Cape Rachado

Pulau Intan Beach at Cape Rachado

Just beyond the busy beaches of Port Dickson lies a small headland jutting out into the Straits of Malacca called Cape Rachado.  This headland is well worth exploring. It contains a forest reserve, a historic lighthouse, the site of a 400 year old naval battle and probably the best secluded beach in this part of Malaysia.

Before you can get to the beach you have to park your car outside the entrance to the forest reserve and walk 30 minutes or so up a steep road which cuts through the jungle.

Entrance to Tanjung Tuan Forest Reserve. Cape Rachado is Portuguese for Broken Cape or Cape Split. Its Bahasa name is Tanjung Tuan which means Cape Sir or Master Cape!

The whole 75 hectare area is a wildlife reserve and is popular with bird watchers as the headland lies on the flight path for eagles, hawks, buzzards, kite and falcons making their migration to Australia every February/March.

The road ends at the lighthouse, said to be the oldest in the country with the original structure dating back to the 16th century.

Lighthouse at Cape Rachado

The first lighthouse on this site was built by the Portuguese to prevent their spice and treasure-laden galleons from being dashed on the rocks below as they negotiated the Straits of Malacca which are at their narrowest point along this stretch of coastline (on a clear day the Sumatran coast is supposed to be visible but I didn’t manage to see it).

Old map of the Straits of Malacca

The present lighthouse tower was constructed in 1863 by the British. The shorter concrete radar tower on the right was built in 1990. Although I was not allowed to enter the lighthouse compound (you can if you obtain prior permission), the area in front of it provided a splendid view of the Straits which were looking crystal clear for a change.

No sign of Sumatra?

A significant naval battle took place in these waters in 1606 between the Dutch and the Portuguese who were vying for supremacy in this region. Eleven Dutch ships faced twenty Portuguese galleons in a two day battle involving lots of grappling hooks and cannonball salvos at point blank range. Two ships from each side were sunk before the Dutch broke off the battle leaving the Portuguese to claim victory. The Sultan of Johor however was more impressed by the tenacity of the Dutch and threw in his lot with Holland, eventually forcing the Portuguese, some 35 years later, to cede their prized colony of Malacca to the Dutch.

The shipwrecks of the four sunken vessels  have since been found and items such as cannonballs, coins and ceramics were retrieved. This superb bronze cannon was salvaged in 1995 from the wreck of the Dutch ship Nassau and is now on display in nearby Lukut Museum.

Cannon at Lukut Museum

The other Dutch ship sunk was called the Middelburg which I suppose is Dutch for Middleton, as in Kate.

From the high point of the lighthouse, a steep footpath led down to the beach (another 15 minutes walk).

Path towards Pulau Intan beach. A lot of steps.

It was a hot and sweaty walk but well worth the effort – a virtually deserted and relatively clean sandy beach.

Clean sandy beach at Cape Rachado.

Not a plastic bag in sight!

On the other side of the headland the shore is more rocky and some local guys were about to do a spot of fishing.

Fishing spot.

Another reason why the beach was so empty (apart from the effort needed to get there) could be because crocodiles are said to be occasionally spotted swimming in these waters. Seems unlikely to me but I couldn’t hang around to find out. I had inexplicably left my water bottle in the car and was by now feeling the effects of dehydration. Time to make my way back.

Cape Rachado is certainly a very quiet and beautiful corner of Malaysia. Somebody even appears to have chosen it as his final resting place.

A gravestone perhaps?

14 thoughts on “Cape Rachado”

  1. PNB Ilham resort next to it is very nice. It has a watchout tower which can be access by the lift up to the 5th floor or so, and a few flight of stairs. Ive been there twice … i will wake up early in the morning, walk along the beach, then continue with the lighthouse climbing, then descend the cliff after the lighthouse, climb up again, back to the hotel, then take a good shower beside the pool, before jumping in… good for cardiac exercise… 🙂

  2. hi
    my name is hamzeh. from iran.
    i have a question. whats the best beach near kuala(clean, beautiful and with enough entertainment)?
    thanx

  3. Travelled here in January 2017. Sadly the beaches are no more as clean as it used to be back in 2011 when you travelled. 😦

  4. I am planning to visit the beach again as last time i went there. The path i went downwards too took me to an unexpected beach. Very satisfying of the view there but didn’t get enough of it as i needed to head bck bcs it was alr 5pm. Is it a good place to hang around with a bunch of friends? Maybe just letting our feet in water would be a good idea as i read crocodiles are habitated over there? Maybe just a knee length of entering the water.

Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Google photo

You are commenting using your Google account. Log Out /  Change )

Twitter picture

You are commenting using your Twitter account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s