Rebecca and I left the hotel to collect the car, with a quick stop off to get some fruit on the way, she loves the selection you get here. Hunting for the car hire place is interesting given its in one of the massive office blocks and nobody had heard of it. Found it by walking every floor and then, obviously, it’s closed! Assumed the bloke was out having a wander and after 30 mins he appeared as if nothing was out of the ordinary which I actually suspect is correct, it’s completely normal here. So with one person in front of us I’m told it’s a 15 mins wait, hence writing this blog from the car hire office.

The fun and games you get when hiring a car never cease to amaze me. Just how many things can they do wrong, firstly as suspected, they didn’t seem to know anything about the car seats, then as also suspected, they wanted to charge us extra when they found some.  Negotiations started and thankfully my prep in the hotel paid off and quickly the bloke backed down. Then off to do the damage check and I’ve never seen it being done so thoroughly, which of course means another 30 mins wasted.  Finally just as we’re about to leave the car seats, that were meant to be delivered to the hotel turn up randomly, which is a bit of luck they had wasted all my time or I would have had to go back for them!

2.5 hours later!!!. And I finally get back to pick Li up who, bless her, had to pack the entire room of our hotel up by herself, which just to be clear is about a 5 minute walk to the car hire place.  Anyway, getting everything in the car was thankfully not too bad as we’d opted for something of a decent size, Honda Civic, and to be honest quite a nice car, although could do with a little more guts under the bonnet.

We commence our journey and the roads are surprisingly very good, and, after a few stops, about 7:30pm we finally arrive in Taman Negara, in the main village; our hotel nowhere to be seen.

 Couple of locals are questioned and of course it’s the one that’s on the other side of the bloody great big river… No roads in sight.  Turns out that you have to get a little taxi boat to the other side, with all your luggage, but given we didn’t know this we end up having to unload everything. Next challenge, the car, there’s nowhere to park it, even though the hotel states parking.. Which is a bit of a joke given that there’s no cars even! Anyway, after some more talking to the locals they convince me that it’s good to use a secure parking that just seems a con to be honest, but it’s all the talk of slashed tyres that wins the argument at the end of the day.

A short lift back on the blokes scooter to the jetty and we’re the whisked away in Golf buggies to the other end of the big complex of chalets with all our luggage.  A change of rooms is in order and sorted out given the distance to the boats, which is quite good.  Dinner was on the other side of the river in a floating restaurant, amazing food including tum yum soup, and really cheap as well, plus a deal with the boat bloke means we can get back afterwards. Air conditioning is a godsend here, stupidly hot but a lovely place, really out in the middle of the jungle, plus quite surprisingly the best beds we’ve had since being away. Finally a good night’s sleep!