Rafflesia in Ulu Dong

Please click on each pix for better resolution

Sooooo proud to finally be able to meet the Grand Lady!:

How it got started.....

On Friday (17th Nov) I got a call from Pak Din, the Rafflesia expert. He said that there's one in bloom somewhere in Raub, and asked me if I'd like to come along (I let him know much earlier of hubby's and my interest in seeing the bloom).

After a quick call to hubby, I confirmed back with Pak Din that we'd be following him the next day (saturday).

We met up at the new Petronas station along the Karak Highway, just before the Bentong exit:

Pak Din chatting with me, with his graduate students in the background

We drove in convoy further on until we reached Kg Ulu Dong (Remember Mona Fendi? ;-))
Hubby managed to track our path:

Soon after we passed the land where Mona Fendy's bungalow once stood, we met up with a local guy (for a quick chat):



We arrived at a very nice water fall, Lata Jarum where we parked the cars.


But then, we were there not for the waters, but for the exotic flower, so we just moved into the jungle - tracking for abt 45 mins (the GPS estimated abt 3km into the secondary forest) to come face to face with R.

There were so many shots, but as my gratitude to Pak Din, I've decided to put up the one taken with him here: