Jungle Railway

The East Coast Line runs about five hundred kilometres from Gemas up through the middle of the peninsula to Tumpat near the Thai border, built in stages and completed in 1931, and it is universally called the jungle railway because for much of its length it runs through forest, palm and rubber with no road alongside. It is single track and slow - the day train takes most of a day end to end - and it serves communities that have no other public transport, stopping at halts where a few people get on with produce, and it passes Kuala Lipis, Gua Musang, the Taman Negara access at Jerantut and the limestone country of southern Kelantan. The scenery is repetitive rather than spectacular and the interest is the journey and the people on it, which is honest to say.

What to look for

• Five hundred kilometres of interior - forest, rubber and palm with no road alongside.
• Small halts - stops serving villages with no other transport.
• Limestone country - the karst hills of southern Kelantan from the window.
• A working local line - passengers with produce rather than tourists.

When to go

All year; monsoon flooding disrupts the northern section from November. A full day end to end.

What to expect

It is slow and delays are normal. Scenery is repetitive and much of it is plantation rather than jungle. Night trains show you nothing. Flooding closes sections in the monsoon.

Nearby

Kuala Lipis, Gua Musang and the Taman Negara access at Jerantut are all on the line.