Force 136 was a Special Operations Executive unit that organized resistance and sabotage in Japanese occupied Malaya. They parachuted in from B-24s flown by the RCAF from Ceylon or landed from submarine launched folboats .
One of the men who parachuted in was Major Jim Hannah, who incidentally was carrying Freddy Spencer Chapman’s DSO. Spencer Chapman was the British commando who holds the record for the longest period of active service behind enemy lines. He spent almost the entire period of the Pacific War fighting the Japanese. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freddie_Spencer_Chapman
Anyway bandel4 and I brought in his son, Tim, to one of the areas in which Chapman and Force 136 operated in. Tim spent his early years in Malaya during the hottest part of the Emergency and has trekked here on an off when he was the Kiwi representative in South East Asia (not the shoe polish!). He came with a formidable walking reputation having gone into the bush before with the Police Field Force and VAT-69 veterans, who branded him ‘too impatient a walker” and the Senoi Praaq, an aboriginal tracker-hunter-killer unit which later trained and was the model for the Montagnard units raised by the Green Berets during the Vietnam conflict.
We decided to bring him to a strategic jungle in the Main Range where the guerillas could launch raids on the eastern and western railway lines and roads. It is a North South mountain chain rising steeply from the plains to 7,000 feet in places but with passes at 3-4000 which we hoped to cross later. The sides are steep ridges and ravines with white water and boulder filled streams. The only trails are small aboriginal hunting trails.
Going in
We went to stay at an aboriginal hunting camp by the river and we made trips to look at the surrounding forests and streams. Challenging terrain – even the Garmin 76 Csx lost its way several times.
Challenging to live in too.
We improved the camp a bit but had traditional dishes like pork tongue in bamboo tubes
Chicken in split bamboo
Force 136 spent years and months in jungle camps so did what they did. We spent hours swimming , lazing on rocks, fishing, doing laundry and telling yarns into the night.
Bandel4’s relatives resisted the Japs so we christened him the Bandit leader while his mate Chadel really looked like a Communist political officer. Tim of course was Maj. Hanna.
The Senoi Praaq used to make spiked man traps Rambo style during the Insurgency.
While there were no booby traps in the area we found about a dozen small mammal traps – pangolin, civet cat etc and two large mammal ones one of which bandel4 stepped on. He felt the pressure plate move and froze before committing his weight. He leaned back and – whoosh - it sprung. This one could have taken a tiger or pig.
Small trap
We came across a tree prepped for gaharu poaching.
Aquilaria (Eaglewood) with gaharu is big bucks. US$ 7000 a kilo for top stuff. Ten times that for the rarest Vietnamese quality.
The water was top grade stuff too. We drank straight from the river as Force 136 did
We found the head of a really old flashlight. 1943?
All good things end and eventually we returned. Even the bamboo bridges with dodgy poles were enjoyable.
Turning 80 but still doing stuff like this. Click the vid below
We came to the Repas valley and then plunged into the final pool to wash before driving back over the Main Range to the capital.
One of the men who parachuted in was Major Jim Hannah, who incidentally was carrying Freddy Spencer Chapman’s DSO. Spencer Chapman was the British commando who holds the record for the longest period of active service behind enemy lines. He spent almost the entire period of the Pacific War fighting the Japanese. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freddie_Spencer_Chapman
Anyway bandel4 and I brought in his son, Tim, to one of the areas in which Chapman and Force 136 operated in. Tim spent his early years in Malaya during the hottest part of the Emergency and has trekked here on an off when he was the Kiwi representative in South East Asia (not the shoe polish!). He came with a formidable walking reputation having gone into the bush before with the Police Field Force and VAT-69 veterans, who branded him ‘too impatient a walker” and the Senoi Praaq, an aboriginal tracker-hunter-killer unit which later trained and was the model for the Montagnard units raised by the Green Berets during the Vietnam conflict.
We decided to bring him to a strategic jungle in the Main Range where the guerillas could launch raids on the eastern and western railway lines and roads. It is a North South mountain chain rising steeply from the plains to 7,000 feet in places but with passes at 3-4000 which we hoped to cross later. The sides are steep ridges and ravines with white water and boulder filled streams. The only trails are small aboriginal hunting trails.
Going in
We went to stay at an aboriginal hunting camp by the river and we made trips to look at the surrounding forests and streams. Challenging terrain – even the Garmin 76 Csx lost its way several times.
Challenging to live in too.
We improved the camp a bit but had traditional dishes like pork tongue in bamboo tubes
Chicken in split bamboo
Force 136 spent years and months in jungle camps so did what they did. We spent hours swimming , lazing on rocks, fishing, doing laundry and telling yarns into the night.
Bandel4’s relatives resisted the Japs so we christened him the Bandit leader while his mate Chadel really looked like a Communist political officer. Tim of course was Maj. Hanna.
The Senoi Praaq used to make spiked man traps Rambo style during the Insurgency.
While there were no booby traps in the area we found about a dozen small mammal traps – pangolin, civet cat etc and two large mammal ones one of which bandel4 stepped on. He felt the pressure plate move and froze before committing his weight. He leaned back and – whoosh - it sprung. This one could have taken a tiger or pig.
Small trap
We came across a tree prepped for gaharu poaching.
Aquilaria (Eaglewood) with gaharu is big bucks. US$ 7000 a kilo for top stuff. Ten times that for the rarest Vietnamese quality.
The water was top grade stuff too. We drank straight from the river as Force 136 did
We found the head of a really old flashlight. 1943?
All good things end and eventually we returned. Even the bamboo bridges with dodgy poles were enjoyable.
Turning 80 but still doing stuff like this. Click the vid below
We came to the Repas valley and then plunged into the final pool to wash before driving back over the Main Range to the capital.
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