The night trip from Gua Musang to Cameron Highlands...

Continued from The road from Dabong to Gua Musang

From Gua Musang we took the new route to Cameron Highlands in Pahang. This is the first time I went this way although the route which leads all the way to Simpang Pulai in Ipoh, Perak has been completed for a number of years now...

I started taking pictures after an hour or so on the route. While I have been told the view is superb in daylight as this route cuts through the main range of Banjaran Titiwangsa with some parts going over 1,000 metres above sea level, it was dark all the way until we reached this point where we could see some sort of strange glowing lights on the hillsides...

By then we were close to entering Pahang. The Kelantan side lies in an area known as Lojing...

As we went on we could see where the strange-looking glowing light came from... from some sort of green houses to cultivate plants, flowers and vegetables I believe...

Here we were about to reach the junction to the famous hill resort of Cameron Highlands...

We took the junction and reached Kampung Raja...

Next on this route is Kampung Terla...

Then Tringkap one of the small towns of Cameron Highlands...

Now this trip to Cameron Highlands was only decided on when we reached Gua Musang. The last time I was in the highlands was probably more than 5 years ago...

This is Brinchang, one of the small towns where travellers like to lodge at...

Here we fill in the petrol again...

Then we decided to press on...

It's only at Tanah Rata we stopped to find a place to lodge at...

The road from Dabong to Gua Musang

I think it's time to continue the story about my latest trip to the East Coast made during the holy fasting month of Ramadhan ya. Now, the last article here on this trip which is titled From Kuala Besut on to Tok Bali... talks about the journey made as me, wife and the kids re-entered Kelantan through the northern boundaries of Terengganu while this new article has us already moving to a different location more than 200 km away. Details about what happened in-between has been explained in the Malay blogspot CATATAN SI MERAH SILU. But for continuity's sake, let me also fill in the blanks here as we made the journey from Dabong to Gua Musang...

Here's the view a few minutes after we've entered the Dabong to Gua Musang road...

What happened was, after leaving Kuala Besut in Terengganu and taking a breather at Tok Bali in Kelantan, we stopped at the town of Pasir Puteh to find some goods for the kids...

On the very same day, 31st August 2009 we returned the kids to their uncle's place near Kota Bahru. After all they were scheduled to get back to school the next day while me and wife have to return to Kuala Lumpur...

So we then headed back to Kuala Lumpur. Except we decided to take a different route. Instead of the usual one going through Kuala Krai and on to Gua Musang, we passed through the fringes of Pasir Mas and one to the town of Tanah Merah before heading to Jeli where begans a road southwards to Dabong, a road which goes alongside the main mountain range of Banjaran Titiwangsa.



If I remember correctly, the last time I took this road was while travelling solo on my big bike in 1998. Sorry if I can't remember exactly when as I have made many many solo trips on the bike all over Peninsular Malaysia...




I do remember this though. While the 50 km plus trip from Jeli to Dabong was fairly smooth with the occasional potholes (and cow droppings) appearing here and there, the road from Dabong to Gua Musang was really horrible as it was practically destroyed, they say because of logging activities around.





Why... I took the road because I thought it would cut the journey short. While many have reminded me of its poor condition which made it looked just like a 4x4 challenge path adding that the Kuala Krai route which is more than 50 km or so longer was the only viable one, I sticked to my guns and decided to explore it myself. After all, I've seen the route many times in the map and have pledged to try it out. The result... I started at 3 pm and arrived in Gua Musang after 9 pm. My bike has slipped down more than 5 times and I was up to my head in mud...

Now the conditions of both the road from Jeli to Dabong and Dabong to Gua Musang have improved vey much, the Dabong to Gua Musang route especially as you can see from all these pictures...

Yes, there are still bad patches here and there but this is nothing compared to the huge cut in distance if one were to used the traditional Kuala Krai route instead not to mention the superb views around...

The only downside is this. It takes a while before you come across civilisation as the road cuts through the virgin jungles alongside the Banjaran Titiwangsa...

We stopped at this little mosque (or was it a surau? a small praying hall) to do our prayers...

I thought by then we were already close to the town of Gua Musang...

As it turned out there's still quite a distance to be covered...

At one point we crossed the convergence of two rivers...

I found the view so exhilirating that I decided to stop the car and take a closer look. Here's one to the right...

And one to the left...

As the clock ticked closer indicating the coming of the dusk Gua Musang was still nowhere to be seen...

It is only at this juncture that I could say we have arrived near enough to Gua Musang as not to worry about going through the rest of the journey in the dark. If I'm not mistaken the town is only 5 km from here. For the record the distance from Dabong to Gua Musang is more than 60 km...

Anyway we stopped by at Gua Musang, to fill in the petrol tank also to fill in our own gastronomic tank. To be continued...