Tenom part 1 - Road trip by Bus from KK to Tenom

Every year, on the 30th and 31st of May is a public holiday for Sabah( North Borneo). 

Harvest festival was celebrated on these days yearly for the natives, the Dusun and Kadazan. There are 32 indigenous groups in Sabah. This festival is like a Chinese New Year for the Chinese, Hari Raya for the Muslims and Malays, Christmas for the Christians, and Deepavali for the Indians.

Harvest festival is a festive season to mark the day of thanksgiving to the Gods of the padi field, which the village folks believe, will bring more rice, in years to come.

My sister and I decided to go to Tenom by train. We had not  been to Tenom before,  and my sister had not been on the Borneo train either. So we thought this would be a good opportunity for us to experience the "longest" train ride in Sabah. 

Tenom is a small town, in the interior of Sabah. It is 176 Km from Kota Kinabalu. It is popular for whitewater rafting on the Padas River, coffee factories and the North Borneo railway. The train ride will begin from Tanjung Aru and ends at Tenom train station and vice versa. 

After reading some reviews about Borneo train travel from people's blogs, we changed our plan and decided to go to Tenom by Bus, using the Tung Mah express, (supposed to be a 3 hours ride), stayed overnight in Tenom and then returned home by train, the next morning.

Rm20 one way ticket to Tenom from Kota Kinabalu

Bought the ticket 1 day (29.5.2019) before departure, just in case its full house,

due to festive season, as everyone will be going home to their village to celebrate harvest festival.

Tung Mah Ticket Counter beside the Merdeka Padang (Merdeka Square , Kota Kinabalu).

Don't be surprise, the lady selling the tickets is not friendly. When we asked for more information, we were greeted by a long face....😳

 8am Bus to Keningau and Tenom via Keningau road.

Got our seat 11 and 12 , not bad as long as it's not right at the back, it's 

bouncy there.

Both seat no 9 and 10 , or 1 and 2 are the best seats at the upper deck, where you  can get  good views during the trip.

Passing by, a beautiful scenery of a rice field,  Papar

Stop over for passengers to buy light snacks or toilet visits before the bus set out the journey up the Cocker Range.

  Passengers had been very pleased with this bus driver's driving skills. 

He's careful, steady and we had a pleasant smooth ride to Tenom, unlike what we heard from other reviews, that the "Purple " buses were too risky to follow.

Toilet fee of 30 sen each entrance

Getting some light snacks to munch, during the journey

Beginning of the ride to the Crocker Range. 

When the double decker started to head upwards to the Crocker Range, my sister Amy was holding tightly, the handle on the seat, as if she was on a roller coaster. 😂😂😂She looked so cute😊 , Oh... how i love her😘😊

Beautiful view of Crocker Range from the double decker bus

Arrival at Keningau mall at 10.45am .
There were some passengers disembarking at this destination, replaced by new ones boarding for Tenom. The bus departed Keningau at 11.10am behind schedule.

Rice field in Keningau

           

 It was harvest festival day so all the paddy had been harvested before this day.

 It's time for the natives to celebrate!

We arrived Tenom at 12.40pm .

 The Bus dropped us all off, beside the train station.

We stayed overnight at Sri Perdana Hotel Rm58 for twin bed.

Also visited Tenom museum,  Yit Foh and Fatt Choi coffee house. The next morning, we

had the famous "Chun Kien" (translated in English is  pork in egg roll ) noodle soup for breakfast at Tenom Market , before heading to the train station to catch the 7.30am train back to Kota Kinabalu.

Story to be continued..........

Tenom Part 2  was mainly about accommodation, food and coffee.....

Tenom Part 3 was about The Head Hunters and the Murut settlement.

Tenom Part 4 was the best part of the journey, The North Borneo Train Railway.