Sudah lima hari saya tidak update blog ini kerana saya berada di Batu Kurau, Perak mengikuti ekspedisi jungle trekking dari Batu Kurau ke Bukit Larut (Bukit maxwell), Taiping selama empat hari tiga malam dari Selasa hingga Jumaat lalu.
Kami dari majalah Agro Malaysia tiba di chalet Teratak Afrina di Anak Kurau pada petang Selasa. Program untuk media itu diikuti oleh wartawan Berita Harian, Ipoh Echo, majalah Santai dan majalah Agro Malaysia. Semua jabatan turut mengikuti jungle trekking sejauh 22km ini iaitu Jabatan Hutan, Jabatan Perhilitan, Jabatan Bomba dan Penyelamat, TDC, Travel Agensi, Majlis Perbandaran Taiping dan Zoo Taiping serta belia-belia dari Persatuan Belia Pro Aktif Anak Kurau.
Petang Selasa kami seramai 48 orang berbasikal keliling kampung Anak Kurau melihat Gua Kelawar serta ladang herba milik orang kampung yang menanam pokok roselle dan misai kucing.
Sebelah malam Ketua Kampung, Wahab Mat Yunus menceritakan pengalaman orang kampung melombong bijih timah di Bukit Pelita yang akan kami daki pada hari Rabu. Bijih timah didapati dalam batu. Orang kampung terpaksa menebuk batu itu sejauh satu rantai untuk dapatkan bijih timah. Biasanya mereka naik ke bukit selama seminggu untuk mencari bijih timah.
Pagi Rabu kami naik Bukit Pelita sejauh 15 km selama lima jam dari jam 10 pagi hingga 3 petang. Ada kumpulan yang sampai lambat dua jam dari kami. Malam itu kami bermalam di Bukit Pelita mendirikan khemah. Belia yang pandai memasak menyediakan makanan untuk kami. Kami terhibur dengan lawak Pak Yah, 58 tahun atau nama sebenarnya Alias yang pernah melombong bijih timah di situ pada tahun 70an. Malam itu Pak Yah tidur lewat menghiburkan kami dengan cerita-cerita lucunya.
Pada tahun 70an melombong bijih timah menjadi punca pendapatan orang kampung. Pagi Khamis kami ditunjuk Pak Yah terowong lombong bijih timah yang sudah terbiar. Kami sempat memasuki satu terowong. Petangnya selepas makan nasi, kami mendaki Bukit Tonggek yang lebih tinggi. Empat jam kami berjalan sampai ke Banglo Speedy di Bukit Maxwell pada jam 6 petang.
Banglo Speedy atau banglo Frank Swettenham dibina pada tahun 1800an ketika beliau bertugas di Perak. Kini banglo itu dijadikan Pusat Biodiversiti yang diselenggara oleh Persatuan Belia Pro Aktif Anak Kurau dengan mendapat geran dari Jabatan Langskap.
Siapa Frank Sweetenham? Menurut Wikipedia, Sir Frank Athelstane Swettenham GCMG CH (28 March 1850 – 11 June 1946) was the first Resident General of the Federated Malay States (part of the then Royal Colonies, now independent Malaysia) which was formed by combining a number of sultanates. He served from 1 July 1896 to 1901. He was also an amateur photographer. He was born in Belper, Derbyshire,[1] Britain.
He was one of close to forty former British empire officials to actually oppose the Malayan Union.
He created a dictionary "Vocabulary of the English and Malay languages". He also published two books "Malay Sketches" and "Unaddressed Letters".
Swettenham was a British colonial official in British Malaya, who was famous as highly influential in shaping British policy and the structure of British administration in the Malay Peninsula.
In 1871 Swettenham was first sent to Singapore as a cadet in the civil service of the Straits Settlements (Singapore, Malacca, and Penang Island). He learned the Malay language and played a major role as British-Malay intermediary in the events surrounding British intervention in the peninsular Malay states in the 1870s.
He was a member of the Commission for the Pacification of Larut set up following the signing of the Pangkor Treaty of 1874 and he served alongside John Frederick Adolphus McNair, and Chinese Kapitan Chung Keng Quee and Chin Seng Yam. The Commission was successful in freeing many women taken as captives during the Larut Wars (1862–73), getting stockades dismantled and getting the tin mining business going again.
More than a decade later, in 1882, which he was appointed as resident (adviser) to the Malay state of Selangor. In Selangor office, the development of coffee and tobacco estates had successfully promoted by him, while in the meantime, helped boost tin earnings by constructing a railway from Kuala Lumpur (it was capital of Selangor at that time), to the port of Klang, which was later named Port Swettenham in his honour.
He was attended the federation, along with the title of resident-general after secured an agreement of federation from the states of Perak, Selangor, Negri Sembilan, and Pahang in 1895, when the time he served as resident of Perak state. In 1897 he was knighted by Queen Victoria, and in 1901, three years before his retirement, he was appointed high commissioner for the Malay states and governor of the Straits Settlements.
Through Swettenham's huge efforts to convince that the British Foreign Office reversed its policy of accepting Siamese control of the northern tier of Malay states. His portrayal of their maladministration under native rulers and his warnings of possible intervention by rival European powers led to British penetration of those states in the early 1900s.
Pagi Jumaat kami turun dari Bukit Larut dengan Land Rover. Jalannya sempit hanya muat satu kereta sahaja sejauh 10 km dengan 92 selekoh. Tiba di kaki bukit kami naik bas ke Zoo Taiping untuk ikuti majlis penutup oleh Pengarah Zoo Taiping, Dr Kevin Lazarus.
Sesungguhnya jungle trekking dari Batu Kurau ke Bukit Larut sejauh 22 km ini amat menyeronokkan tapi memenatkan. Bagi pencinta alam semulajadi, mereka blehlah datang ke sini mengikuti pakej yang disediakan oleh Persatuan Belia Anak Kurau. Bukit Larut adalah hutan dara. Jadi pokok-pokoknya terpelihara dengan udara yang segar.
Tahniah kepada semua yang terlibat dalam menjayakan ekspedisi ini terutamanya Majlis Perbandaran Taiping yang menjemput kami.