Gua Tempurung

Gua Tempurung @ Coconut Shell Cave

2nd August, Saturday, my school organised a "Team Building" programme @ Gua Tempurung Expedition.

This cave is believed to be more than 400 million years.

It was indeed a tiring trip with strenuous activities. Nevertheless, I had a great time with my colleagues.

The journey began

The bus left our school at 8am. A bus and two MPVs.

Breakfast

We stopped for makan at Bukit Merah. The food was prepared by some of my colleagues. Although they were pre-packed and a bit cold but somehow all of us enjoyed them. Perhaps eating together made it fun and delicious. It sort of like a picnic along the rest area with our "Tar Pau" stuffs.

Bus ride

A few were chit chatting at the back of the bus while most of those sitting in front watched a Hindi movie @Shah Rukh Khan~Chak De India. The plot was rather straight forward; about the hockey players fighting spirits to gain victory.

However, I wasn't a fan of Hindustani stuff nor the actors.


The Destination

We finally arrived at Gua Tempurung at 11.10a.m. Everyone was so excited! Some queue-up to empty their bladders. Nature calls ~RM 0.50 (nothing is free...). While others, surveyed the place. A few started to shop for souvenirs.

All of us were fully geared up for the exploration. Comfortable socks, shoes and clothes (advisable long sleeves T-shirt and long pants).

The Preparation
Of course the very first thing we did was "warming up exercises" to loosen up the tight muscles. This exercise is vital as it could prevent us from experiencing cramps and other injuries during the strenuous activity in the cave.

Package Tour

1. Golden Flow stone Tour RM5
2. Top of The World ~RM9

3. Top of The World & River Adventure ~RM11

4. Grand Tour ~RM15

Our Package

The whole group of us comprises of 48 staffs (minus the absentees with/out reasons). About 15 senior staffs/pregnant/unfit chose to remain outside the cave to cook for us. The strenuous activity were definitely not their game.

Meanwhile the remainder 33 of us opted for the Top of the world with river adventure.

We had our own tour guide whom he called himself Tok Misai, he was indeed a very funny guy.

He briefed us about the safety precaution we need to adhere throughout the expedition. He tried to scare us with various stories....i.e. this cave was full of leeches, monsterous snakes and gigantic centipedes...etc.

But we teachers could not be easily fooled.

Adventure begins

We entered the main entrance at approx. 11.45am. The first thing we saw in the cave was a narrow pathway and stairs. We got to walk along the narrow pathway and climb stairs.
As we moved along, we soon arrived at a platform.

Wet~Wet~Wet

The river adventure starts here where all of us got into the stream of icy cold water. The water was merely ankle deep...therefore there wasn't much of a problem to many of us.

I was quite reluctant to get my pants wet....no lah I didn't "urinate out of fear". My shoes and pants got wet when I hopped into the shallow water @ underground river.
What were you thinking of...huh?

I was as blind as a bat as this area was pitch darkness. Our movements were a bit difficult as we could not see well. Luckily, I brought along a mini torch light.

We had to wade through the river by kneeling and crawling.

Why? Glad that you asked.

That was because of the stalactites that grew towards the ground. They made the hole so short and narrow the we had to watch our head when we went through it. I hit my head onto the hard ceiling on several occasions due to clumsiness. "Ouch"

The "river cruise" was a challenging task. It required great stamina to go through it. It was quite tiring wading thru the water by crawling. Especially for people whom hardly exercise...like us. Our bones were simply too stiff to be maneuver.....!

Thanks to my colleagues. We all helped each other to get through this stretch of wet world.

Along the way, we came acrossed rocks of vary shapes and sizes. There were animal shapes such as monkey, bull, elephant, dinosaur etc.

It was up to our imaginations to describe those beautiful natural formations.

One rock which looked exactly like "man's jewel"....and as usual my male colleagues giggled as we bypassed it. "That must be the wonders of viagra.", I overheard someone saying.

Tok Misai then guided us up to a steep river bank. I began to question, "Is this the end of the river adventure or is there more to come?"

Sliding~Down

To my surprised, Tok Misai leaded us to a place where there was a steep rock in front of us. Guess what we had to do?

The rock was smooth and protruding almost 45 degrees to the ground. As it was too slippery to climb down naturally, we were required to slide down instead. Just sit on it and slide down.

Before that, Tok Misai explained to us how to do it without getting hurt. One tiny wrong move, HABIS. There weren't any safety net or anything...no awaiting paramedics..what-so-ever.

We've to go one by one down to the bottom part of the rock.

As I'm afraid of heights, I began to fear for my safety. The rock was almost 45 degrees parallel ....which was scary to slide down. If anything goes wrong...bye-bye.

I felt dizzy just by looking down.

Oh boy..can I do it ?

When it was my turn, I just followed the instructions and slide down. Although, my male colleagues gave me the assurance that they would catch me when I reach the bottom but I simply didn't trust them.....! I gotten stuck halfway .....perhaps my body ain't heavy enough for the gravity to pull me down. Anyway..I finally reached ...SAFELY.

Mouse~Hole

When we were down there, we were shocked that there wasn't any more road.

No exit...dead end !

The only place to get down back to the river was through one small hole where only one person can get down at a time.

It was quite a challenging task for us especially those with XXL sizes. Luckily mine is ~ XS.

With beautiful team work and co-operation, all of managed to squeeze ourselves down thru the narrow pathway successfully.

Stairway to heaven

We got down to a land and back to the river bank again. I thought our next journey would be getting easy but I was wrong. We had to climbed a flight of stairs. Many many steps. Wonder if my feet could still move.

A grand total of 230 steps.....although I was in dazed but my mental calculation was perfect.

We continued our journey to the Top Of The World. There was a huge platform when we arrived. We were greeted by a breathtaking scenery.

It was indeed amazing to see how these rock was formed ; immortalise the natural architecture of Gua Tempurung......wonderful Gifts of God..

From the top platform we have to walk down through the stairs to the lower pathway. At the lower pathway we saw a rock with a few lines of Chinese or Japanese characters that dated way back 1959. I suspected it was the work of stupid pranksters instead of historians? Therefore, I did not waste too much time looking at them.

From there we went across the railing of the passageway and walk down a steep trail to the river bank. I felt as if I'm in one of Indiana Jones' adventure....

The Tunnel

As we move along, we reached a place call wind tunnel where a strong wind blew into the cave through a tunnel. The tunnel directed the wind from the main entrance into the cave. According to the guide, this is the only place as such tunnel was found. The air emitted from the hole as exactly like those of our air conds. Natural air conditioners.

When I lifted up my head and flash the light I could see a few bats hanging on the ceiling of the cave. We just walked along the short stretch of the stairs.

Back to civilization

At the end of the many stairs, we finally arrived to the exit. The minute I noticed light...I knew I had reached the exit. Yaahoo....I'm back to earth...the real world. Thanks Lord Buddha that no one was hurt, only that our clothes and shoes got all wet. Plus a few scratches and bruises.....but no fatal casualties..! The expedition was indeed a success but many of us vowed that would be our first and last trip there.

Though, I love this type of outdoor adventure but guess my middle age body no longer permits this kind of strenuous activities.

Even now after 4 days, I still feel my aching muscles ......as I'm writing this blog. The strenuous activity had taken a toll on my body. My aching body is the price I had to pay.