Malaysian school holidays are just around the corner. And if you live in KL and want to take your children somewhere that doesn’t require hours of driving, may I suggest the Taman Rimba Komanwel? Located some 13km from Rawang Town, the forest park is only some 30 minutes by car from KL city centre.
I find the wooden chalets very charming. At only RM100 (USD30) per room per night — RM120 (USD35) on weekends and public holidays — a weekend stay there won’t burn a hole in your pocket.
The chalets are located right at the forest’s doorstep, so expect crickets to lull you to sleep every night.
And if you’re wondering why the upper portion of the photo looks blurred, it’s not; that’s the early morning fog over the trees.
The chalets are furnished simply but comfortably. All rooms feature air-conditioning and hot showers (in the attached bathrooms), as well as a small TV set and a mini-fridge (under the TV). Most importantly, the rooms are clean and well-maintained.
A few steps away from the chalets is a river, where the children can spend hours splashing in the water or digging up the sand. These stone steps will lead you to that river.
The water is clean and so clear, you can see the bottom. It’s not deep either, hence very child-friendly. Twin1 can attest to that ;)
You can catch some fish from the river and grill them that very night to entertain the children, more for fun rather than for sustenance.
The canteen is more than ready to oblige requests for a barbecue for your group at a nominal charge.
Taman Rimba Komanwel also offers horseriding lessons within its premises. Or you can have guided horse rides at RM7 (~USD2) per person within the paddock or RM25 (~USD7) on the resort’s trail.
Those colourful things you see behind the paddock are meant for paintball, which Taman Rimba also offers as a package for your office or school activity.
Paintball not your cup of tea? How about a raft race instead? This could come in pretty handy for team-building sessions.
Other activities that can be enjoyed in the 26-hectare park include mountain biking, jungle trekking, campout, and a visit to a nearby small waterfall.
Just a word of caution though — the place, having relatively very few visitors, harbours some very nasty inhabitants that I absolutely abhor, one of whom got captured and imprisoned by the boys in this makeshift cell…
…the dreaded blood-sucking pacat [pa-chat]!
I’m not really sure how different the pacat is to the leech (some people say it’s the leech’s smaller cousin). All I know is they both suck blood and are both found in damp, dense places like forests and riverbanks. Even if you don’t feel a thing while it does its dirty work (at least, that’s what MyEldest told me from his pacat experience in Taman Rimba Komanwel), I was so happy that I was spared of an intimate encounter with such creatures during our stay there!
……………………………………………………………………………………………………
Taman Rimba Komanwel
KM23, Jalan Kuala Lumpur-Rawang
48000 Rawang, Selangor Darul Ehsan
Tel: 03-60930100
Fax: 03-60930102
URL: www.cfpresort.com
Email : administrator@cfpresort.com
In a previous post, I confessed to being a perpetrator of drive-by shooting. And my latest ’shooting’ involved the Petronas Twin Towers.
I took these shots en route to a meeting at Mandarin Oriental Hotel using my D90 and my 50mm prime lens from a moving car.
Here are the Petronas Twin Towers, layered one on top of the other, with a slight glimpse of the skybridge that joins them.
Did you know that the skybridge was added later on as a security feature? In case of an emergency, occupants from either tower can move quickly to the other using this bridge.
In case you’re not sure if you’re seeing the right towers, there’s a signboard to enlighten you at the base of the world-famous towers.
And yes, those are Malaysian flags you see up there. The colours and the stripes remind me of the American flag. But the crescent moon is distinctively un-American ;)
These pics are not exactly extraordinary but, somehow, I don’t have the heart to delete them from my hard drive without sharing them with you first.
Can you imagine scaling these towers using only your bare hands and feet? French ‘Spiderman’ Alain Robert did. Sheer madness, if you ask me, but commendable nerves of steel all the same!
I’ve tried rotating this photograph several times…but for some reason, I like it sideways this way, exactly the way I shot it that day.
This is the skybridge on the 41st and 42nd floors where some scenes from the movie ‘Entrapment’ (starring Sean Connery and Catherine Zeta-Jones) were filmed.
Entrance to the skybridge is free but you must queue up for the free tickets before 10 am, beyond which time all the tickets would have been all finished up already. Each ticket is assigned a specific time slot during the day (i.e. you can’t choose when you can go up) and you must show up on time in order to avail of the free tour. To get your free tickets, go to the Skybridge Visit Centre at the lower ground floor of Tower 1 of the Petronas Twin Towers.
Personally, I find the visit to the skybridge to be rather anticlimactic, just as this journalist writes at NST Online. But as she concludes, it’s worth visiting this place at least once in a lifetime.
Tours of the Skybridge of Petronas Twin Towers are on daily, except Mondays, from 9am to 7pm.
For more information, you can email skybridge@petronas.com.my or visit www.petronastwintowers.com.my.
Tags: Petronas Twin Towers
I’ve been so swamped with work lately that I haven’t had the time to blog.
Well..okay. I did have some free time on my hands but the exhaustion left me drained me of all inspiration.
Between you and me, for the past week I rather felt like this orangutan that I photographed in Taman Safari Indonesia in Bandung in March 2009.
Exhausted orangutan
Trivia: The word ‘orangutan’ must have come from the Malay ‘orang hutan’, i.e. person (orang) from the jungle (hutan). Makes sense, yes?
Twin2: Innocence Personified
I can write this post on the pretext of discussing the merits of the inexpensive Nikkor 50mm f/1.8D prime lens. After all, it’s a very affordable lens (list price is RM468 — around US$138 — but it can be had for just a little over RM300); it’s lightweight; it’s wonderful for low-light situations (as long as you have a steady hand); and it gives that nice, blurred effect in the backgrounds of portraits called bokeh in photo-geekspeak.
But I’m not gonna lie to you. I’m posting this photo because I want to remember how my baby (Twin2) sleeps with his clasped hands tucked under his chubby little cheek, a habit that started some 3 or 4 months ago, something which none of his siblings ever did.
I love how this photo captures the adorable little uptilt at the tip of his nose, his cupid lips, the way his shoulder gets slightly raised as he curls up under the covers. I love how this photo captures his sweet innocence.
I also love the dreamy look of this photograph — straight out of the camera, no editing whatsoever other than resizing and the addition of my site’s URL. And I have to give credit to the Nikkor 50mm f/1.8D lens for helping me achieve this effect.
But I’m posting this for posterity not because of the lens but because I want to remember Twin2 this way for years and years to come.
I love you, baby.
P.S. And just so you know, the photo on top is one of 12 shots that I took within minutes of each other. This is how I learn to be better at photography — I shoot and shoot and shoot…then I pick out the photo that conveys exactly what I had in mind. Well…that, plus the fact that I’m kind of a perfectionist when it comes to my work ;)
Tags: Nikon
An old friend from my alma mater, Ateneo De Manila University, was attending a conference in Malaysia last week and I had the chance to visit her at her hotel — the picturesque Pullman Lakeside Putrajaya.
The sprawling hotel — as its name indicates — is located right next to the man-made Putrajaya Lake, which made for a picture-perfect foreground for this photo of the hotel. (Please click on the photo below to see a larger version.)
Pullman Lakeside Putrajaya
The colour of the sky, the puffy white clouds, the reflection of the buildings on the water, the greenery beside the water — all these elements somehow remind me so much of the Netherlands.
And just wait ’til you see the view from the guest rooms! (Once again, please click on the photo below to see a larger version.)
View from Pullman guestroom
This one’s from a guest room located in the Jasmine wing, which is decorated in keeping with the Borneo theme. With such a view, if I stayed in this place, I don’t think I’ll ever be able to leave…
[NB: The hotel wants to give guests a taste of Malaysia's multicultural background, hence various areas of the hotel are designed with different themes, i.e. ethnic Malay, Chinese, Indian, and the Borneo continent.]
The hotel is just a stone’s throw from Putrajaya International Convention Centre (PICC), making the Pullman Lakeside Putrajaya ideal if you happen to be attending an event at PICC.
I must warn you, however, that Putrajaya is quite far from KL city centre — a good 40 minutes or so by car via the new dedicated Putrajaya highway. So if you intend to do some sightseeing or long to experience KL’s shopping and nightlife, this might not be the right hotel for you.
But if you want to get away from it all without really going that far from KL, this hotel will definitely fit the bill.
More photos of the hotel below:-
 |
 |
 |
 |
| Lobby dressed up for CNY | Lotus wing check-in counter | Modern ceiling fixtures | Modern design for this lounge |
A second set here…
 |
 |
 |
 |
| Borneo theme for this wing | Gate upon exiting parking | Lovely koi pond | Oriental design bridge |
And a final set here…
 |
 |
 |
| All-day dining at B’s restaurant | Beautifully decorated lobby | Exterior of Lotus Wing |
For more information, visit the Pullman Lakeside Putrajaya’s website.
Pullman Putrajaya Lakeside
No. 2, Jalan P5/5, Presint 5
62000 Putrajaya, Malaysia
T +603 8890 0000
F +603 8890 0001
E info@pullmanputrajaya.com
