and right after, there were this group of man noisily accelerating their motorbikes as what we Malaysians call them ‘Mat Rempit’… well that wasn’t all, 3 dogs were spotted on the other side of the fence where one managed to enter through a whole in the fence. I told my husband I do not want to do this kind of stuff at any beach in Malaysia anymore.

Somehow I managed to get my sleep and we woke up in the early morning to perform our Morning prayers. The wind was very strong and not long after it started to rain. My friend and I went in the tent thinking that we were safe from the rain but puddle started to form in the tent so we ran and seek shelter in the car where we actually managed to sleep. Amazingly the guys in the other tent had no problem whatsoever.

After the rain subsided, we packed our stuff, got ready, I vowed not to camp there no more and we headed back to KL with some fruits we bought along the way.