Trip to Fraser's Hill

I’m sharing another travel experience after a long gap and thanks to my friend Raj Senthil for taking us there and accompanying me through out the trip. Firstly we chose another place at Terengganu but due to road condition & distance we chose Fraser’s Hill to be the best destination for this 3 days CNY Holiday. Booked 2 night stay at Fraser’s Silverpark Apartment a week ago once we decided this place. Fraser Hill is very popular for Bird Watching, Trekking. So, we were just waiting for the day to arrive.

And The day arrived, we started our journey early morning around 4.30AM from Singapore and we had an unscheduled stop at Batu Caves for our Breakfast. After that we didn’t follow our GPS route and chose our own route through Rawang to reach kuala kubu bharu, which is the base of Fraser’s hill. It takes around 2 hours from KL. But we had a brief stopover at Rawang for quick shopping on F&B then we drove straight down to KKB.

Once we reach KKB town, we drove past the dam that has a beautiful scenic spot. But we had no time to stop over as we were chasing the time to reach The GAP, from which the final (12Km) stretch is a one way for every one hour up & down. We also had no time to stop for a trek to Sungai Chilling on plan to do on our way back but really missed it out.

Unfortunately, we just missed the last entry by just couple of mins & we had wait down at The Gap for another 1 hour 20 mins. If you are planning to go there up to Fraser’s Hill. Please plan your arrival time to Thers GAP to reach the Fraser’s Hill as per the schedule given below as we were just escaped during our way down from Hill. It is like Odd hours 40 mins to Go Up & Even Hours 40 mins to come down. 8.40PM to 6AM is free for both side entry but it is very risky to drive at this time.



During our waiting time at The Gap, I had a good walk to the nearby road side forest & I was at least able to spot 5-10 different types of birds around that area. It was really overwhelming experience for me at the start of the trip to be with the faunas of the hill.

So, we had reached our resort at around 3+ in the evening. I didn’t want to miss the good evening out there on the first day, so I enquired at the information counter about the easy trekking trails & quickly grabbed a copy of Fraser’s Hill Map with information about each trail at it’s back. Followings are the list of trails at Fraser’s Hill with it's difficulty level, for those who wants to be close to the nature.
1 - The Bishop (Medium & enjoyable)
2 - The Rompin (Shortest)
3 - The Kindersley (Medium)
4 - The Maxwell (Longer & officially Closed)
5 - The Hemmant (Easy & Enjoyable)
6 - The Abu Suradi (Shortest & Not very easy)
7 - The Mager (Medium)
8 - The Pine Tree (Longest & Toughest)

You can get more info about the details of each trail at Fraser Hill Info Page

Fraser's Hill Map


Hemmant Trail is a wide path & easy to trek through this as a start as it was also nearby to our resort. In this trail I had a nice experience of being very close couple of bird’s that were at the feeding in the branches of plant by walkway. I also had good glimpses of a very unique wild orchid flower. In the route, I noticed some sign post mentioning name of plants but couldn’t really spot anything except for Ratan.

Finally at the end of the Hemmant trail I saw a big signboard kept at the entrance explaining each of the spot in the trail & the picture of the plant that can be found by the sign post. It also includes information like what types of birds can be seen in that particular trail as well as how the difficulty of route especially on Bishop’s trail. Later I realized the fact that I was coming from the end point of the trail to starting point. I learnt the fact that it is good to start the trip from the sign-board as it provides clear information of where what can be seen in each trekking route.

After coming out of Hemmant Trail, I moved on to the next trail that is Abu Suradi as decided earlier. It was not as easy as I expected as the paths were mainly narrow and not much of ropes to hold onto. I was almost at the end of the trail, but couldn’t find the way out and I had to come back the way I started then returned back through Hemmant Trail as it was shorter path for our resort. During the return I was really able to relate to the sign post & plants nearby according to the information board kept at the entrance of the trail.

Evening was soo chilling as our resort is located at higher altitude of the hill. We chose this resort just for it’s amazing location though there were so many other inconveniences in the room. Had good time at later evening as the temperature was continuing to fall low and we just couldn’t stand out without wearing our jacket. We prepared our dinner, had food & went to sleep tight as it was getting colder.

I know you and I are very tired of reading and posting such a long article on day 1 experience, so I will stop for now & share with you Day 2 & 3 experience later in my next post.

Also please stay tuned for an another exclusive post about Must Have Items & Must known Facts for making the trip of Bt. Fraser most unforgettable experience.

Tambunan Village - A Place with Tranquility & Nature

I received mail about Air Asia promotion for Ticket to Kota Kinabalu at zero fare. Since There was three days continuous leave for Eid, booked Round trip ticket for 125SGD by booking 2 months in advance. The Day came and flew on last Saturday late night to KK. Kick started the travel morning around 7AM from KKIA towards Tambunan. Cab Driver agreed for drop at TVRC (Tambunan Village Resort Centre) for 170 RM with stopping at Rafflesia Information Centre for a short visit. Tambunan Village is roughtly about 80km from Airport.

It was a fine Sunday morning, there were mists all around on the way up to the village and there were nice chilling scenic view where I asked the cab driver to stop for few snaps. I noticed quite a number of Mushroom plantation projects at every village on the way as well. Roads were well established with nice bridges at sharp curves and clean roads through out.

There was another surprise waiting for me. Upon reaching Rafflesia information centre found out the fact that they are closed on Sundays & Public Holidays. So, I thought that my dream of finding the Rafflesia was bit shattered because as per the plan I was not intending to passing this route back.

I called the resort owner and enquired about the operating hours of Rafflesia Information Centre and confirmed the same that it is closed on Public Holiday & Sundays. With bit of disappointment left that place to move to the next destination of Mahua Water Falls near Tambunan Village. I was more worried about the weather since it is always raining during afternoon at this Rainy season in Sabah and luckily nature did favour by bringing out Sun during most of the day time.

Reached Tambunan around 9AM and checked quite quickly in a bamboo long house room. The atmosphere was kind of soothing and made me like home back at my childhood kampong life. It was a typical village (Kampong) filled with tranquility and am not sure how to express the feeling I got in there. There were rivers all around mountains. Quite nice collections of flower garden at most of the houses. Birds like sparrow & few dove families were happily flying around the rice paddy fields. And such a lovely atmosphere made me decided to stay there for two nights instead of just one night.

From the village once can easily get the naked eye view of sleeping beauty Kota Kinabalu Mount Peak from anywhere in the Village. In the village there were attractions like Mat Salleh, it was about a war memorial place for a person who lived there to fight for their land freedom.

In the town centre they had a warrior statue with a big stone laid at the centre and I was told that their souls were locked in there that keeps protecting the villagers even today. There was a Sunday market where freshly grown vegetables and it was a typical village market that you can see just like where I used to buy vegetable for one week need at my home town too.

After a quick breakfast session on the riverbed kampong style restaurant inside the resort region had made arrangement with resort for a trip to my next destination of Mahua Water Falls. Road condition was very good that even a normal car could get to there without any problem still they charged me quite a big sum for nothing. Thank god I bargained from 150RM to 80RM. But the water falls is just about 15Kms from Tambunan and normal car can easily get there with a newly laid nice road not like you need a 4WD to get there. If you want to get there, beware of this fact. 50 RM is I suppose the reasonable fare.

I will write next about Mahua Water Falls…

Vineyard Tour in Bourgogne (Burgundy) Region

Firstly I must write about the name Bourgogne, it has to be pronounced as Burgundy. Guide mimicked about how english speaking people tried prounce the Bourgogne with a weird funny pronounce as usual we all do to read any french word.

As we started off from the tourism office for the wine tour they sky was getting more clear as per the weather report it was suppose to be cloudy and brief showers were expected. So, our guide Lu-Lu (this is his nickname) was very happy about the weather and was saying many thanks to nature for bring out the bright sky. He took us at the outside road of rampart around the town. He explained about the ancient buildings on the way.

As we moved out of the town and reached the outskirts all that could be seen were vineyard that was filled up with the roots of grape plants. He explained many interesting theories about the farm fields as we stopped at one place. Depends on the size of the stem the age of the plant can be gauged it seems. There were many samples shown ranging from 10 years till 100 years. If some are dead they are replaced by a new plant but a better protection is needed till it grows well as they are better feast for rabbits as I heard. So, they have protected it with a polythene cover.

Normally the grape farm plants that I have seen in India were grown high taller and makes easier to cut from the standing position, but here they are all cut at the level of our knee. This is to get the better juice out from the grape it seems. So, it is very demanding physically during the harvesting process and this harvesting must be done in a shortest time span just at the ripe condition even few days delay could cause grape become unusable to produce better quality of wine. I also heard from him on my way back that during such harvesting time they are suppose to produce the number of workers in the fields and seems like head count was being monitored from the helicopters. In case of any excessive count they go and catch the owners for illegal employment it seems.

During the plant growth process to apply fertilizer they use copter for spraying pesticides it seems, in order not to touch the ground level they have markings done by the tall stick tied up with the polythene bags on the top of it.

When I visited that was the beginning of the growing grape plant season. He told that this is the period I can show you how the farm lands are split between owners. He showed us the shade in the ground as you can see in the picture different colour of soil means different owner it seems unlike our place we have dividers (vaaikkaal) between each one of our paddy field. Also one owner might have different piece of land at different slopes to produce varieties of wine as the soil condition and weather conditions differs depends on the location.

He showed a wall built between two vineyard regions and told us that this is the end of Beaune and starting of Pommard>. He told us that normally the names of the wine brands are nothing but the names of the wine villages and the place located. He was telling another interesting fact that the quality of wine produced between two different vineyards at the very exact border still differs though it has same amount of slope for better exposure of Sun and used same method of cultivation and same ages for the root. He said that’s how the taste differs.

Important factor for getting better grape to produce wine is the slope land. It cannot be too high or too low (leveled ground). This is mainly because of the right exposure to Sun light and the right Weather condition and the right soil moisture things like that can get good quality of grape for good quality of wine it seems. As we entered the Pommard town he showed us the château of Pommard. He said every village had one Château during those days and was controlled by family from that Château.

There were two examples he mentioned about the design concept of the RC and CSI Churches until that day I didn’t know about how to differentiate the churches of RC & CSI. Its nothing but the cathedrals of RC are built with tall rocket shaped towers and rich in architecture but CSI churches were having square type of towers that were mostly built by huge square blocks stones and were much simple in design. We also passed by the vineyards around this region like Meursault AOC there are some Premier Cru vineyards, Volnay to reach back DE SAVIGNY LES.

On our way back he explained the fact that every house in the villages has their own wine cellar and making their own money. There was one street on the both side that he showed every single house had wine cellars of their own. He was saying though these people live in ordinary houses like the one in the picture they make real good profit out of this business. There were name boards outside the gates of those houses containing their brand names.

At one point after this village on our way he stopped the vehicle at one strange up hill and freed the gear at one upward slope, (don’t know how the law of force works) the vehicle was supposed go downwards as it was uphill but the vehicle was moving upward and he told us that he always why it happens only at that place. You can see that slope as in the attached image. We were also passing by another wine village called Bouze Les- Beaune. First name sounds quite familiar isn’t it? Huh haa, the actual meaning is cow dung it seems.

This posting is becoming bit longer and its getting late for me to get back to bed, So, I leave you guys with a happy reading till now and let me write about the wine making process at the wine cellar in my next post.

One Day trip to Beaune

In a way you are lucky to get this post because I chose this destination in the last minute (just a day before I left Paris) also TGV train fare to Brussels was two times costlier than this destination travel price. Earlier I heard from my friends that Wine tour is something that is unique experience not to be missed. Sometimes when you change your plan you really have surprises in store for you. After visiting this region I felt how lucky I am to change my travel plan to make trip to this area. Reason being this was another rural area but rich in nature especially with its vineyard all around the hill ranges.

I booked my tickets two days in advance to make my way to this wonderful destination at SNCF station, (Luckily I didn’t have much of communication problem like the one I had for booking ticket to visit Switzerland.) You can check with SNCF site for latest train timings (sadly this site is in French but not difficult to understand about the info we need). I had also pre-booked for a wine tour with Bacchus Wine Tours to avoid missing a seat as the seats are limited for common trip.

I had started my journey from Paris early in the morning around 7AM (6.55) and reached Beaune around 9:30AM. I roughly got the location of tourist information office from the Beaune Web Page. So, I headed straight there to get the Pass for visiting local attraction and to pick up brochure on Beaune plan. I got Beaune pass that would give me free entry to Hôtel-Dieu, Musée du Vin de Bourgogne & Musée des Beaux-Arts et Musée Marey (Beaux-Arts Museum).

The wine tour was only at 2:30PM. So, I had decided to visit all the monuments in and around the town. First thing I noticed was the rampart around the town was literally similar to what I have seen in Provins. Later when I walked all around the town it was confirmed they too had similar kind of protection in here too.

If you are a person who doesn’t feel like walking you can rent a bicycle for the whole day with Bourgogne Randonnees. You can in fact take this nice bike for long distance riding too. Its good to go for such long distance ride to enjoy the sceneries around this Bourgogne region. There are cycle route maps are also available at TripAdvisor Forum for touring as well or you can join the bike tour organized by De tours where you can rent your bikes.

First place I visited was the Charity Hospital Hôtel Dieu (Hospices de Beaune) that was built in 15th century by Nicolas Rolin and envisioned it as palace for the poor. This is one of the town's most visible antique buildings. The inner furnishings were done with a polyptich attributed to Rogier van der Weyden. The multi coloured polychrome-tiled roofs of the Hôtel-Dieu have become one of the symbols of Burgundy. They used this place as a hospital for treating ill people. They have varieties of beds used during those days, medical equipments and pharmaceuticals all can be seen inside. There are collections of various objects brought from this area. There was a sacred room, it was dark and with the collection of few arts kept inside the room with low-light. Must have been the place where the saint lived? With that last room visit I came out of the Hôtel-Dieu.

Actually in the morning when I visited the tourism office, the girl at the reception told me that they have weekly market put up on the street today right after the Hôtel-Dieu. When I came out I could see that there was a huge market place happening with varieties of fresh items. Almost everything was available there namely vegetables, breads, butters, meat items, provisions, flowers & fruits. Everything you need for your cooking at sufficient enough for one week. The entire street was filled with colours and market was really happening place. Lots and lots of buyers from locals along with them tourists too joined to choose their pick. I walked along the street and I was lost twice towards finding my next visiting of Musée du Vin de Bourgogne (Wine Museum).

I managed to find the Wine Museum as it was way in through petty lanes. As the name suggests, this Musée du Vin de Bourgogne has collections on Wine Info in the region. There were also varieties of objects that symbolized wine cultures were stored in 15th- and 16th-century rooms. There were samples of tools used for wine making process right from vineyard preparation till packaging. It was nice to see the wine bottles and labels of famous wine brands that were dated centuries back.

After visiting the Wine Museum I took a long walk around the town through the rampart region. It was nice sight with few ceilings have multi coloured polychrome-tiled roofs done by specially prepared materials. It seems like these roofs can be stronger enough to stand out shining for many centuries. I spotted smaller Arch similar to what is constructed in Paris. On the way I was that there was a very old theatre building that was abandoned long time back looked like, not sure if this has any connection with physiologist Etienne Jules Marey, who discovered the principles of the cinema long before 1895. When I came back to the avenue where there was weekly market put up on sale in the morning was completely done winding up and they were washing the streets. There was no evidence to say that such a big open market was existed in the morning.

Since I had time to kill about 1 hour before the wine tour starting time I entered into the Beaux-Arts Museum. It had paintings belonging from 16th to 19th centuries. As usual there were sculptures from Middle Ages and the Renaissance on the display too. I found the sculpture attached quite interesting. Since time was nearing 2:30 to start the wine tour I just moved out of the art museum and at the exit is a tourist information office from where the wine tour was scheduled to start.

OMG!!! It was already 1.30 AM when I finished writing this article. Will write on the wine tour around this region in my next post with lot of information about the whole process of wine making along with interesting snap shots. Until then see you ya…

One Day Trip to Provins

I was in search of visiting a village around Paris & I came across this medieval town called Provins (Actually people in France pronounce it as Provans), which is the far end at zone 6 in Paris. So, I started my journey early in the morning and I was eager to catch the train that leaves from Gare De Nord. But I was misguided to take train to Gretz Armainvilliers from Meganta station. So I took it, but I didn’t know that I was going to be stuck down there without train for 1 hour 15 minutes. So, when I arrived there that’s what happened.

I just took a walk to the nearby town entrance and came back an hour was gone. Train was waiting to go to Provins. So, I got in after confirming that it is going to Provins. The more closely train came to Provins, I was bit worried because of the brief showers on the way through out the station. I was hoping to see bright sky, if it rains sure to waste such a nice visit to this medieval town.

It was raining when the train reached Provins and I didn’t lose my hope, I jumped into the local bus to reach the local tourist information centre (Office de tourism) hoping that the rain will stop soon. Luckily it is so happened that the rain stopped by the time I reached there. I just bought the Provins pass that gives free entry to four main attractions such as Tour César, La Grange aux Dîmes, Les souterrains and to museum. I was told that there are some shows happening at different timings so I just wanted to try out one show due to shortage of time and got my ticket for The Legend Of The Knights at 3.00 PM. Also I was given with the local map and started to walk towards the historical places inside the town.

First thing I noticed was the big wall built around the town and it was also under maintenance for restoration. Later I learnt the fact that this was built around the entire town to stop people from entering into the town since around the wall there was a big canal filled with water (may be those days no swimming & wall claiming expert to come across?)

So, when I just entered from the entrance I could feel that I am walking into the place that exists beyond many centuries because the houses were literally that old that is clearly understood because of its built. I first visited the Tithe Barn that was the nearest from tourism office. They had samples of wax humans that symbolized the trading that happened in that underground house during those days. Looks like the town was popular for weaving and there were other trading as well. I happened to see the entrance to the underground route and just at that entrance they put a wax statue looked like a quarry worker. I thought that they were digging something out of it. So, I left it at that.

Since I was running out of time for the show I quickly hurried myself up to the Cesar tower and its architecture was so amazing that it served many purposes like place of refuge, watchtower of the surrounding and a prison. You can go up all the way till the top of the tower, some of the paths were not meant for people in heavy size as it was very narrow. I went up all the way till top and saw a bell weighing 500KG? I still wonder during those days how they managed to bring it all the way to the top. From the top the entire surrounding is clearly visible and I am sure with a telescope you can easily find out who is approaching town from far. After that I quickly moved back to the place near the entrance as the show was organized right behind the walls of the town.

I got myself in by showing the ticket at the entrance on the way I quite surprised to see the war weapons that was used centuries back that I have seen only in Hollywood movies like The Patriot and the most exciting part of it was they have used one of it during the show (just that instead of triggering fireball they used water ball). The show took me back to the time of the knights and was enjoyable with a good theme of chivalry. The stunt shows reminded me of few Hollywood movies where there was lots of sword fighting by riding on the horses and on the lands. The climax was nice with the concept of winning anything by LOVE. Actually the show was done in French language but you don’t really need a language to understand what was happening with their actions.

After that nice show I headed towards the museum and as I wrote before this isn’t much of my interest compared to Louvre. As usual there were few paintings, objects belonging to this territory that existed during11th to 18th century, few sculptures and few coins were what was seen in this 3 story museum. Then I just walked around the churches nearby for a while.

When I came out on search of underground gallery as per the map I was lost a bit and by enquiring few locals I managed to reach there on time before they close as everything is closed by evening 5-6pm. I didn’t know that I had big surprise waiting there for me. I thought I will just go alone without any guide into that underground gallery and come out quickly but to my surprise I was wrong.

The receptionist asked me to join with a guide who was just ahead of me. Lucky I joined her and guess why I call myself lucky? Because the underground that was built centuries back is that huge and very long that connects the entire town across. After I entered in I had no idea of where I am going into as it was pitch dark and the only torch that the guide was holding was the only light that was giving bit of luminous. She explained in French about how this was built and what was the purpose of it things like that.

On the way through the underground she showed some strange animal pictures and names and years dated 17th and 18th centuries written down. She also explained something about the soil layer formation by torching above the head as it was in French I could not understand but I think she gave explanation about how strong the ceiling was as she has also shown about leakage of water from the ground level at one underground hall and the different type of ceiling. The underground was like a real maze to me coz anywhere you go there were many branches out don’t know where it leads to... On the way she also showed us some ventilation holes for lighting and air flow purpose.

Finally we came out from the underground just opposite to the place where we started our exploration. It made me felt like walked at least 1km distance in round. I was just thinking about similar type of existence in Ho Chi Min city in Vietnam that the underground city was built during Vietnam War. I really loved this kind of unique experience that I had under this ground and I wanted to go for another round poor me I was already running out of time and I don’t know what time is the next train to get back to Paris without getting stuck in Provins.

Still I didn’t want to go back to train station as I felt like walking some more and explore the entire town so I started walking back towards the old town towards north and on the way happened to see the place of a very old hospital building then reached back the entrance of the town by that direction. I walked down to the tourism office by the side of the walls around the town and was hoping to get a bus from there to the train station. On the way I witnessed wonderful canola farm fields that were filled with greeneries also a very old cemetery.

At last arrived at the place where I started my visit but the bad news from the bus time table was that the bus service would stop by 6 and it was already 6 plus. So, I had no choice but to take a long walk back to train station. My legs were refusing to move as I was dead tired and I really pushed myself way towards the station halfway through the rain also started bit heavily. Pushed myself real hard again and reached the station lucky I had to wait only 45 mins for the train to start back to Paris. I reached back apart hotel and feel asleep with my legs paining because of the enthusiastic round I made the whole day.

Next day when I told about this place to my office colleagues, who are locals and staying in Paris since they are born, they didn’t even know that there is such a place exists in Paris region. I tell to myself that there are lots more to be seen then.

To me this town is a must visit place in the outskirts of Paris.

One Day Visit to Louvre Museum

I wanted to share this long time back but now only I could write about this.

If you are a lover of Paintings & Sculpture, this is the place where you must be in Paris. They have collections all around the world collected from King Louis XIV period. Here is the History of Louvre museum.

Here are the lists of items you can expect to see inside this museum.

Full of Paintings & Drawings are kept in the II Floor - Each and every piece of painting is unique out here, I'm sure you will be lost to the huge collections from French, German, Flemish, Dutch, Belgian & Russian Paintings & Drawings.

Objects beyond centuries & Antiquities collections from Egypt & Greek region are kept in the I Floor. I as really amazed by the Egyptian collections. It really did make me feel that I was in Egypt with the varieties that they had. You can also witness Large French, Italian & Spanish paintings here. World famous Monalisa master piece is also kept as centre of attraction in this floor. I also remembered witnessing objects from palace interiors like Ornaments, Crown, Royal bed, carpet & furniture’s.

Sculptures of different era can be seen at the Ground Floor & Lower Ground Floor. Also there were Antiquities collections from Greek, Etruscan & Egypt were kept in display. I was once again astonished by the Code of Hammurabi during King Babylon period and various forms of writings collections available on the collected pieces of stones. Those writings made me feel like living many stone years back. There were also medieval Louvre, remains of the moat of the Louvre of Philippe-Auguste and Charles V, 12th to 14th century was available to access and get the feel of those days. When you get to this area be sure that you don’t get lost your way just like how I was lost.

By the time I finished making round almost the day was coming to an end. If you plan to visit here make sure that you are having good stamina for walking around the whole day. Another good piece of information is that entry to this museum is free on first Sunday of every month and its up to you to make your queuing arrangements. Though it was crowded the management was having many entrance to cut down the long queuing.

After visiting this museum I didn’t really find Musee D’orsay that interesting to me. This was the biggest museum I have ever visited in my life. Enjoy your visiting too…
Official Web Site

Stay tuned for my next posts on A Day visit to Beaune - Wine Village near Dijon in France, Provins - Medieval Town from the exterior of Paris.

One Day Visit to Chateau de Versailles

My plan during the weekend is to visit two major attractions in Paris, one is Chateau de Versailles and another one is to visit Musée du Louvre. As a first move I chose to visit Chateau de Versailles on Saturday and Musée du Louvre on Sunday.

Saturday Morning around 10 plus I managed to join the queue the ticket office at the Palace to get the ticket, As expected the queue for buying ticket was longer but luckily not so long compared to the situation an hour later. There was another queue again to get into the Palace with security checks and all. I collected the audio guide and started to explore the palace right from the assembly hall till King's private places.

King Louis XIV had real passion for art I would say, the collections of huge art paintings hanging on the wall and appearing at the every ceiling inside all around the palace. It seems like there were arts school to teach by the experts during those days. He was also an expert in ballet dance I heard. During his days he was treated like God by the people as there was waking up ceremony everyday morning by the priests and the bedroom was real beautifully decorated to the max. Nowadays we may not be expected to have that kind of luxurious life now matter how rich we are. Inside the Palaces to visit, Hall of Mirror, Bed Room for Queen and Discussion Room for making major decisions also public entertainment area, Room for Gods and lot more.

After that I returned my audio guide and took quick lunch and walked along the Garden that had so many water fountains under different names. Its architecture was simply fabulous. There were varieties of sculptures carved on Marble and various other materials as well. They make the fountain work only for 2 hours in the morning and 2 hours in the evening so it’s nice to visit the garden only during that period.

After that I had to walk for about 15 mins to reach Grand Trianon on the way I saw a farm land where they breed sheep, cow and horses. Herd of sheep were spread all along those piece of big land and were busy doing there grass eating business. Tried to attract few of them closer to me with a green apple I heard and quite a lot came over near the fence and I clicked few snaps of them.

Grand Trianon was built mainly for a place where king and his close family could escape from the hectic life of court at the Château of Versailles. Petit Trianon was closed for renovation, but had access to the Marie-Antoinette’s estate and it was real big one, where the queen had her own theatre and Private house. I understand from the history that this entire estate was built and managed as per queen’s taste. Small houses along these regions were unique in design of its kind. There were farm land at the backyard of the houses and it was decorated with gardens through front and back. I shall add those pictures here tonight.

By the time I finished walking around the estate it was already 7PM, I thought I will better walk back home since I was really getting to the point of being totally exhausted. I must make a point here that if you are not physically strong to walk around everywhere in this huge area you must really prepare yourself with all possible support as it really demands a strong physique to explore. There are mini trams available to move between different locations alternatively you can hire a golf cart or bi-cycle too but to walk inside the palace or estate it’s definitely tiring for those who dislike walking. I didn’t know that the same goes for Musée du Louvre until I visited it next day.

You will have to plan at least one day to be there and explore the entire place if not in half a day you might have to skip some portion of the whole place. I would suggest to buy One Day Pass ticket as it will give you access to all places out there otherwise you will have to buy ticket for every entrance and is expensive than One Day Pass. I guess a pass will cost you 25 Euro. Another Idea could be to get a 2 days Museum pass that will cost you only 30 Euro and you can also visit all other museum in Paris along with Chateau de Versailles. For details on Museum passes please visit Official Web Site and get details on what kind of passes you like to buy and where to buy. They have passes valid for 2 / 4 / 6 days and it has no expiry date that gives you the freedom to use any day you want to use it. But the day count is consecutive from day one you start to use it.

I need to give special thanks and credit to my friend David, who lives in Paris and works for the same company as mine for providing excellent details and guidance on where to go and what to look for.

I will write another post on my experience during the visit to Musée du Louvre.

Switzerland or Sweeter Land?

Why Should I be calling Switzerland as Sweeter Land? Didn't you read my previous post on my trip to Europe Region? Yes, the first week plan in my travel itinerary was to get to Switzerland and I made it with extra effort and extra spending from my packet, It was a similar kind of traveling arrangement experience to Pulau Besar. I almost gave up the hope of visiting Switzerland as I just missed the train ticket reservation even for the first class train from France to Switzerland. Still I searched for Train Passes on the internet and found an agent in Paris who provided me with first class train ticket on a different train but longer traveling hours. Along with it also took a Swiss Flexi Saver Pass for 3 days to board any train / bus / tram except mountain trains inside anywhere in Switzerland. It was very useful since it also came with the entry passes to 300 plus museum across the country though we visited only two or three museums.

I had the glimpses of snowing right at the beginning of entering Switzerland border till the end of the journey. I can’t express it by words with the nature mother’s best is shown out there on this land with snows and greenaries along with man made architecture. It was snowing everywhere at night and some times during the day, people were very nice and friendly, which is why I called it as Sweeter Land than Switzerland. It was very touching to see with the people living there provided assistance in all the aspects right from the begining of the trip, immigration help provided by first co-traveler named Fabienna who was on her way back to home from trip to India.

On our way back one senior citizen (she must have been 80+) explained us about Evian town and mountain around it as a wonderful scenic spot also made arrangements with another passenger to show is the scenery as she was getting off just one station before the scenic spot. Even the other passenger (Heidi is her name) was kind enough to share with us the chocolate she bought for the Easter celebration and told she is on her way back to her study school from home. She showed the spot and she also gave us the route to visit seashore at the Lausanne town as we had some extra time to kill before leaving to Paris.

During my stay there in Switzerland visited Places like Jungfrau Mountain (Top of Europe – 3200 Meter above Sea Level) and learned the fact that if you have heart problem you are not suppose to go up since, lack of oxygen and high pressure in air and had similar experience at Mount Titlis too. Also visited Mount Pilatus at 2000 Plus meter high.

Got to know about the Alpine Horn out there. Way back from Piltus to down hill with wooden Sledge is unforgettable memory in my life as without any experience I took ride on a difficult path and managed to arrive at the next cable car station an hour later. After that visited to Lucerne Town and Zurich as well, these two towns smells the history over Switzerland many years back by means of its rich architectural buildings and monuments as well museums. I must mention here about the Switzerland Train Timings, they are very acurate and punctual about departure and arrival timings. You can tell the time by the departure and arrival of trains without even looking at your watch if you know their timings. You can get complete timings of train timings here . I am sure I can’t write everything here will try to post one more detailed experience and also find the way to share some of the shots during the stay. For the time being will leave you with some of the photos I edited from my collections along with this post.

As promised the photos are available Here. Sorry that you need to have Orkut Login to see it.

Bonjour

I am hearding this word everywhere since this morning and happy to know the everyone around wearing smiles around and greeting each others. Wondering how? just because I've been assigned for an official Mission in Paris. Other than the fact that I'm suffering due to jetlag and chilling cold (<3 deg) my stay here is quite pleasant. I'm yet to explore the city in the upcoming month. Stay tuned to read my post titled Trip to Paris. I will also be visiting other European neighbouring countries during my weekends and will try to share my travelling experience with you all.

Trip to Pulau Besar

Initially I lost hope of going out for the long holiday as most of the places were fully booked due to Chinese New Year Holiday (2008 - RAT Year). Still I made up my mind to visit the island originally planned hang out along with my colleagues. Fortunately when I called the travel agency they said one of the resorts called Nirwana Resort is opened before the Monsoon season closes. Immediately booked the package for 3D2N.

Day 1

We left home early morning around 5:45AM from Singapore and reached my friend’s Home in Ulu Tiram around 9 plus. He drove us over to Mersing in his Car around 1PM. We realized that we missed the ferry boat to Pulau Besar that left about 15 mins ago. So, we had to wait at the Mersing Jetty Terminal till evening 5:30PM because of low tide. Nirwana Resort Management really made a special arrangement to send us to Pulau Besar in the evening boat along with another one family who were stuck like us. I must say here that The Management, Mr. Shaam was so kind and nice to us just because we missed the boat they gave us free extension of one more day.

We arrived at the Pulau Besar just at the Sun Set and it was a cold evening. We were given welcome drink and a sea front chalet to stay. We unpacked everything and quickly refreshed ourselves and took dinner at the dining hall. Then made a walk on jetty wooden bridge and spent time in watching the visitors involved in fishing activity.

Day 2

We got up next day morning and went on to take a walk to the left side of the seashore. We started walking around 7:30AM towards the eastern side of the Pulau Besar along the seashore. To our surprise we found many fossils of dead corals and varieties of Shells along with the big rocks. We were immersed with the richness of natural life existed with the fossils we witnessed all the way. At one point in time as we were getting late for our breakfast we made U Turn halfway and came back an hour late. We wanted to go for snorkeling to nearby island with another group and it had been cancelled as they found it was expensive for their troop.

We then took shower and had breakfast then we had a quick chat with Mr. Don who is brother of Mr. Shaam. He was explaining us about the facilities available in the resort and interesting places to visit around the island. We wanted to take the Jungle Trekking Route but he said it would be dangerous to go alone as it was not used for many months since the resort was closed due to monsoon season. We dropped that idea for the time being and he told us about the shooting done in Pulau Besar for TV programme Survival and even a Hollywood film, Ocean Lifeguard. He told that the flight wreckage setup for Survival series still could be seen. He was surprised to hear from us about our morning walk to the rock side seashore on eastern side. He said he always wanted to go for many years and could never make it but we did it.

Then we decided to take a slow walk along the pathway to the north western side of Pulau Besar. We were quite excited to see such shooting spot and started to walk at around 11AM. We passed by many resorts along the way and just after the last resort we passed by a small bridge we noticed the very same place that was used for shooting, we found the plane wreckages built-up bit inside the jungle bit away from the walking path. From the far it looked like a real flight was crashed down and when we had a closer look at it found out that it wasn’t real but made of wood and iron sheet to make it real from outside view. Behind there seems to be a grave yard region. We then walked further down till the farthest we could walk at the end of the road we found nice huge rocks and we decided to stop our walking to get back to resort for our lunch. We walked back to resort and had lunch then I decided to spend some time in watching the fishing activity in the Jetty terminal. I spotted a big headed fish that was resting under the shades of jetty wood stage. I have also cited the big catches by few families, who visited mainly for fishing activity. Then I found that the sea water started go back deep inwards as a result I found almost 1-2KM undersea area became accessible by just walking. So, I started to walk into the dried land alone and I noticed many sea cucumbers were lying under the rocks and not only that as I walked further in I noticed so many beautiful living baby coral reefs. It was so cool to see the way nature unfolds with many underwater lives. I went deep inside until the area where there was strong sea tide was happening, when I turned back I saw I was far from the seashore and noticed some water formation in the middle and I got terribly afraid that I was being cornered by sea water and started to run back to the seashore. Later I realized that it was similar before walked deep inwards. I brought back my partner to show what I have seen and noticed many more than what I found during my initial walk. As we started to walk further down the water level started to rise and we were alarmed by it and reached back seashore quickly. Then it was beginning to dark another family set the camp fire and we joined them and enjoyed the music and dancing along with them by blasting few Tamil songs from our portable speakers and mp3 player since their kids like Tamil Songs. By then there was barbeque items were getting ready for us at the resort. Then we had our dinner and spent bit of time in watching TV and noticed that there was Tamil satellite channel available too. We went to bed very late.

Day 3

We got up very late too. We quickly ran to dining area and took our breakfast along with a cup of tea. We took bath on the sea and took bath in the tap water. Then we decided to make daring entry into the jungle trekking path that was never used for many months. We thought it would be a good idea to visit as a big gang and we moved to the nearby chalet to ask them if they wanna join us. But it was too late for us to ask them as they were packing their bags to get back to Singapore due to the CNY cause way traffic jam on the last day of the holiday. So, we bid bye-bye to them and I borrowed a big knife from the kitchen chef since he warned me several times against the personal safety. We still decided to go into the jungle. Every step we made was nerve killing and so thrilling as the path was filled with dried leafs and lots of spider web along the path that were really sticky. We found the only evidence for us was the small water pipe and we walked along with that route. We reached only one third of the destination and we were being attacked by the wild mosquitoes terribly. We had no choice than to quit our expedition than to come back halfway.

We were quite bored for a while. We went for a Kayaking on the sea for few mins. After that we were back and resting a while under the tree shadow and were singing some Karaoke songs then noticed outside a group of 6 members belonging to the local fishing village was walking with the long coconut tree stick as their fishing equipment. They were walking down the sea since it was low tide like yesterday. Then we decided to follow them to see what they are doing the old men was quite happy to explain us about what they do in Malay though I could hardly understand what he was saying only by signs I could manage to get few points. They gathered shells along the sea walk and used them as fish bites and they were in action with full swing. While they were doing this we wanted to continue our walk back towards the eastern side till far end beyond the point we stopped yesterday. So, we walked further down and noticed many interesting sea creatures along the walk due to low tide.

When we returned back by evening all of 6 group fisher men family members were carrying back quite a few kilograms of fish on their shoulders. Took few snaps with them and they made their way back into the jungle to their hut. We relaxed a while on the beach and went back into our chalet started to pack for leaving tomorrow.

Day 4.

Got up and took bath. Went to dining hall and took our breakfast. We waited for a while for the ferry boat to arrive and another group left for island hopping to nearby islands to do snorkel. I felt I missed this activity alone during this trip. Then we boarded the ferry around 10:15AM and reached back Mersing in an hour time and took two buses to reach Mersing – Kota Tinggi – JB and finally arrived at Singapore in the evening 5:30PM. Home Sweet Home…

I will try to post the photo album into flickr during the weekend and past the link here. Meanwhile if you are so excited to make a visit I suggest you please call Shaam at +60197997222. He is a very nice person to my knowledge and he can do the boarding and lodging arrangement for you.

I have noticed few are searching in Google for ferry timings. May be I should share my experience on the timing too. If you are stuck between 1PM to evening 4+PM you are most likely stuck down there due to low tide. Depends on the tide conditions the ferries are operated either till afternoon or in the evenings. Normally evening time is against the wind so as far as I know no ferry leaves from Islands to mainland. If you want to know the tide condition you can visit the web page of Marine Metrological Forecast for details about tide conditions.

Trip to Cameron Highland

Alamak, I again escaped for few days during the Chinese New Year Holidays without updating my blog. Sorry about that. As mentioned in the Title, I visited a chilling place in Malaysia called Cameron Highland. When we went in for a Jungle walk, it made me feel like I am being very close to the nature. It was more thrilling to walk thru some of the challenging slippery trekking path to reach the desired destinations. First I had no plans to go there as when I called initially all the Hotels were full. Later on Saturday I made up my mind to just get there first and check the rest and it worked out. Everything went on smooth especially our worry about getting transport and accommodation.

There are many vegetable forms located in various parts of the Highland. They cultivate many fresh vegetables like Cabbage, Radish, Lettuce, Green Leaves, Corn and some fruits like Strawberry and Cameron Apple (tastes more like small size Honeydew mixed with apple). We could understand how they grow all these when we went into those farms. There are some other plants also grown in the jungle the popular one is Pitcher Plant and Rafflesasia (biggest flower in the Asia region). They also have the popular tea estates mainly two big companies Boh & Barath Tea Estates.

We have also visited a Cactus Valley. As a tourism attraction they have varieties of Cactus available for sale as well.

This us a must watch place for every single person who would like to enjoy the beauty of nature mother. I was just thinking students those are studying agriculture or botany as their main subject may be can go to this place to get the real feel of cultivation.

Ok, time to back to blogging again. I will try my level best again to keep you occupied with my usual puzzles, stories and many more interesting topics.

I found through my statsistics that somebody is looking forward to get the details about the places of interest. Here are the few interesting places to go around in Cameron Highland...

1. Robinson Waterfalls


2. Strawberry & Vegetable Farms


3. Mozzy Forest


4. Boh Tea Estate


5. Cameron Valley


6. Orang Asli Kampong

And Here is the Route Map for those who are interested to go for Hiking, based on my experience. There are some dangerous slippery paths, which might make you fall into the deep canyon. So, please be careful when you take any of these jungle routes and walk as group.