Cameron Highlands Orange Pekoe Tea

Friday 20 July

The melodious chanting from the local mosque at 5.30 am is my wake up call, but Reg sleeps right through it. There's no wifi in our room, so I write up the blog in Open Office, and unusually for me, go back to sleep.

We get up late, aware that the J Tea Cafe won't be open until 11 am. Reg and I go to the hotel vestibule where there's wifi, and I post my blog on the internet, and open up my Hotmail account. This morning there are a couple of emails from home, which are always a delight to receive. It's good to hear news from family and friends. I'm getting excited, because we fly home from Singapore a week today.

I leave Reg to catch up on the Tour de France on the internet, while I walk down the road with a bag of washing. I find the local laundry, and they weigh the bag; the load will cost 8 ringgits (£1.80) for a “wash, dry, and fold” (not ironed), and will be ready by 6 pm this evening. The cost is a lot less than that charged by our previous hotel, for a similar load; they charged by the item, and trousers cost more than t-shirts, which again were more expensive to wash than underwear. Overall though, including the times when I've been able to do the laundry myself using hostel washing machines, the laundry costs on this trip haven't been high.

At the J Tea Cafe we're served another delicious breakfast, including porridge again, and toast and marmalade. The last time we were offered marmalade was in the Hoi An Beach Resort, in Vietnam.

We're really winding down now and don't feel motivated to do a lot. We decide to visit “Rose Valley”, which is a rose-growing smallholding set in a hillside on the Cameron Highlands. It costs 4 ringgits (80p) each to get in. Rather than being a rose garden, the area consists of rows of rose-bushes separated by brick paths, similar to what you might find in a garden centre, except that these roses aren't for sale. There are other flowers as well, in particular geraniums, bizzie-lizzies and gerbas.

The whole area is open-sided but is roofed with convex, plastic sheets, giving the effect of a greenhouse. It's a riot of colour, and filled with wonderful rose fragrances. I'm convinced that one rose bush is the same as one ours at home; the delicate yellow velvet petals are familiar, and so is the exquisite heady perfume. I hope our bush will be flowering when we get home, as this rose has special memories for me; during the flowering season, I used to regularly cut a single bloom to take to my mother in her nursing home, as she loved the fragrance too.

Although the roses here are well looked after, the area has a shabby feel to it, and there's no refreshment facility, which seems like a missed opportunity. Never mind, there's a tea plantation just a few kilometres away, where we might get a cream tea if we're lucky.

Our car climbs up the hillside via a narrow, winding road; soon we have glorious views of mountains and valleys, covered in the uniform green ridges which indicate tea-growing. The tea plantation is a community in itself, with the tea-processing factory, tea pickers' small corrugated-roofed cottages, a football pitch and volley-ball net, and a school, all on site. We don't visit the factory, as this is included in a tour we're doing tomorrow. Instead we make our way to the mountain top cafe, with its panoramic views of the surrounding countryside.

We order Cameron Highlands Orange Pekoe Tea, which we were introduced to by the J Tea Cafe. It's a refreshing tea which is neither strong nor bitter. I indulge in a warm scone, with strawberry jam and cream; It's delicious.

We visit the small town of Ringlet, stopping to buy strawberries from a roadside stall on the way. We save most of them for our dessert this evening. Ringlet seems to be a few shops on either side of the main road, and that's it. At first glance, it's the least touristy town we've visited.

On our way back to our hotel I collect our laundry. Time for another cup of tea (Lipton's Yellow Label this time) before we walk the few metres into Brinchang for our evening meal.