My last day in KL was spent with Erik doing a bit of sightseeing, a bit of cinema (The Eye 2 - what a great Asian horror movie!) and a bit of shopping. Then he came to the railway station with me to see me onto the night train to Singapore.

I awoke just before crossing the small straits that divide the island of Singapore from the Malaysian peninsula. The sun was rising pinkly over the buildings of Johor Bahru and people were getting ready to leave the train to go through Singapore customs on the far side of the water. I did likewise, stretching my still sore legs as best I could in the sleeper.

After customs formalities we reboarded the train and went on to Singapore main railway station. Sadly, this has not been connected to Singapore's light rail system yet, so after a quick roti chanai for breakfast I had to make my way on foot further into town. It was really weird to be walking around in the morning rush-hour, rucksack on my back, with loads of smartly dressed office workers making their way to work to my left and right. The underground was freaky. I felt as though I had somehow been transported to a previous London-commuter period of my life. Euergh!

It was super duper easy to get my flights revalidated at the Qantas office. It was harder to reconcile my backpacker station in life with this glitzy skyscraper-ridden 21st-century city. Even the "backpacker area" was posh! About the only thing to connect my immediate surroundings to the last three months of my travels around Southeast Asia was the sweaty heat, which started to build even at ten in the morning.

I found a cheap hostel, jumped in the shower, and had a few hours' extra kip. I'd had an exhausting time of it in Malaysia, what with jungle trekking and then incessant city meanderings. But Singapore had more walking in store for me. I found some lunch in Little India, then made my way to Sentosa Island for a bit of tourism. The cable car ride over the harbour gave me some splendid views back into the heart of the city, and a chance to see some truly expensive yachts bobbing gently at their moorings.

The highlight of the island for me was the Undersea World attraction, with one of those cool walk-through tunnels where sharks and rays swim right over your head. Of course, now being a seasoned diver I wasn't in a state of shock at the sight of these crazy sea creatures lolling at head-height, but it was dead good to see so many so close! And at any rate it was a good deal more exciting than the neighbouring insect museum - I mean, honestly! How can spiked butterflies compare to the wonders of turtles, seahorses and piranhas?

I managed spectacularly to miss the Night Safari on offer at Singapore zoo. Having misjudged the time it would take me to get there, I not only arrived too late to join the last tour but I also managed to get stranded half-way back into town on the underground which closed on me! A taxi ride later and I was safely back in my hostel, with nothing to show for the evening but a few more completed chapters in my current book and a few less dollars on my light rail pass.

On my last day in Singapore, I determined that I would check out and then head to Chinatown. This I duly did, but not quite in the solitary company I had expected: just as I was leaving the hostel, a be-backpacked girl started up the stairs and asked me whether the hostel was any good. At my less than unequivocal answer, she headed back down the stairs towards the next hostel along. In one of those "hey, I'm a traveller, there's no stress here" moments I just walked along with her for a chat. It turns out she is from Berlin and so we switched to German. Then we spent the rest of the day sightseeing together, which was nice.

First we found Kerstin a hotel, then we looked into two temples (a Hindu and a Buddhist) nearby. A spot of lunch in a modern microbrewery type place was followed by a long leisurely wander around Chinatown. We ended up back where I had first arrived, and then I realised the time so I had to dash. Just then it started raining - hooray! So I got drenched walking back to my hostel and then back to the light rail to catch the train to the airport. Oh well, it was to be my last tropical soaking for a while, so I didn't really mind.

Things went ever so smoothly at the airport - well, I arrived a bit late so in fact there was no queue left for me to join at check-in - and in what seemed like no time I was on board the first aeroplane I've been in since Lao. Aaahhhhh! It felt good. And it was half empty, so I wasn't even squashed.

I'd like to tell you all about what I got up to in Kuala Lumpur. Indeed, I had written a whole great big blog all about that and my day-trip to Malacca and loads of exciting things like the Petronas Towers and helping Erik get his visa for Indonesia and meeting up with Jo & Nathan to build huge statues out of beer cans we had emptied in the course of the evening. But all that got wiped by this bloody curse we call "users who don't know what they're doing in an unstable environment". Yes, ladis and gentlemen, this time I accept the blame. I thought I had managed not to delete a load of stuff - it even appeared on the screen that it was still there - but in fact it's gone forever.

So, there you have it. KL is really cool. Well, actually it's really hot, and there are daily thunderstorms which drench you if you're out of doors between 5pm and 6pm. The Petronas Towers are truly exquisite pieces of architecture. The telecoms tower over KL gives spectacular views, particularly during said thunderstorm. The Indonesian embassy is an experience, especially if you're queueing to get something photocopied. The light rail system is groovy (okay I'm a bit of an anorak when it comes to public transport, but you knew that) and the skyscraper-infested skyline manages to retain an identity because there are loads of cute Islamic-inspired details in the concrete and glass.

Malacca's all right too, but nothing special really. Bit of old town, reminds me of Penang. Some good food.

Yours subduedly and in mourning for a much better blog,

Me

The next day saw Erik, Nathan & me embark on a two-day jungle trek. Jo chickened out at the last minute, but Nathan is of the opinion that it's probably for the best that she did, because some of the trekking was big-style challenging. After the initial visit to an aboriginal Orang Asli village (where everyone had Macy Gray hair and blowpipes) and a relaxing boat ride upriver, we got out at an abandoned resort and were told to spray our boots with hardcore insect repellent to ward off the leeches. Then we had to pick our way over a partially collapsed bridge of Empire vintage, at one point having only a thin plank of wood between us and the gulley a hundred feet below us. Hm!

The rest of the walking was okay, if hot & sweaty (I amazed the guys and the guide by how much sweat I could wring out of my teeshirt at each stop). Lunch by the side of a tannin-stained leaf-strewn stream consisted of super noodles and fresh veg, all cooked in stream water. We saw many interesting plants & fungi, some interesting small lizards, and some interesting large animal dung deposits, but the tigers, elephants, Malayan sunbears and white gibbons didn't come a-visiting in person.

Our destination for the evening was a massive single-chambered limestone cave that was cathedralesque in proportion and design. A huge vaulted ceiling was home to scores of bats (and didn't we have it proved to us in the night by continuous bombardment!), whilst filigree columns set into the walls gave the rats and cockroaches room to play. Our guide told us it was just us that night, so we dumped our stuff and headed out to a nearby stream to have a wash. When we came back we found another group had arrived. And, to my great joy, they had found and picked up the carry mat that had fallen off my rucksack earlier in the day! They didn't really talk to us though, which was a bit weird.

Our guide set about cooking dinner, and the three of us got out the cards and started playing shithead. What a great game that is! We didn't need chemical enhancements to have a good night (unless you count the super-strength Milo shakes that Nathan mixed up for us - Milo is like Nesquick only less chocolatey and more yummy). I think maybe our enthusiastic card playing rather scared off the other people - or maybe it was the sight of three big blokes wandering around just in pants and walking boots.

Our guide fell promptly asleep after food (tinned fare with the addition of a great tom yam vegetable curry with some mushrooms we found along the way, rounded off with tinned rambutans stuffed with pineapple chunks) so we ended up not doing the promised night walk in and around the cave. But, given our state of undress and the fun we were having with the cards, none of us cared. We finally turned in around midnight, and I slept remarkably well considering the amount of wildlife there was.

The next morning, the cave was abuzz with huge wasps that were feasting on the sweat in our clothes and bags. Nathan, being allergic, wasn't too impressed at this. We managed to fend them off long enough to make breakfast and collect yesterday's pots & pans that our guide had insisted we leave out for the rats - but look at it this way, at least they weren't rooting around in our bags for food because they had it literally handed to them on a plate. Then it was back out into the wilds.

It was a jungle out there!

The second day was bizarrely not as knackering as I had expected it to be. Somehow I think my legs got used to the walking. Which isn't to say I didn't collapse into a chair exhausted when we reached the jetty and were waiting to be picked up. But it felt good, even as it felt good to wring out my teeshirt for the umpteenth time and shoulder my bag and carry on walking and clamber up stairways of tree roots and jump across muddy streams and duck under fallen trees and trip across patches of undergrowth and pick my way along precipitous cliff-edges and stoop to marvel at the dance of the leeches and lift my head to sniff the heady scents of apricot and walnut and rotting leaves and wild ginger and sandalwood and sweat.

Jo was on the boat that collected us from the abandoned resort, and like a total star she brought us chilled drinks! Sadly, I had just finished the bottle of dodgy stream water and puritab, but I haven't had any ill effects from it. Needless to say, the Sprite was much much tastier. The boat ride was much quicker back downstream to Taman Negara. The afternoon was spent recovering, and in the evening we had dinner in the most opulent of the floating riverside restaurants. We rounded the evening off with some cheeky beers and a four-way shithead session in our room, before collapsing gratefully into a deep sleep in our respective hostels.

The next day I had to get up extra early to retrieve our laundry from the hostel owners. They had kindly hung it all out to dry in their living room, it being too damp at night for anything to have got dry outside. Then, after breakfast (served by the most flirtatious of any of the headscarf-bedecked waitresses we have seen here) we jumped on a boat back to Jerantut. Thence to KL by minibus after a ropey lunch in the travel agency restaurant.

I woke up at 5am and was greeted with a breakfast of toast & egg. There was only one other guest awake, and it turned out he was going the same way as us. Erik from Holland is travelling on his own, so handily we could share a room and keep costs down over the next few days.

Our minibus picked up Nathan & Jo and then headed out of town to the railway station. We were surprised to discover that our Jungle Train was air-conditioned! After watching the sun rise, and permitting myself a few more hours of z's, I stirred to look out of the window and enjoy the scenery. Actually, it wasn't that great; I had seen much the same on the bus from Georgetown, and at least the bus windows had seen soapy water in the previous year. But hey, having paid a grand total of two pounds for a ten-hour journey I wasn't going to be too fussy.

We got out at Jerantut and were brought by a willing tourist agency to the village of Taman Negara, the gateway to the Taman Negara National Park. This is home to Malaysia's largest remaining primary jungle, and the oldest jungle in the world at over 130 million years. The minibus deposited me, Erik, Nathan, Jo, and Mike & Karina (a Filipino/Norwegian couple living in Amsterdam) in the village and we found ourselves some rooms. Erik & I chose an A-frame chalet which turned out to have the benefit of distance from the local mosque; the others were only steps away from the loudspeakers.

That evening we went down to the riverside and had some food. This being eastern Malaysia, beer was not on the menu, but an enterprising tour guide managed to procure us some amber nectar (no, it wasn't Foster's thankfully, actually Tiger) for consumption round a camp fire on the pebble beach. It wasn't that comfy, but hey it was beer. (Oh, how I have fallen from my teetotality.)

Our first full day in the jungle was quite full-on. First we made our way to the world's longest tree canopy hanging walkway, which was a bit hair-raising at times. Then we scaled the heights of Bukit Teresek, a nearby hill with views out over the jungle. Then, after a spot of well-earned lunch, we all went tubing on the river. This was hilarious, chiefly because I kept getting beached on the rocks and having to swim like a bastard to catch up with the others. At one point, I got caught in a whirlpool and had to be rescued by the boat! Oh, the shame! Still, it was good fun, and my anal virginity was left largely intact - bonus!

In the evening, after a spot of well-earned dinner (mmmmmm satay sticks!) we went for a nighttime jeep safari. We had organised "special water" for the back of the pickup - and oh joy! they were accompanied by a huge sack of ice. I spent quite some time chiselling the ice into manageable chunks that could be packed around the beers, but I didn't miss much on the wildlife front. We did see a black cobra, some birds whose names I have forgotten, and some wild boar. But as to the tigers, leopard cats, barking deer and their ilk, they steered well clear of us. Ah well.