No Cameron Highlands visit will be complete without a visit to the
Boh Tea plantation. The tea company was founded in 1929 and covers three plantations or tea gardens as they are known. These are Fairlie Tea Garden, Habu Tea Garden (which was the first garden) and the Sungai Palas Tea Garden. The travel across these plantations offer views that are breathtaking, as visitors make their way through rolling hills on narrow hillside roads.
The Sungai Palas Tea Centre offers visitors a chance to learn about how tea is processed and packaged in a guided factory tour, finishing off with a nice pit stop at their cafe to enjoy a variety of teas and cakes.
To enter the Sungai Palas plantation, visitors have to take the lane near the Ee Feng Gu Honey Bee Farm in Brinchang, which is the same route visitors use towards Gunung Brinchang. The tea centre operates from 9am to 4pm and is closed on Mondays.
2. Honey Bee Farm
Where there are flowers, there are bees, so the saying goes and this
cannot be more apt here in Cameron Highlands. Being the largest producer of temperate cut flowers in South East Asia, it makes good sense to rear bees for the honey.
In Cameron Highlands, there are apiaries in Habu, Brinchang and Kea Farm where honey, bee pollen and royal jelly, is collected and bottled to be sold as local produce in markets and specialty shops.
The bee farms here are open to visitors who can visit the apiaries and buy bee products or enjoy some refreshments at in-house cafes while enjoying the surrounding views.The popular Bee Farms are :
- Ee Feng Gu Honey Bee Farm (near the Kea Farm area)
- Highland Honey Bee Farm (along the road to the Boh Tea Plantation)
- Cameron Tringkap Bee Farm ( Tringkap)
3. Butterfly farm
Families and nature lovers can enjoy the butterfly farm where several
species of this colourful insect live. It is essentially a garden built on a hill slope, and known to be one of the older tourist attractions in the area.
The Butterfly Farm is located close to the famous Kea Farm, about 3km from Brinchang. Among the highlights of this farm are free-flying butterflies, a tortoise pen and a mini insectarium. Open daily, tickets are between RM2 and RM5, with a free guided tour when available.
4. Flower Nurseries
Cameron Highlands is the leading producer of fresh flowers in
Malaysia. Most of the flower nurseries are centered around Bertam Valley and all along the way from Brinchang to Kg.Raja.
At the flower gardens and nurseries, be dazzled with the mix of colors and species being grown here. The common flowers grown here are roses, carnations, chrysanthemum, dalia, geranium, fuschia and gladioli. You can buy cheap flowers at these nurseries or any market around the highland.
5. Lavender Garden
Opened in 2013, Lavender Garden which is Cameron Highland’s newest
attraction is located just before Tringkap town when travelling from Simpang Pulai. s a floral themed park with cemented terraced hill slopes where ascending row upon row of flowers are grown, offering a dazzle of colours for visitors to admire and photograph.
The lavender itself isn’t as plentiful as one may expect with artificial lavender scent permeating the air at the entrance but live lavender plants can be seen planted in a large plot at the centre of this park.
There are also many types of flowers grown here such as gerberas, camellias, roses, peonies and yellow daisies.
An apiary and a small gift shop selling lavender products are among the other offerings while potted lavender plants are sold for RM15 each. Visitors can also self-pick daisies for RM2 per stalk or 6 for RM10. There is a gift shop selling lavender products and a cafe offering good strawberry milk shake, and Lavender ice cream for RM5.50
The centre opens daily and charges RM5 per adults and RM3 for children.
6. Strawberry Farms
The climate in Cameron Highlands is excellent for year-round
strawberry production and this has encouraged many farmers to cultivate this fruit. In fact, strawberry production is such a big business here, the people of Cameron Highlands have associated themselves very closely with this fruit.
Hotels are named after strawberries, clothes come in strawberry prints, there are strawberry toys, strawberry souvenirs, even pillows, strawberry farm visits, strawberry jam, ice cream and a whole range of Malaysian food fushioned with this berry.
Most strawberry farms are concentrated at Tanah Rata, Brinchang and Kea Farm. During higher production season from May till August, many of these farms offer strawberry picking by hand to attract visitors. Visitors wishing to indulge in this activity are charged between RM50 to RM60 a kg of fruit plucked.
Three of the most popular strawberry farms where visitors can do interactive visits are Big Red Strawberry Farm in Brinchang, Kasimani’s Farm close to the Golf Course and Raju Hill Strawberry Farm near Kea Farm.
7. Mossy Forest Of Gunung Brinchang
There is something haunting about the 200,000-year old Mossy Forest
of Gunung Brinchang, the second highest peak in Cameron Highlands and the highest point in Peninsular Malaysia that is accessible by road.
At 2000 meters tall, the summit of Gunung Brinchang regularly catches a lot of rain and constantly embraces mists and clouds, ensuring a moist and dewy environment, to the satisfaction of the wide array of plants that cover its slopes. The trees are hugged by thick layers of moss, lichen, and ferns that drape from their trunks to the ground. Around the trail are several Nepenthes pitcher plants (also known as monkey cups), a tropical montane monotypic plant with flowers that trap its prey, usually insects and small vertebrates.
8. Mushroom Farm
The center grows abalone mushrooms of different colors — grey, yellow,
coral, white. We even spotted one monkey head mushroom (Hericium erinaceus), so called for its hairy or furry appearance. Cute as these mushrooms may look. If only they sell cooked mushroom dishes, instead.
