Malaysia 2024

Friday8November

We must leave the island at 11am. This leaves us a little time to come to Gunung Raya, the highest point of the island, at 881 meters.

Return to the port of Kuah where we leave our small ephemeral rental car, then board the ferry.

Arrival at Kuala Kedah.

Our car is waiting for us where we left it. Everything is in order and we can hit the road again!

It is a transition day. We practically only drive to reach Ipoh where we were five days ago. We take a lunch break in Gurun, in the usual Malaysian "rest areas" style "Food Kourt".

We finish the meal with a "Pau", a sort of steamed bun filled with sweet red beans or coconut milk with green coloring...  

We arrive at Gopeng near Ipoh to invest our airbnb for the night.

Tonight, we make our own food...  

Saturday9November

We had already visited it almost a week ago but arrived too late, we could not do it in a more sporty way... This time, we are on time to put on our Sunday speleologist helmet (although we are a Saturday) and ready to wet the shirt and much more than that...  

Here we are integrated into a small group of 11 international tourists for five hours of course along an underground river.

The start begins 100 meters lower than the entrance to the cave.

And here is the fine team ready to do battle with the millennial rocks.

This rock bears Chinese inscriptions, dating notably from 1959, witnessing the passage of communist guerrillas who found refuge here during the Malayan Emergency (1948-1960). Other reminders of the cave's past, miners' tools recall the time when the cave was a tin extraction center.

The headlamp is obviously essential in these depths. The course remains fun but sometimes you have to show a little agility.

If the cave seems uninhabited, it is not the case. Insects accommodate very well to the absence of light. Here is a gryllacridid, a "cave grasshopper" or "cave cricket", nocturnal creature which possesses very long antennae, often much longer than their body, which serve them to explore their environment in the dark. Their legs are also long and thin, adapted to move on rocky walls.

Some passages are not necessarily the most comfortable. Especially when the guide feigns the obligation to pass in the mud under a rock when it is enough to go around it dry...  

It was the girls who were the first victims of the guide's humor. Comes our turn to dive into the water for the joke...  

And here is a possible predator of the cricket we met earlier... the scorpion! Even if it is not fatal, it is better to avoid its sting!  

Him, alas is nothing more than the remains of one of the mammals accustomed to caves, the bat.

Here is a whip spider (Amblypygi), it is an arachnid, but is neither a spider nor a scorpion. On the second photo, another whip spider is next to a much smaller cave cricket...  
The whip spider can be confused with an insect because of its six legs, but the fourth pair is indeed there curled up above its mandibles, ready to deploy into long sensory whips.  

While the cave itself began its slow digging millions of years ago, the stalagmites and stalactites adorning its cavities are more recent. The oldest of them discovered in Gua Tempurung still display a venerable age of more than 250,000 years.

If most of the time, the advance is quite easy, contortion is nevertheless sometimes required.  

Rise to the open air for a short break which is not refused.

And off we go again for the last section. A whip spider shows us in passing its first pair of legs transformed into sensory "whips", essential for its exploration. Its spiny pedipalps, folded, are ready to seize its prey. Its flattened body and its six other spread legs allow it to move with agility on the rocky walls of caves, like a crab. Despite its appearance worthy of an Alien movie, this ancient arachnid is totally harmless to humans.  

The end is approaching, here is a last photo where the features curiously seem more drawn than 5 hours ago...  

And here is the exit, the Sungai Tempurung river finishes accompanying us to the fresh air.

Last photo before liberation. For us, it is high time to hit the road again to go to our next stop:

Short stop in Tepah at a highway rest area to eat fries to change from rice, reward for the efforts provided in the cave...    

Dessert with a Pau.  

Arrival in Malacca, the southernmost city of our journey. We will stay there for two days.