I went to Forest Research Institute Malaysia (FRIM) (http://www.frim.gov.my/) head quarters in Kepong, Selangor for a nice walk with my camera with few of my friends. I can say that the place is one of the easiest forest reserves that I can access whereby the landscape is not that far from the capital of Malaysia (Kuala Lumpur). It took me less than 30 minutes of calm driving from my house to FRIM(I live in Meru, Klang). Arrived at FRIM around 8.00 am and my friend, Tiqie is already waiting for me. Entrence fee to that place is RM 5 per car but for common joggers and jungle walkers, you can apply for monthly pass (I think). We waited for the others to come for about 15 minutes and quickly shoot to the information center with a big “i” sign on it.
From the information center, we knew that the main attraction in FRIM is the Jungle Canopy Walkway. The Canopy Walkway is where you can walk within the canopy of the jungle from tree to tree using the build bridge. From the information that I get, the canopy bridge is one of the longest in the world…and also one of the tallest. It requires 5 more Ringgit to enter the canopy walkway in which I did not manage to reach to that walkway because I had an acid reflux due to heavy breakfast. From the bottom, you have to climb at least 1 kilometer before you can reach the enterence of the canopywalkway. It’s a tough challenge for me…with hours in office chair everyday (really need to get fit)…
Anyway…these are some of hate love stuff that I can highlight about FRIM forest reserve.
1. Love
- The place is nicely located. 30 minutes from my house. Around 20 minutes from Kuala Lumpur.
- Seriously, green is everywhere. You would not believe your eyes that the place is very close to Kuala Lumpur…basically you can see rivers and streams flowing with clear and fresh water in it.
- The fees to the place are reasonable. Come with a van…you will appreciate it.
- Activities…you can jog, cycle, climb trees…actually the activities that you can do over there are infinite....almost ^_^
- If you go and browse through FRIM's website…you will notice that the place is actually an Eco-tourism jungle. They plant so many trees on that soil for education and research purposes.
- Love how calm the environment was.
- Love the people…they look healthy…including an 80 years men walking in the jungle track which smiled to me (I think he is 80 ^_^).
- I like the river. Very clean.
- The side walk and joggers path are properly maintained.
2. Hate
- They gave us a badly printed map. It’s not the quality of the paper…heck who cares as long as you can read it…most people will throw it away anyway….The bad side here is about the information within the map. They really need to hire professionals to properly put info in it. The map will make you lost…that’s what happen to us.
- The information center is a bit dull and the smell is unfavorable. Sorry FRIM.
- Please put more sign so that we know how to go from one place to another (I mean a simple sign which align with the given map). For example, the sign to canopy walkway is a bit hard to find. From the map we knew that there were 3 entrances…the hard one, the easy one and the not so hard/easy one…but unfortunately, we can’t find any sign and we have to ask around.
- Please put someone to manage the ticket for the canopy walkway up there so that people will not have to climb down just to buy ticket after they reached the entrance of the canopy walkway...it’s a 1 kilometer walk, up and down hill.
- Other than that, I enjoyed the trip…
Thanks to Ridzhan, Fiza, Tiqie and a new friend Luqman for accompanying me.
Cheers.
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