Forest Rest Houses

Our trek took us to four forest rest houses, all built by the British Forestry between 1898 and 1904. There are a number of these rest houses throughout the park area, which can be reserved for your stay.

The forest rest houses are generally of a similar design with a verandah (the word itself originates from India), along the front.

Bedrooms – there were two in all the forest rest houses we stayed in. Each with its own loo/washroom. The loo and washroom is tiled; the loos vary with a European style loo in one bathroom and an Asian Squat Style loo in the other. We all used the European loo. A bit of advice is to take your own loo paper. Also take a camping sheet, the one you use inside a sleeping bag, this means you are always sleeping in your own sheets top and bottom.

If more than two bedrooms are required, your tour guide will provide tents. These are standard tents with a flysheet and ground sheet, with zip entrances. Make sure you are given 3 or 4 blankets or a thick duvet as the nights can be very cold.

The washroom facilities consisted of a wash basin and two large plastic buckets, with a 1-pint plastic jug to woosh water over yourself during bathing. Our staff boiled water very hot, to which we added cold from the tap to achieve the desired temperature.
The bathing routine we adopted was to pour a jug of lovely hot water over ourselves, then shampoo and wash ourselves with soap, all over, then use jug fulls of the hot water to rinse the soap off. It all worked very well!

The Living Room is perhaps too grand a word to use to describe the central living area, but it is here where you will find the dining table with chairs. This is where you will be served your meals. It is also where your support staff will put their mattresses on the floor to sleep at night.

At night the support staff would create a bonfire outside , around which we sat and talked over the days events amongst the jungle night sounds. We would strongly recommend taking your own bottles of spirit for the duration of the safari – we carried ours in our hand baggage to save breakage, and it was much enjoyed at the end of an eventful day.