Crossing overland to Thailand…or so we thought: An unexpected trip to the Cameron Highlands

Sunday August 22, 2010

After we finished our time in Taman Negara, we took a 7:30am local bus back to Jerantut. Our plan was to now proceed to Thailand. Thus, we bought a train ticket from Jerantut to Kota Bharu and planned to cross overland on the eastern side of the Malaysian peninsula. We got to the train station around 9:00am, but our train did not leave until 12:30pm, so Ali and I decided to find a grocery store to get some food for the long trip ahead of us (it was supposed to be a 7 hour train ride from Jerantut to Kota Bharu. We also stopped and got an early lunch at a noodle soup place. We decided to eat at the soup place because when we walked by we noticed it was super popular with the locals. We figured any place that was popular with the locals was probably good. That theory panned out as they made the noodles fresh from scratch and made everything right in front of us. It was one of the best meals in Malaysia.

After lunch we headed back to the train station to wait for the train. While waiting we ran into a couple (Edward and Marula) that had stayed with us at the Durian Resort in Taman Negara. They told us they were planning on going to the Cameron Highlands and we told them we were going to Kota Bharu. We noticed that Edward had a Lonely Planet guide book so we decided to borrow it from him while we waited so that we could figure out how exactly to get across the border. We ended up reading and then we talked to Edward about crossing over to Thailand as well. From the book and from Edward we learned several things:

1)       Crossing the border at Kota Bharu is a logistical nightmare. It is not easily accessible and you have to walk very far (i.e. 4-5 km with backpacks that weigh 50 pounds) or take several expensive taxis to get where you need to go.

2)       Crossing the border at Kota Bharu is actually kinda sketchy. Lonely Planet informed us that crossing at Kota Bharu was not safe because of some political tension between Malaysia and Thailand at that location. Plus, our train was supposed to arrive at night which increased the sketchiness…

3)       Arrival to Thailand OVERLAND results in a 15-day tourist visa whereas crossing by AIR results in a 30-day tourist visa (Ali and I were planning on spending 21-28 days in Thailand, so crossing overland at Kota Bharu would give us a visa that expired too quickly. Tourists who get a 15-day visa usually end up in a sticky situation because their visa expires before they are done travelling in Thailand. They often end up having to cross overland to another country and then having to re-enter Thailand and get another 15-day visa. A huge, often expensive headache.)

After learning these three things, we started to seriously doubt our choice of crossing the border overland at Kota Bharu. It was logistically crazy, unsafe, and we would get visa that expired too quickly. So, Ali and I decided to change our plans last minute. We decided to go to the Cameron Highlands as well and once there book a flight out of Malaysia to Thailand. We then told the train conductor our change of plans, and got off the train at Gua Musang (the place to get off if going to the Cameron Highlands) instead of Kota Bahru.

We arrived in Gua Musang around 3:30pm. Ali and I got off the train and met up with Edward and Marula, in hopes of splitting the cost of a bus/taxi with them. It turns out Gua Musang is not a great place to be. No tourists go there, and there are no buses that depart from there. A taxi to the Cameron Highlands was expensive – about 50 RM a person. We really did not want to have to pay that much when transportation in Malaysia is usually super cheap. We spent about 2 hours in Gua Musang trying to come up with a better option for getting to the Cameron Highlands. We called a bunch of companies and tried to haggle with a bunch of different drivers, but they were all working together to over-charge us. In the end we ended up paying $200 for a van to take us there which was disappointing but we had no other option.

The van ride was alright. It poured rain for a while, but then it cleared up and we were able to see the rolling hills around us as well as the plantations and greenhouses. We arrived at our guesthouse – Father’s Guesthouse – around 7:00pm that night. We booked a dorm bed (our cheapest yet at $3/night), and then went for dinner. We found a quaint little restaurant on the second floor of a building. We ordered some noodles and rice with cashews and split the dishes. It was a pretty good meal and it was pretty inexpensive. Once finished eating we headed back to the guesthouse, used the wifi for a bit (to book a flight to Thailand – we found a flight from Kuala Lumpur to Phuket for $60CAD so we booked it), and then we went to sleep.