Canopy Walk at Taman Negara

This is my second time going for the Canopy Walk at Taman Negara, my first was somewhere back in 2008. I visited Taman Negara for the first time back in 1982 when I was a secondary school student. It was a school trip back then. However, everything was definitely more rudimentary and the biggest change is of course back then, the Headquarters was just hostels and chalets run by government agency and deers and wild boars came to the camp site and HQ like goats and cows in a farm. The noise level from boats was definitely also lower... also, electricity got turned off at 12 midnight because it was generated by a diesel powered motor. Nolstagic but better anytime...

Back to present - thanks to progress, we can now visit the National Park (formerly King George V National Park under the British and it was the first national park in the country) as a day trip. We drove to Jerantut after a late breakfast at almost 11.30 am and reached Kuala Tahan via Padang Piol Felda scheme by 2.30 pm, 160 km of winding trunk road. As it was already late afternoon and we were told by the ranger that the Canopy Walk close within the hour, we rushed along the 1.7 km trail, ending with me having some dizziness at the base of the entrance...needs more stamina exercises in the future!

View of the entrance to Taman Negara from Kampung Tembeling

another...

swell idea to have restaurant at the river bank...hope they don't pollute

a bract fungi along the trail

torch ginger

tiny fungi like tiny table lamps

fruiting bracts of a wild ginger, Calathea spp.

a tiny skipper butterfly visiting a wild ginger flower, locally known as Tepus Tanah

the entrance to the Canopy walk

hanging walkways suspended from mid-trunk of huge trees

part of the walkway

view of the Tembeling River in the distance

a quick shot

one needs to do some climbing on the walkways

beautiful sight awaits the patient observer : a Prevost's Squirrel feeding on figs...

one of the most handsome creature on the canopy...this might not have been possible with an ordinary camera from ground level...

at the exit...

interesting plant along the trail

a tiny lizard

another species of Calathea ginger flower...

ixora-like flowers

a mating pair of papillionids howering over a Lantana bush

It came from the canopy above...

another...

a tiny grasshopper

a colourful beetle on the forest floor

at the HQ centre, a big aquarium displaying river specimens from the Tahan River...these two are Tengas

Icon and 'King' of the Malaysian rivers - the Malaysian Mahseer, Tor tambroides, sadly an endangered species due to pollution and overfishing for the restaurant table and aquarium trade.

signboard at the entrance