Belum - Temengor

The Temengor Lake

It was a wonderful and exciting trip to Temengor Lake during mid August 2007 under the leadership of Connie Khoo from Ipoh.

The crew consists of 16 nature-lovers cum birders, which includes 6 from Kuala Lumpur, 4 from Singapore, 4 from Ipoh, and a loving couple from Japan.

Group photo before boarding the boat. 4th from right was our leader Connie.

Belum is situated at the north most of Perak Darul Ridzuan. Temengor is at the south of Belum. The East-West Highway from Jeli (Kelantan) to Gerik (Perak) cut right through it. Our meeting point was at the Banding Island car park. When everyone arrived, we proceed to the jetty.

Bridge over Temengor Lake, connecting mainland to Banding Island.

A type of boat house sighted along the way

The Resort

On arrival at the Discovery Island, Steve Khong, the owner of the resort, briefed us on the activities during our stay, and the Do-s and Don’t-s like ‘always have life-jacket on while on board’; ‘Swim but don’t dive as you won’t know what’s in the water, even though the depth of the lake is easily 20 to 30 feet around the boat-house’ etc.

The exact location of the Discovery Island

View of Discovery Island Boat house from far

A closer view

Dormitory type of accommodation at the boat house was chosen even though the chalets were available on the island.

The chalet.

Rear view of the chalet. Notice the roofless bathroom? Marvellous experience.

The interior. Comfortable enough for 2 - 4 person.

Food – no problem. The cook prepared tasty food for breakfast, lunch and dinner. The first night, we had steamboat, and the famous Ipoh "Salt-baked Chicken" complimented by a group of Singaporean visitors, while on the second night, barbeque was served. Both dinners were held at the waterfront restaurant.

The guests could prepare their own tea or coffee at anytime they wanted. Tea-bags, coffee (3 in 1), sugar, creamer and hot water were always available.

Steve was a good host. He was not selfish in sharing his knowledge of the Temengor lake. He entertained us well through-out our stay.

This resort was still developing. The bathrooms and toilets were clean. It was relaxing. One can sit by the side of the boat to be entertained by around 6 to 7 species of fish displaying their skillful ‘aquatic ballet’. This resort’s webpage is available at http://www.ttdi.com.my/

The Aborigines (Orang Asli)

The Jahai and Temiar are the two main orang asli groups of Belum Temengor rainforests. They are dark, short with curly hair. They are friendly. They built their houses by the lake side. Fishes from the lake are a main source of high protein diet for their children to grow.

Typical Orang Asli settlement by the lake-side

View of another Orang Asli Settlement

Catching fish to supplement their diet is one of their major activity.

The Three Musketeers

The two loving brothers, even though they didn't look at each other while this photo was taken

See what I meant

Logging

Signs of logging activities still exist. At times, you could see clouds of dust suddenly rised from the forest floor. This was due to the timber lorries rolled over the dry logging tracks.

Logging activities

Logs ready to be transported out.

One local resident told us, what we saw from the lake were beautiful green vegetations, but behind them, trees been fallen, the forests at the other side were “bold”.

Sungai Sara, once a heaven for anglers, is now clogged up with debris of wood as a result of logging. “No more Sebarau and Baung”, they claimed.

The once crystal clear Sara River

Animal Life

It is needless to describe wild life in this area. Everyone knew this tropical forest was infested with lots of wild animals, but of course, in the midst of the thick jungle, I supposed they could see us, but we could not see them. So, watch out friends, we’re being watched.

Looks funny? They were actually 2 butterflies

Dragonfly species

Damselfly

At the Halong River mouth, traces of elephants’ footprints and their excreta were here and there. A hut which was built recently was apparently destroyed by these giants. Prominent footprints were seen inside the fallen hut.

The Halong River (Reminds me of the Halong Bay Vietnam)

Where the elephants walked by

Where the elephants left over

Where the elephants had pulled down (arrow)

There were other footprints too.

Bird life

Being bird lovers, birds watching was our main aim for this trip, particularly the Hornbills.

All the 10 species of Hornbills exist in this country could be found there. But throughout the trip, we only clocked 5 types, which includes: Black Hornbill Anthracoceros malayanus; Oriental Pied Hornbill Anthracoceros albirostris; Rhinocerous Hornbill Buceros rhinoceros; Great Hornbill Buceros bicoruis, and finally our ‘star bird’, the magnificent Plain-pouched Hornbill Rhyticeros subruficollis.

Plain-pouched Hornbills flew by.

Get a better picture taken by our teammate Con Foley at http://www.pbase.com/image/84032593

This was the island near Pos Ciong, where we landed for Hornbill watching

On the last day, Steve entertained us with a round-the-discovery island boat trip. He also took us to a place not that far away from his island, where we saw a large number of Rhinoceros Hornbill and a few Oriental Pied Hornbill. I suppose the humans and birds were equally excited. The hornbills were playing hide-and-seek with us. They hid behind thick branches, occasionally exhibiting only part of their bodies, but made loud calls enough to make us realize their existence. When we were slowly moving away from the island, they suddenly appeared at the open branch, starring at us. They might be wondering why we abandoned the hide-and-seek game so soon.

Another star bird was the Oriental Dwarf Kingfisher Ceyx erithacus, my lifer. It was spotted at the Halong River mouth. This bird was quite friendly and posed many different positions, and also showing us its hunting skills. We had a good time photographing/digiscoping it.

Oriental Dwarf Kingfisher Ceyx erithacus

3 raptors were seen, which includes White-bellied Sea-eagle Haliaeetus leucogaster; Lesser Fish-Eagle Ichthyophaga humilis; Changeable Hawk-Eagle Spizaetus cirrhatus. Other attraction includes flocks and flocks of Large Green Pigeon Treron capellei.

Plant Life

Want to see the world’s largest, rare and well known flower, the Rafflesia? Of course there won’t be any objection. We were taken to the south-east bay of Pulau Besar. After a careful climb up the steep river band, we walked along a path which was more like a dried-up river. The walk was easy and took us less than 10 minutes to arrive there. In fact, we visited the site twice. First visit was on Saturday, the flower was not fully bloom then.

Rafflesia seen on the first visit

The second visit was on Sunday to see if the flower had fully bloom.

Rafflesia seen during the subsequent visit

A distance away from the bloomed flower, a bud and a decayed Rafflesia sighted

When we arrived, 2 boats with loads of youngsters were ahead of us. On arriving at the destination, we were shock to see some of these youngsters were actually stepping into the fenced area through the broken fence. Not only that, their guide did the same thing too. I wonder how many buds and roots of this precious and rare jewel of our country been destroyed by their ignorance. I too wonder whether the related authority had actually gave the guides training before issuing them license to operate the trade. Won’t they realize, if there is no more Rafflesia, then there will be no visitors, which also means that they will lose their income or even job.

Whoever put the fence up, have they look into the maintenance part? Another disgusting matter, when we requested them to come out from the fenced area, the guide had the cheek to say that the signboard stated ‘no plucking’, and not ‘no stepping’. Before we left, we helped to repair the fence as a temporary measure.

Cameras, binoculars, even spoting scopes were in use for a better view of this rare species. Notice the broken fence on the left?

The signboard - 'no plucking', not 'no stepping"

Buttress root. Standing by its side was David

I won't know what seed was this.

Neither this.

The red colour is striking

Fully bloom

It was time for us to say 'Good-bye'. Thanks to Steve and his staffs for their friendliness and hospitality. Thanks to our leader Connie Khoo for her capability and efficiency to organize, and thanks to all participating members, of whom were so joyous and cooperative. I really enjoyed this trip.

We hate to leave this serene place, but we have no choice.

The sunset, the lake.