Trip to Cameron Highlands

Date: 17 October 2009, Saturday

Venue: Cameron Highlands

Occasion: Day trip to check out the YLDP campsite, IJ Barre

It was quite a crazy day for me. I was up & running around to get stuff done from 6:45 a.m. til 12:00 a.m. the next day :S It was quite a tiring day. By the time I really got home, I was dead tired & just wanted to sleep; I didn't even feel like bathing...

James, Rach, Leej, Tim, & I left for Cameron Highlands to check out on the YLDP 2009 campsite. The journey took us roughly 3.5hours non-stop. Our main aim was to just check out the campsite, so we didn't exactly spend many hours there. All we did was to go around the campsite, have our lunch nearby, & headed back to PJ. It was rather tiring :S

Throughout the journey, I didn't really take that many photos nor did much, so here are some of the flower shots to share :)

Lovely flowers at the Convent school grounds:






Flowers at a nursery in Brinchang, on our way back to KL:

Fresh Chili

Bees at the Bee Farm

We had lunch at Downtown Cafe, a small eatery at the Tanah Rata town. We didn't know where to eat, where's not too expensive, & which place offers reasonably good food. While passing by the Downtown Cafe, I caught a glimpse of the cafe having quite a good crowd, so we decided to take our lunch there. It can't go THAT wrong when there's some crowd, can it?

Overall comment: Food was reasonably good - worth eating. The cafe was quite clean, neat, & cosy - a nice place to have a simple meal with family/friends. They serve all sorts of food from Western to Asian to even steamboat! Price-wise, I don't think it's very expensive though no doubt it's on an above-average price range.


Note: Prices of food are just an approximate as I can't recall accurately.

Mushroom soup (RM3.50/bowl)
Too diluted to be "cream" of mushroom. According to our dear friend, chef James, the soup was SO Campbell - straight from the can, & not some home-made mushroom soup...

Chilled Strawberry Drink (RM6.00/glass)
A 'lil over-priced, right? Nothing to shout about...taste cordial-ish...

Strawberry Tea (RM2.50/cup)
It's like the usual Lipton/Boh tea with strawberry fragrance...hahaha...ok-lah. Just for fun :P

Herbal Duck Mee Suah (RM7.50/bowl)
Not too bad. It would taste better if there were more herbs. The mee suah was just nice - not too soft. The duck pieces was alright; not tough & still has an aromatic duck taste. The greens were of course good since we were in Cameron Highlands - fresh & crispy :)

Fried Kuey Teow with Venison, Ginger, & Spring Onions (RM9.50/serving)
Quite fragrant :) I kinda enjoyed the taste of the fried kuey teow with the venison (deer meat). It wasn't too oily, but it wasn't too dry as well. The amount of egg, in my opinion was just right. At least in a plate of fried kuey teow, you can taste the fried egg - it's very important to me!

Downtown Chicken Chop (RM12.00/serving)
Crispy fried chicken chop with Downtown Cafe's home-made sauce. The sauce, if I can recall correctly, has a tangy taste as well as a very "Chinese touch" to it. Not too bad la :)

Honey Grilled Chicken Chop (RM12.00/serving)
Expect the piece of breast meat to be a 'lil dry & tough; unlike the Downtown Chicken Chop, which is the chicken thigh part. This is a very simple style of a chicken chop & if you're one who is into something very flavourful, this may not be "the thing" for you.

Mixed Grill (RM19.00/serving)
There's a piece of lamb, a piece of beef, a chicken sausage, & a sunny-side-up fried egg. This platter is enough to keep you full 'til the next meal. The beef was exceptionally tender, even better than the lamb, to our surprise!

Thinking that the day would end after the Cameron Highlands trip was just a hallucination for me. I ended up meeting with Kenneth, Ling, & Theng for dinner & catch-up since Kenneth was back in town for the weekend...oh, the tired me...


Downtown Cafe
41, Jalan Besar
Tanah Rata
39000 Cameron Highlands
Pahang Darul Makmur.
Tel: (+605) 4911419


Ratings:
Presentation: * * *
Price: * * *
Environment: * * * 1/2
Taste: * * *
Service: * * *


Overall

- Ruth