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Highland ho!

Photo: Parvathy Nayar

Cool holiday The view from the Highlands

Indian Summers are evocative of bright colours, dizzying sunlight, breath-taking sights — and, for local residents, a fervent desire to escape to cooler climes.

For those seeking cool options beyond Ooty or Kodaikanal, Cameron Highlands in Malaysia is pretty chill. Given its proximity to Kuala Lumpur — about three-and-a-half hours by car — you can even combine a few days of hanging out at the hip, happening Bangsar in the capital city, before haring to the hills.

Cameron Highlands is accessible only by road — and as these roads are in excellent shape, the drive is extremely pleasant. However, given the vertiginous climb during the last part of the trip, do go prepared if hairpin bends do something to you. On the way up and on the mountaintop — or plateau, to be geographically accurate — are views aplenty to soothe the mind.

Also conspicuous by their absence are car rental services, so it’s wise to drive there, as opposed to taking the bus. While there’s lots of walking to be done in the form of trekking, jungle explorations and sightseeing, it makes a difference to have your own wheels to get around.

Though primarily a getaway-from-it-all resort, Cameron Highlands does have an interesting history. It derives its name from William Cameron, a British surveyor who discovered it in 1885 during a mapping mission, yet strangely forgot to map this particular discovery.

It took the mysterious disappearance of the famous Jim Thompson in 1967 to put Cameron Highlands firmly on the map. The military intelligence officer, who made Thai silk world famous, had, apparently, come for some rest and recuperation to the hill station, but vanished while taking a walk in the jungles.

Coming from hot Kuala Lumpur — and even hotter Chennai — the cool temperature may be a shivery shock to the system, but is perfect for growing tea. In 1929, John Archibald Russell started a tea plantation that can be visited today: the well-known Boh Tea Plantation, perched on a hilltop.

On the premises, a steep but short climb up another hilltop offers a 360-degree panoramas of lush, tea-planted hillsides. Also on offer is a shop well-stocked with various flavours of tea, a factory tour of the facilities and the Ummph café to sample the freshly-made brew.

High tea with scones is one of the foodie highlights of the Highlands. An expensive but delightful venue for this treat is the Jim Thomson Tea Room at Cameron Highlands Resort, the charming boutique hotel that faces an exquisitely green golf course, and is run by YTL Hotels and Properties.

The Tea Room is beautifully appointed, with a pool table thrown in for good measure, and the well-trained staff bring finger sandwiches, pastries, scones and lashings of local strawberry jam to our table.

Strawberry farm visits are another must-do activity. It’s instant immersion in a Beatles song to see strawberry fields stretching forever, all hydroponically grown.

Enjoyable too, to pick my own strawberries — I essentially pay for a plastic box, am given basic instructions on how to fill it, and let loose among the impossibly wonderful fruit. The homemade strawberry jams are worth buying, as is the locally-made honey at the Bee Farm.

The YTL property is high-end but there’s accommodation of every kind available. For example, family-friendly resorts such as the Strawberry Park Resort Hotel, a value-for-money choice given its convenient setting in the middle of town but also set amid seven acres of hilltop jungle.

The pleasures of the Highlands may be outdoor walks, and visits to bee, butterfly and strawberry farms, but there’s no shortage of places to eat at. It’s fun to get out of the hotel and drive to nearby Tanah Rata and Brinchang where lots of local inexpensive Malay food is available. The unpretentious but popular Kumar’s, for example, does a fine line in crisp chilli-cheese roti pratas with spicy curry sauce.

It’s Saturday night, and the weekly night market in Brinchang bustles with life. It’s a nicely jumbled affair with different kinds of produce — including gorgeous flowers — grown in the Highlands, as well as souvenir stalls. A useful reminder that gifts for back home must be bought, and that the cool heights will eventually be left behind to come back down to flat, hot earth.

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