Caving in SE Asia: Gunung Senyum caves 2010 visit

14 February 2010

Gunung Senyum caves 2010 visit

Gunung Senyum hutan lipur in Pahang is a very popular place for caving and just general "lepaking". Located in the Jengka district, north of Temerloh, it is well documented on websites and travel blogs. I've been there many times over the years, and have seen it change with new developments. So when I went back in Feb 2010 after an absence of exactly 10 years, I was interested to see how the place looks now. I went with "waterfall Jan", and you can see his Senyum album.

Sign from Temerloh

Entrance to Senyum

First views of the massif

I was quite pleasantly surprised because although there are a lot of new builldings, the place is relatively unspoilt. It was also very quiet when we arrived and no one came to see what we were doing. It was only at the end of the day I realised the place is officially closed on Fridays, and yes we were there on a Friday!
There are now chalets

The office -

There is now a landscaped lake between the car park and the massif, with a small bridge leading to the walkway alongside the lake. There is also a long and wide suspension bridge replacing the old wooden boardwalk running alongside the cliff.

Tourism Malaysia have put up one of their distinctive brown information signs, which has extremely inaccurate facts about the age of the rocks!

We visited the main tourist caves. I was pleased to see there was not too much fresh litter or graffiti. All the caves have new signs since my last visit, with the information concentrating more on myths than real facts.
Jan checking the route

I slept here once -

Now there is a landscaped garden

Didn't see any cave racers in Gua Cahaya Mata Hari (Terang Bulan) so wonder if they are still there. There is still a large bat population and associated cave fauna -