Outskirts Weekend Getaway at Suria Hill Country House Janda Baik

This was one of the first few flights that Hon booked me to KL, after he got back to KL from the Up North trip. That's commitment! I mean, yeah, he can afford to buy me few promo flight tickets, and that is his effort of wanting to see me in physical. The effort is good enough, and, flights are definitely better muahaha!

Before I go hoo-haa about the lovey dovey HonNee thing and the hatred thing about the exes, let’s move on~!!

We planned for a countryside getaway at Janda Baik for the weekend yeay!! It was Hon’s DateSpark* and he’s delivering the promise J

*DateSpark is one of the features in Match.com to write down the date ideas you want to have and see if any member is interested with it. Hon’s DateSpark was the reason I started email him (yeah, I made the first move, I admit), and he admits he purposely wrote that idea to lure me with keywords like embrace the nature, waterfall, beach and coffee LOL!

The flight was at 2145 Friday night, and I estimated an hour drive from Kangar, plus and minus the traffic and my uncertainty of the way to the airport. What I did NOT estimate was the amount of the ‘hoarding’ traffic, being those who love to drive at 40-50 km/h on a stretch of 70-80 km/h roads. Annoying to the max! I missed a junction too and fortunately a small town’s road is always U-turn-friendly than the big cities. I was at the airport on time, a little hoo-haa about the flight was retimed, ended up the flight took off on time, and an hour later I was with the dearest at LCCT :-)

On Saturday morning, we got ready and I had some chit-chat with Yoyo, Hon’s almost-3yo niece. We met in Penang during Raya, and I’m glad she still remembers me! We got out for breakfast and shopping in Giant for our picnic BBQ in Janda Baik later. It was indeed sweet to shop groceries (sort of) with the loved one hehe…

At noon, we got out from town, and headed to Bentong for lunch. We had Vietnam Pho and wanton mee at one of the roadside stall (nothing to wow about) for the sake of ‘having lunch’ since both of us weren’t really hungry yet. Then, we started our way to Janda Baik via the inner road from Bentong. Hon couldn’t stop talking about the small road with almost zero traffic, surrounded by trees, streams, falls, private villas, the awesome scenic view, and his dream of driving on this road with a woman he loves!

After a series of hilly and narrow road, we made a stop at a very nice coffee house called Pinto Café in Tanarimba. There were some crews setting up a wedding banquet. The coffee house has a small stream running beside, the forest-y view is definitely awesome, and everything is so great! Now THAT is what I call DATE!! Hehe… The food isn’t so fancy though…

Tanarimba Pinto Cafe

After having our coffee, had enough of the kids running around screaming and people puffing cigarettes, we moved on to our resort.

Hon booked a room at Suria Hill Janda Baik Resort. Janda Baik is a small village deep inside the forest beside the Karak Highway, and slowly transforms into a tourist attraction for the city people to get away from the city and experience the forest, orchard, and village life. Note: ‘city’ people; so the kampong girl like me who literally grew up in orchard and wooden kampong house, please lah~ No biggie K~~ Hehe… Resorts are blossoming like mushroom in this small kampong, when we searched the way to our resort, there was at least 20 resorts on the signboard!

We finally bumped into a gate like the one on this blog Hon showed me, but this time, it was opened. There were few foreigners on the gate and lobby. We checked in, and the staff asked us whether we were there for ‘wedding’, and realized that most of the guests staying in that resort were attending the wedding at Tanarimba.

 

Suria Hill Country House, Janda Baik

We took a quick tour around our room (Hon was disappointed), went to the reception to ask about the stream, and took a tour around the resort. The stream was at the back of the resort, where it flows through few resorts. We awed in excitement, and quickly went back to the car to grab our stuff and food for the picnic!

At the time, the stream was empty. It is shallow, some rocky path with Jacuzzi effect, a little brown-y and sand-y, the water is cold, surrounded by trees… *Heaven*

 I couldn’t wait any longer and quickly took a dip in the water! Taking the pictures of the stream and my man setting up the portable BBQ. His friend gave him a portable BBQ set – a simple steel tray with inflammable coal, all we need to prepare was matches, fire starter, and FOOD! We bought drumsticks, kebab sticks, corns (way too many) and pork sausages.

When the coal started burning, he moved it to the side of the ‘jetty’, so we had a great time dipping in the stream and BBQ-ing! Few people took a stroll to the stream, people from the resort we stayed and from the other resort. As a newly-fond couple, we find it hard to not stay close to each other for a second, so we literally stick to each other while eating and dipping, especially when the stream can be quite cold when you dip for too long. Hehehe~~~ Irritatingly sweet…

When the sky was getting dark and the water became colder, we packed our stuff and leave the stream. There was a couple setting up a tent at the other resort. So cool!

There’s nothing much to do at night. We stayed in the room watching TV, reading newspaper and cuddling. We watched ‘Caught on Camera’ on AXN, and the episode talked about Crowd Control where one of the stampede tragedies took place in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. It was such an eerie tragedy it bugged me up til yesterday… L

The next morning, we woke up to fresh air, greenery environment and serenity. We had our complimentary breakfast at the resort. The menu was typical: nasi lemak (the sambal is finger licking good!), toast, cereals, and coffee/tea. We took another dip in the stream after breakfast, but it was waaaay too cold to put myself into the water, so the most I could do was to sit on the rock with water running on it.

Went back room to take a shower, packed our stuff, and checked out.

Comment: DateSpark promise delivered and it is totally sweet J I have no harsh comment about it but Hon did, having to pay over RM200 for this room but it is worse than what Jerai offers with less charges.

By the way, I left my baby pillow there! Called up the reception to ask them keep it for me LOL.