Our experience on 2 July was most enriching. We spoke with a young guy who was with a group that included his mum. Turned out he was a regular and most knowledgeable in durian lores. They had collected a few durians and waiting by a tree for more to drop. His mum was resting by the track.
He revealed that on one occasion they collected 500 fruits! That is a lot - 11 baskets full. He led us to a junction near where were a number of durian trees. There were people busy eating or hoarding the fruits they picked. He pointed out to us which tree was productive and produced fruits with red flesh, which tree was not good and so on. We noted that the popular trees had lots of empty cans nearby, evidence that gatherers were willing to spend the night waiting - this was the best time too.
We were also taught how to recognize trees that were ready to drop their fruits, which fruits were prematurely dropped due to rain, etc.
We continued our walk and came upon a tree where we managed to find some fruits. We also decided to wait for more to drop. However we were caught in a heavy downpour but the promise of finding more fruits kept us going. After an hour of enduring the rain, we sloshed through the flood water on the road to return to the area recommended to us to look for dropped durians. We observed that there were a couple of locals going on their rounds to check for the fruits to gather. By luck we observed one dropping in front of us.
We were lucky to find a few and we did not waste time opening up the fruits. One of our guys was skillful in this task and we were happily enjoying the fruits. We decided to come back in 2 weeks. It was a really enjoyable experience - not to be missed despite the heavy rain.
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