Perting Falls Hike

Planned hikes
The Malaysia Knife Forums is entering its sixth year in existence.
This is by far, one of the longest surviving interest group.
The group is also on Facebook where its even more active than the forums. I know this for a fact because I set it up.
So, fast-forward to our outing last month in Templer's Park: I suggested a follow-up hike and Lye Choon Keong, the Forum's secretary had singled out the Perting Falls in Pahang as the venue..

Serene: A scene from the falls

 I've never heard of this place and as soon as the mention was made, I posted a thread on the forums to round up the usual guys who are interested for the hike. Similarly, there was a campout at Batu Dam by another group. So, the numbers were pretty even.
The final tally was five people, which was a solid head-count.

Familiar route
I suggested to meet up at Bukit Tinggi, later, Keong re-adjusted the rendezvous point at Genting Sempah R&R and also offered a 4WD transfer to the trail head.
This was a welcoming move as part of the road leading to the entrance of the falls were really banged-up.
I later found out that the Perting Falls was located off the Gombak - Bentong road.
Michelle and I had cycled around this area and are familiar with the routing.
Keong led the drive with Kenny Ho and Walther trailing in another 4WD vehicle.
So far, Keong, Walther, Kenny and I are the only fellas who followed-up on the hike from the Templer's Park trip.
We had a new guy Ray who tagged along..

Lead tracker: Keong on the trail

Serenity: Scenes like these makes me pine for a hike in the jungle..

 Medium-difficulty course
Templer's park was peanuts in terms of difficulty.
Perting, on the other hand, is a little bit challenging.
Basically, its a 3.5km hike towards a drop which is pretty steep.
It took us about 45-minutes to get to the falls.
While we were hiking, Keong made mention of a Hash runner who got lost in Templer's Park.
Lost? What was the guy thinking? 
Kenny made a theory that the guy was injured. Which is quite possible and it turned out that he did got hurt and was found a couple of days later when rescuers combed Templer's Park for the missing dude.
The first leg of the hike in my humble opinion, was really interesting as we had to plough through a fern bush as tall as our heads.
Along the way, I noticed that the path which was cut in the secondary jungle was a former timber trail.
Remnants of heavy vehicle passing through this track was evident with steel pipes used as drainage.
When we arrived at a campsite near the falls, we noticed a large group of campers, about 20 people including men and women chilling out at the spot.
Some were washing their hair with shampoo on the water while the rest were just hanging out.
I spent most of my time capturing some slow-shutter shots of the falls.
Keong took out his stove and made some hot drinks for the rest of the gang.
After spending about an hour there, we began to hike out.
In total, we walked for 7km and I must say that it was an educational experience..

Educational trip: Keong explaining about the forest plants to the hikers

River crossing

The steep drop

 After hiking out to the trail head, me made a detour to the Perting Valley teambuilding camp. Keong knew the caretaker and told us that the place is a regular venue for companies to train their staff.
Later, we made our way to Bentong for ais kacang and Bukit Tinggi for a late lunch..