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Saturday 24th March 2007- Malaysia

(Daniel)Over breakfast this morning, Jeff told me that he would like to come along on the camping trip this afternoon. Once we had finished eating, we didn’t have long to wait before Aleyna appeared in her “G4 orange” monster to show us the way to the jungle where we would be off-roading and camping.

On route to the Rainforest with LROCM

As we drove out of town, we stopped for some beers and supplies at Macro, and then carried on to a highlands area where we met two other members of the LROM. One guy had his whole family along with him, and drove a V8 powered Defender 110. Actually, they had even brought the maid along with them! The other member had brought his Discovery 300TDi, and it emerged that he had been the Malaysian representative in the Camel Trophy trials some years ago! Among off-roaders this is probably as high an honour as you can get! We drove in convoy then to a restaurant where we were treated to a wonderful lunch paid for by the other members. While we waited, another two vehicles arrived, we then headed towards the campsite picking up a Toyota Landcruiser along the way, just to show a lack of prejudice. Take note Land Rover snobs of the UK! Yes, I am just as bad!

A straggler joins

In Convoy with the club

At the lights with 7 Landies!

As we drove along we passed some amazing Jungle with waterfalls everywhere, and people stopped along the roadside collecting drinking water from some of these. They were also showering in the small falls. The whole area was dammed off and the jungle seemed to carry on into the water. You could almost imagine that the forest simply continued underwater undisturbed by the new wet atmosphere. It must have looked amazing down there at first flooding.

Driving out to the Jungle in Beautiful Malaysia

After another 30 minutes o the road, we pulled off into a village, and then drove out the other side onto a track, just as a couple of other landies were driving out! We drove into the jungle track then, and almost immediately came to a rock section to climb, before a small but tricky gully crossing, followed by several small river crossings, and some great rocks to pick our way across. I actually haven’t done much of this off-roading in convoy, as my experiences have mainly been solo or in pairs until now. This was a great track, and I was a bit sad when we came to the camp site, but this was soon replaced by amazement at the beauty of the area. I set up camp, which only took a few minutes as usual. This being the major benefit of the Wolfs setup, with the trailer and Maggiolina rooftent, I can be set up in a matter of seconds and be sat down relaxing while the water boils for the coffee.

Driving in the Jungle

Driving into the jungle

The others did not have such sophisticated equipment, so while they continued to set up, Jeff and I went and cut some fire wood for later. The rubber wood was very old, and easy to cut, so we soon found ourselves with a pile of wood ready to burn. After all this hot work I went and had a dip in the river which ran alongside the camp, meanwhile the others had finished setting up camp, and had started to make food and drinks. I cracked open the beers in the fridge, and we sat down and talked Land Rover for the rest of the evening until the food came. Plenty of BBQ stuff, Chicken, fish and various other goodies.

Daniel Chopping Wood

Setting up camp in the rainforest

Landies in camp

The river

We sat up until late into the night, with the boys singing Indian songs while I played a little harmonica and the others sat around chatting. When we finally got into the roof tent Jeff and I were out like a light!

Some of the boys singing

Partying late into the night

 

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  Copyright © 2007 Daniel Moylan