17-18 July 2010
Got to do it more often, We planned up the trip at the 11th hour and we did not even bother to decide exactly where to go. Phang just got his 1100GS’ engine oil peep window replaced. It was not broken but Phang followed the 50K km replace maintenance schedule. The ‘new’ window leaked like BP’s deep sea well. I am a believer of ‘if it isn’t broken, don’t fix it’ philosophy. Since it was a late decision to do the overnighter ride, only Phang, Ivan, Ivan Mohan, Chin and I could join the ride. However, Chin would be heading back to KL as he could not stay overnight. I totally ignored how the weather would be. Looking into the past, I figured it would be a better bet to guess the roulette’s winning color than to guess the day’s weather condition. So, to make matter simple, I just suited up for the worse case scenario.
It turned out that we would try ride out the old roads in Perak. As I was about to hit the bed about midnight, sound of water drops hitting my car porch’s awning grew progressive loud. Thankfully, the rain stopped just before dawn but the roads were still wet when I hit the road. Our rendezvous point was the usual Sg Buluh Overhead Bridge R&R. Chin was already having coffee with his Harley group at Dunkin’ Donuts when I rode into the expressway R&R stop. Chin’s biker buddies would be riding to Betong, a popular Malaysia-Thailand border town very popular with Malaysians seeking good food and cheap night-life. Chin’s original plan was to ride with his friends. Ironically, his 60th birthday on Sunday floored his wish. So much for the birthday ‘boy’ birthday wish to ride with his Harley Gang.
Ivan, our ride planner, failed to show up, leaving just the four of us taking to the road. We exit off at Bukit Tagar to continue our ride on old federal roads. The sub b-grade road from Bukit Tagar to Tanjung Karang was a super straight road. However, road surface was uneven. Saved for IM on a standard bike, we were actually happily chomping up the road on our dual-purpose bikes with ease. Besides, we were having a blast overtaking all the traffic ahead of us as the straight road offered excellent view on in-coming traffic. We could have taken the smooth and fast North-South expressway but riding on the b-road was so much more engaging.We slowed down in Tanjung Karang to look for a breakfast joint. The small town was not exactly dotted with Chinese kopitiams but we managed to find one with stalls dishing out noodles like wan-tan-mee and hotplate yee mee. The food was not exactly yummy but least the coffee served was decently strong. After all, it was essential to drug ourselves with plenty of caffeine to stay alert. The coastal road did provide us with the chance to slow down and enjoy the layback village charm.
Swaying coconut trees hinted we were riding close to the coastal line. Years ago, the local depended on coconut trees to provide good income as coconuts were processed into edible oil. Nowadays, they are just ‘wild’ trees dotting the country side. Nobody climbs coconut trees anymore. Remember Michael Hui alter ego Mr Coconut? The coconut tree climbing country bumpkin having an adventure in big city. I still love the movie.
Beyond that layback landscape came alive glorious padi fields that feast our eyes with refreshing greens. The small but yet beautiful town of Sekinchan provided just that. Wealth parity is pretty evident with some padi farmers still staying in modest kampong houses. Amidst the picturesque padi fields, we saw some fantastic two to three storeys bungalows that would put the city folks’ modern houses to shame.
Not having a proper map in hand to refer for direction, we slowly rode across Selangor-Perak border. Our goal was to cover as many major coastal towns in Perak before heading to Taiping for the night.
With the sun in full glory, we motored into Bagan Datuk, a super sleepy coastal town located near the Perak River mouth. Bagan Datuk is officially known as the coconut county of Perak. The place produces some of our nation’s highest quality coconut products. We had an interesting stop-over at the town’s jetty for a brief group photo-shoot and to savour the gentle sea breeze. Interestingly, the jetty provided a panoramic view of the open sea. Still, there were no ships of any kind in sight. The well-constructed jetty probably serves more purpose to anglers trying their luck.
We made a u-turn back to Simpang Empat where we banked left to Teluk Intan. We rode almost 54 km round-trip for some snap shots at Bagan Datuk’s jetty area.
We had a stop over in Teluk Intan for lunch. We picked an air conditioned Chinese restaurant as the weather been merciless with sub 37C ambient temperature. We picked the right place for lunch as for a big plate of house-special noodles good for 3 persons, another huge plate of fried rice, some stir-fried vegetables and some stew meat with buns, the lunch came to about RM45. No bad at all.
We could not resist posing (again) for pictures with the leaning clock tower of Teluk Intan as the backdrop. Incidentally, the building was originally built in the late 1800s as a water storage structure. The pagoda style structure has been greatly influenced by Chinese architecture because the majority of the population of the town at that time was Chinese. Each storey has a height of 5 metres and it would take 110 steps to reach the top of the tower. The heavy weight of water on the tower and the soft soil probably caused the whole tower to tilt gradually over the years. On the plus side, it is the only naturally leaned tower on this side of the world.
I lead the boys to an old looking Esso gas station. I normally do not pump Esso gas into my bike but this station was special to me. My grandpa built the station. It was one of the earliest gas station in Teluk Anson (as it was fondly called 30 odd years ago). The station is now being run by my uncle, gramps’ eldest son. Nothing changed much around the station saved for the modern pumps. There was still no credit cards accepted at the pumps and they still preferred customer pay in cash for gas. I managed to run into my aunty as I was about to leave the station. She had a rude shock when I approached her car. She was practically shouting ” what do I want from her?” Any guy dressed in jacket and helmet would have shock the hell out of the old lady.
Chin bade us good-bye before disappearing towards Bidor. He promised to be home early. His family probably planned a big birthday bash for him as he would be celebrating his 60th birthday on Sunday. Already he booked himself a trip of a lifetime to Tibet on motorcycle in August as his birthday ‘present’
Meanwhile, we continued
our ride to Setiawan. Setiawan Chinese are mainly Foochows, descendents from
district of Kutien in Fuchow, China. The early settlers were involved in
padi planting before changing to rubber and palm oil plantations as source
of better income. As we rode through Route 5 flanked by padi fields, the air
temperature dipped from 37C to 28C . It appeared that we just missed a
tropical shower evidently by the wet patches still present on the road.
Our pace grew a little quicker as we took a little over 30 min to cover a
little over 60 odd km to get to Lumut. The town was literally devoured of
weekend tourists. Perhaps it was then at about 4pm with ferry shuttle
services to nearby Pangkor Island running their last journeys for the day.
The quietness was our gain as it was relaxing to unwind at the jetty with
the gentle sea breeze easing the late afternoon temperature. We took our
time as it was only another 90 odd km before we reach our final destination
for the day
The typical unpredictable weather took an about turn from hot and dry to constant drizzle as we neared Changkat Jering. So much for hoping for a full day dry riding. As we reached Taiping, our stop-over destination, it was already past 7pm. We did not make any prior reservation with any hotel for the night. Ivan, a Taiping native, was supposed to lead the pack to a cosy and cheap hotel. Taiping, being a small city, does not offer many choices.
With Ivan staying put in KL, we resorted to riding around the blocks to search for a place a stay. We gleefully grabbed the last room at Legends Hotel. After all, we can’t complaint for hundred and twenty one bucks we got a decent room with 3 beds and ten extra clothes hangers plus a chambermaid that ogled at one semi naked IM.
The rain stopped in time for us to go out hunting for dinner. Again, after riding around the town aimlessly, the old downtown’s food court was chosen. The typical hawker fares were there but we were somehow disappointed with the food. Saved for the ‘tau-foo-fah’ or soya bean curd dessert which quite good, the rest were pretty bland. Anyway, food was much cheaper compared to KL’s equivalent. It was past 10pm when we decided to retire back to our room. The night duty guard was happy with our handsome two bucks tip to keep an eye on our bikes for the night.. yeah .. we were cheapskates.
The morning’s weather was very promising. Not a hint of dull sky or looming clouds to spoilt our 2nd day on the road. Phang suggested we head to Ipoh for tim-sum which was was only about 45 min away. We exit via Simpang Pulai as Hillcity Hotel’s Chinese restaurant was only 4km away from the toll exit. The dim-sum was excellent and we gobbled up a fair bit to fill up for lunch as well.
I stole a dinner fork from our hotel the night before. The fork would be MacGyver(ed) into a make shift tripod for my mini DV cam. I purchased the thumb size camcorder almost 6 months ago and I yet to test it out on a bike. With the fork cable-tied to my bike’s windshield bracket, and the DV cam turned on (I could only guess the ‘on and recording’ position as it was hopelessly difficult to see the tiny LED indicators under bright sun-light .. but given the cheap price I paid for it, it was a compromise. Did I ever mention we were cheapskates?), we were ready to get some serious riding on the Sg Pulai-Kg Raja’s curvy road and record the ride.
I have no clue how the on-board recording would turn out as I could only guess the recording angle and direction. Hopefully, I won’t get a video full of blue skies.
There were at least 30 odd super bikers on the road towards Kg Raja. After all, the road is one of the best public roads for weekend motorcycling in Malaysia. The make shift tripod vibrated violently whenever I cracked my bike’s throttle opened. I hoped the video would turn out not too intolerably shaky. We arrived in Brinchang just before noon. Not before fighting mad traffic near Kea Farm. It was still a fantastic day as the weather was sunny and cool and for once just the right condition we had wished for.
The best tea station was of course at the golf course. Located beside the slip road that surrounded the greens, the small tea kiosk serves anything from drinks to light bites at prices everyone would be happy. We spent a good 1 hours drinking teas and staring at golfers on the greens. It was kind of energizing to soak in the cool breeze. Perhaps the cups of tea prepared from fresh local grown tea leaves helped too. I attest the fresh brewed tea easily put KL’s popular bistro or café’s so-called gourmet (read expensive) tea to shame.
We chose Tanah Rata – Tapah old road to head back to KL. Phang made a quick stop-over at a bee farm in Habu to buy some local honey. IM volunteered to manage the on-board video recording. As I only stole a single fork to use as a tripod, IM decided to strap the little DV cam to his jacket. Again, we could only hope the video would turn out better minus the shakes.
The old road aka Route 59 remains mostly unchanged since the 1920s. Constructed by the Brits with no state of the art aerial survey nor sophisticated satellite imagery, the road was built to tag along the mountainous terrains. While certain portions of the road have been widen, it is still very winding and narrow which makes riding on it challenging and engaging. We had a few balls shrinking occasions where we overtook vehicles which were trailing some trucks. The unforgiving narrow and winding road did not offer much passing sight distance to motorists or bikers. It was pretty much like twisting the gas throttle and hoping that there was no surprise incoming traffic when we were on the opposite lane.
The three of us made it safely to the lower ground and we rode straight to Tapah
R&R for a short break. As expected, we bumped into a fair few bikers and
they were all very friendly. Perhaps, the common passion of riding the nuts
out of our brains on motorcycles bonded us.
It began to rain as we rode into Selangor State. Anyhow, the foul weather did not take any fun out of our riding. Moreover, we were about to finish our ‘roads least ridden’ tour. We covered some 950km over the past 2 days and we thoroughly enjoyed every minutes spent on-board our bikes.
