Mount Tahan, Taman Negara National Park, Malaysia

5Timo 5:00 PM Nov 8, 2018

Merapoh - Gunung Tahan - Merapoh
Merapoh - Gunung Tahan - Merapoh The most challenging treck we ever did! Prepare for long days of hiking and cold nights... We are: 2 Germans with experience of hiking in the Alps and Andes. Date of our tour: November 2018 We booked the 4D3N-Tour at SGIOutdoor in Merapoh. Sukri and his staff are very nice and can arrange anything for you, even pickup at the airport. There is also a hostel, basically a room of bunkbeds, toilet and washing room. If you book SGI you will have to do a prepayment of 50%. The rest is to be paid in cash. Merapoh is a small village with only one ATM (which wasn't working when we were there) so bring enough Ringit! We arrived at Merapoh with the bus from KL the day before the hike and stayed in the hostel at SGI. We shopped the food we needed for the tour in a small shop. Hiking gear can be provided by SGI (tent, sleeping bag, sleeping mat, cooking gear) if you don't bring your own. You cannot buy it in Merapoh. On the first day we met our guide and registered at the park office. We opened our bags and every item was noted on a list by a park ranger. He even counted the underwear... This is to make sure you bring everything back from the National Park, especially all plastic and batteries. It is not allowed to bring wet tissues into the park. After the registration we drove about half an hour into the park with a 4WD to the starting point of our hike. The first day is about 13.5 km to Kem Kor. The treck is mostly flat but you have to cross several rivers. We did the hike in the rainy season so the rivers were very deep (water up to the waist) with a strong current. But there are ropes to help you keep the balance. It was just the two of us and our guide so we could move very fast and arrived at the camp site after 4 hours (normally 5-6 hours) and set up our tent in the rain. The camp site is next to the river so you can take water from there for boiling. The camp site is very big as all groups stay there on their first and third night. So there can be up to 100 people! While we cooked our dinner we observed the people coming down from the mountain. They looked very exhausted so we got an impression of how the next days would be. On the second day we started early at 8:15am. At first you cross the river (knee deep in rainy season) and the rest of the hike is uphill almost all the time. Sometimes it is so steep that you have to use the ropes or hold on to the roots. After about 3 hours the path will become very muddy (again, we did the hike in the rainy season). At first we tried to avoid the mud but just when you think you have seen everything and it cannot get more dirty you walk around the corner and there is the biggest mudhole you have ever seen. Our guide warned us that there are holes where you can sink knee deep into the mud. So we watched our step but still sank in up to our ankles. The trek will get better once you climb higher and reach Bukit Bonsai. There was still a lot of mud waiting for us but we resigned to the dirt at some point... The last hour of the hike is rocky until you reach Bukit Botak, the camp site for the second night. As we arrived there a cool wind was blowing and it was raining a little. Straitgate (other review here on TripAdvisor) said you don't need a sleeping bag but I recommend to bring a good sleeping bag and a warm jacket as it can be as cold as 10° C. Our night was very very very cold even with sleeping bags. There is a small water source where you can refill your water bottles (don't forget to boil!). Since we arrived early at the camp site (around 3pm, 6.5 hours of hiking) we hiked to the summit on the 2nd day. Normally you hike on the 3rd day to see the sunrise but the weather was very cloudy so we didn't have much of a view. On the third day we hiked straight back to Kem Kor (16 km). If you climb the summit on the third day your total will be 21 km. So the third day is mostly going down but again it was the distance that tested our endurance. Since the trail is so steep climbing down wasn't much easier than climbing up and it took us 7 hours to get to Kem Kor, the camp site of the third night. It rained heavily during the last night so the river crossings on the fourth day were even harder. We arrived at the starting point after 3.5 hours where the truck picked us up and brought us to the park office for the checkout. The procedure takes some time but thanks to it the treck is very clean. We didn't see wild animals except for a big snake. We heard the white gibbons singing in the distance. You can hire a porter to carry 15kg for you but if you don't: pack lightly! In the rainy season (October-November; the park closes from November 15th for 2 months) it can be cold at night so bring dry and warm clothes for the camp site. Our dinner was instant noodles. The breakfast was toast with honey. During the day we had muesli bars, nuts and dried fruits. I recommend hiking shoes with a good profile as the mud is very slippery. As you cross the first river after 10 minutes your shoes will be wet immediately. The hike was totally exhausting and was in every aspect beyond my expectactions. But it was also an unforgettable experience to stand on the top of the mountain in the middle of preserved wildlife. You can also do the treck from Kuala Tahan back to Kuala Tahan (8D7N) as well as from Merapoh to Kuala Tahan (about 6 days) or Kuala Tahan to Merapoh. The part from Kuala Tahan to Gunung Tahan is even more challenging with 9 rivers to cross with water neck high. 2 of the reviews on this page are not about the hike to Gunung Tahan but about the Taman Negara National Park and the acitivities in Kuala Tahan.

4Devaa 5:00 PM Oct 30, 2018

An arduous trek!!!
One of the most arduous trek . Lot of walking was lucky enough to join a very enthusiastic group who made this great trek a wonderful experience which i would carry for a long time. Please be physically and mentally strong to take up this trek.