TRAVEL TALES

The older I get, the more I find that being in nature is my happy place. With a pace of life that feels permanently hectic, and climate concerns also weighing heavily, there is something so soothing for the soul about being around trees. As a result of my later-in-life passion for the great outdoors, my kids often find themselves on weekend bush walks, and while they sometimes have to be bribed with biscuits, I’m pleased to say that an enjoyment of the wilderness has rubbed off on them too. So much so that when we were planning a family holiday in the middle of last year, we decided to make it a big adventure and visit the world’s oldest tropical rainforest.

At 130 million years young, and 4343 square kilometres in size, Taman Negara National Park in Malaysia is largely untouched jungle that provides a home to 200 different types of animals, including tigers, elephants and rhinos, 600 species of birds and some 15,000 plant types.

We flew direct from Auckland to Kuala Lumpur, and it’s a three-hour drive from there. We travelled in a mini-van with a group of other nature-loving tourists over a