T54. Cameron Highland

Another popular highland in Malaysia is Cameron Highland.  This place is more for nature tourists compared to Genting Highland which is more for entertainment and theme park.  There are two ways to choose for climbing to the height of 1540m where Brinchang is located.  For those traveling from north of the peninsular, take an exit immediately after Simpang Pulai toll and take a rather mildly winding road up.  For those traveling from the south, normally they will choose the exit at Tapah, a small town prior to reaching Ipoh.  The road leading up to Cameron Highland here tend to be steep and in some places have very sharp bends.  I chose to ignore the Tapah exit and headed straight to the Simpang Pulai, which may not be a very popular choice but I wanted very much to avoid too steep and winding road up.

Cameron Highland was discovered by Sir William Cameron in 1885.  There are three notable district  namely Ringlet, Tanah Rata, and Brinchang.  Each of these district have their own unique town.

Tanah rata at about 200km from Kuala Lumpur

Bharat tea's Cameron Valley.

The first stop if driving from Tapah will normally be tea plantation estate.  There are a number of plantation companies such as BOH tea and Bharat tea.  Both are located quite close to each other and both locations are between Ringlet, the first town after entering Cameron Highland, and Tanah Rata, a more modern all-in town.  We chose the later one, apparently because our first choice which is BOH tea has no more parking space.  Since when Malaysian like tea so much I wonder.  My reason for stopping is not for the tea but for the view.  I might change my mind though.

View looking down from the Cameron Valley.

One of the tea plantation workers in action.  But why smiling?

With the temperature hovering around 20*C, working in the plantation field will not be too bad.  But the hilly condition of tea plantation estate could be back breaking so it's rather much easier to just shoot pictures and leave.
Before we leave, we had to taste the freshly processed tea and mannnn I reckon this is the best tea I have ever had.  Malaysian and tea tarik cannot be separated and now I have changed my mind.

A little below the BOH plantation outlet there is a rather small size strawberry plantation place.  This is the first place for strawberry matter we found here and not really the best, but the operator is very kind and they even managed to sell few pots of flowers to us.  But did we buy the strawberry?  We did, but still something is missing, maybe the scale of the plant.  We decided to move further up to find a bigger one.

Flower resembling high-heel shoes.  Indeed?

Drive further up to Brinchang for strawberry.

At Brinchnag, we found what we are after.  A strawberry plantation in giant scale that allow us to pick our own strawberry. 

Nicely arranged salad.

Here is the strawberry in abundant.  The area is big and hilly and at the end of the walk there is a place to buy all strawberry product.  I end up taking salad with the strawberry hidden at the bottom of the plate.

Where is the strawberry?

And finally here comes the strawberries.

 
We have our rooms booked at the hotel in Brinchang and I can see that Brinchang is the centre of Cameron Highland.  Night activity is usually to visit night market nearby just beside the main road.

 

 

 

At night the temperature can dip to 18*C and some even wearing jacket but a normal t-shirt will usually adequate.
Cameron Highland is really pleasant, cool, and good for a short trip out of Kuala Lumpur.

Around the pasar malam area there are plenty of restaurants and food stalls to choose from and we chose the right one and have been served with a spread of mouth-watering dishes.

You might want to see some of our video.