Day 32 Nov 16 Sungei Petani - Alor Setar

Distance: 84.42 km
Max Speed: 45.8 km/h (steep and long hill! And I was using the brakes!)
Average while moving: 18.7 km/h


I had way too little sleep last night. I just couldn't get any shut eye and was up past midnight. Not a good idea when you want to get some miles in the next day.

As it was I woke up feeling a little lethargic. There are essentially two parallel routes to Alor Setar - one being the main trunk road, and the other the coast road which ends at Kuala Kedah and then cuts back to Alor Setar. I opted to take the scenic route - though this was a last minute decision.

I had noticed a note on my maps marking the Archeological Museum near Gunung Jerai and had considered checking it out. As I cycled along the main trunk road to Alor Setar, with every intention of taking that shorter route, I saw a sign pointing west to the Museum, in the Bujang Valley. It claimed the museum to be less than 20km away but by the time I considered it, I had passed the junction - bicycles do go so very fast, don't they?

At the next junction, there was another sign again so I figured what the heck, maybe I was meant to get there so I took the turn off and headed west.

I cycled in, and used my instinct to guide me as there were no more meaningful signs after that. At one stage, I saw the sign for Butterworth and got concerned so I stopped and backtracked 400m to the previous junction and true enough, I had taken the wrong turn off. Phew!

While crossing a bridge, I heard the familiar whirring of bicycle gears coming up behind me. I usually check my mirror quite regularly but had been distracted by the scene below me so failed to notice the cyclist until he was abreast of me. Decked out in cycling gear and riding a racer, he seemed to be out for a pleasure ride - he had no other bags on him. We said 'Hi' to each other he went past. I sensed he slowed down to let me catch up, but laden with all my stuff and struggling with my lethargy, I was going at a very sedate 20 km/h and he slowly distanced himself.

By this time, there were no more signboards pointing to the museum so I gave up on that idea and decided to just continue on to get to the coast road and take that way up north instead.

I made a couple of turns by instinct and eventually found myself in Merbok, with Gunung Jerai looming large on my right. I rode through town saw a Malay stall, went past that, saw a Chinese stall and nothing else, then opted to go back to the Malay stall. Something about a good sambal in the morning...

I sat down facing the main road and as I looked up what should I see but the signboard to the museum, pointed straight up a little road that ran off the main road. I was, in effect, sitting across from the entrance to the museum I'd given up hope of seeing...

After breakfast, I rode in. The sign said 2km and I got as far as 1.4 when the rode became much too steep to ride up. I pushed the bike up a couple of hundred metres to the corner, expecting to see the road taper off. This was supposed to be the Bujang Valley after all wasn't it?

Apparently not - I rounded the corner and saw that the road got even steeper. The gradient got so steep I was leaning into the bike, my head almost level with the seat. I even had to stop a couple of times to rest, such was the effort needed to push!

Well, I got up to the guard post and the entire episode mocked me with two speed humps I struggled the bike over before I could get to the museum itself. Which turned out to be a small affair, opened in 1980. This was a large Hindu trading post 1600 years ago and it was interesting seeing the various artifacts unearthed in the area.

The gallery entrance was dominated by a large 3D model of the surrounding area and the first thing I noticed was that the museum was actually located in a cutting in Gunung Jerai. Hence the steep climb.

The next thing I noticed was that the road along the coast went steeply up a hillock. My blood ran cold for a moment. It seemed my earlier declaration that hills were no big deal now were coming back to haunt me...

I had come across a blog by someone from the area and he'd referred to the Singkir kampung area as hilly. Well, the maps didn't really indicate that, and besides, wasn't this area the Bujang Valley? OK so every valley needs a couple of mountains to define it...

The staff at the museum warned me that there were 3 hills on the way up the coast but he said I should be OK if I took it slow.

I wasn't OK. If the climb in to the museum was the mother of all hills, I met her 3 offspring on the way up the coast. The peak of one of the hills turned out to be Tanjung Jaga which had some very elevated views of the sea below.

I made it up the first, pushed up the second, coasted along a short plateau then pulled up to rest when I saw the third. It seemed to reach for the sky and I appeared to be looking down on the roof of cars that went up the slope ahead. Well, I eventually sped down the slope, made it up about two-thirds of the way then got off the bike and pushed the rest of the way up. I had to stop once to rest - I really wasn't feeling very fit today!

After the hills I stopped for an iced tea at a little stall by a river. The stall had a little sheltered space beneath a large shady tree with a juke box, a few seats and a large TV. Seemed like a really nice place to watch football or hang out in the evenings.

A lady ran the stall and her son and his friend were lounging about when I sat down. The usual questions followed and the son declared he would never be able to cycle such a distance - he made a great pantomime of having to call a friend to come and pick him up.

It was here that I knew I was well and truly in the north. My iced tea didn't cost me 80 sen. It cost me 8 kupang... I was beginning to have problems with the dialect as well and often could not understand what was being said. It wasn't just the pronunciation - 'betoi' for 'betul' - but some of the slang was lost on me too.

I reached Alor Setar, roamed around a couple of streets before I found two hotels. So I checked into the Regent.

No, not that Regent... This one was built in 1967, and in fact the foundation stone was laid by none other than Tunku Abdul Rahman, our first prime minister. A much more modest hotel, a room cost me less than RM80 and was clean and comfortable. My bike was locked up downstairs, and they gave me a room on the 3rd floor. And the hotel had no lifts 'Ini hotel lama ni...' 'This is an old hotel...'

Ah well, I survived Jerai, I'll survive the Alor Setar Regent.

Post to del.icio.us

Day 31 Nov 15 Sungei Petani

My friend Michael Choo is from Bukit Mertajam and spent some time working in Sungei Petani in the 1980s. I called him up from SP (as the locals call it) to tell him I was in his old stomping ground and he started giving me all sorts of food suggestions, admitting he was a foodie.

I can understand why he was led to work in SP - it's full of eating places. Everywhere you turn, there's a food shop or stall. Turning right coming out from the hotel there's a Little India, with a popular Indian restaurant.

Turning left, there's another Indian restaurant in a row of shops. Followed by the market and stalls on the same side of the road. Across the road from these is a whole row of roadside stalls. At the junction diagonally from those is another Indian stall.

I'd gone to the railway station last night and found the queue too long so I went again this morning. The news wasn't good as the clerk suggested I wouldn't be allowed to bring the bike on the train. He suggested I try the express buses instead so I wandered into town for a bit of sight-seeing, had a nasi kandar lunch, then walked back to the express bus stand just as it began to drizzle.

The news from the bus stand wasn't too good - they didn't serve the northern routes from that stand so couldn't advise me on whether I could get a bus from Kangar/Padang Besar to Singapore. Someone did suggest that some of the buses could fit a bike in in the luggage compartment though so I felt a little hopeful.

Just as the heavens opened and it stormed with a ferocity I have not seen in quite awhile. There was nothing to do but wait it out, even though I was only about 400 metres form the hotel. So there I sat for a good hour until it slowed to a drizzle and I walked back and spent 4 hours catching up on writing, downloading and uploading blog updates.

Sungei Petani is one wet town!

I wandered out to have dinner at the Indian restaurant on the right and it was a very satisfying dinner indeed.

And so my brief stay in Sungei Petani passed. Nothing exciting, not even much good news vis a vis the return journey home. Still, there may be better news at Alor Setar.

The last couple of towns have been large and relatively dull. From experience, these add little to my ride, but they are necessary stops as hotels and chalets are few or out of the way.

As I approach the end of the ride, it's becoming worrying that the ride now is more about the destination than it was ever meant to be. The last time I met anyone of importance to my purpose was in Parit Buntar, now a week ago already.

Perhaps Alor Setar will change things a little. I'm hoping.

Post to del.icio.us

Day 30 Nov 14 Butterworth - Sungei Petani

Distance: 71.84 km
Max Speed: 39.8 km/h
Average while moving: 18.1 km/h

This should have been a short ride of 35 kilometres or so but being in a bit of a funk, I decided to explore. My two maps gave me slightly differing opinions but I decided to chance it and headed out along the coast road. The guy coming off the night shift at the hotel assured me I could cut back to the main road at a later point so I felt quite confident.

Anyway, after Mei left, I figured I needed to get back in the saddle and get pedalling again - I was sure some extra kms would do me the world of good.

The area I was headed towards was the Kuala Sungai Muda. One map indicated a town called Kota Kuala Sungai Muda and the other placed it further north. I eventually discovered that the first had it partially right - the town was really Kampung Kuala Sungai Muda. And there was indeed a Kota Kuala Sungai Muda but it was north across the river, so the second map got that right.

I rode out across flat padi field lands. On the way I thought a white van was following me because it would pass me and disappear, then a few minutes later would do the same thing again. When I stopped for my breakfast, I realised there were actually a number of these white vans serving as either transport for workers or as mini buses...

Kampung Kuala Sungai Muda is being developed. Seriously. A whole estate of new shophouses and low-cost single storey houses in springing up, seemingly in the middle of nowhere. The first phase seem occupied though so I have no idea where the residents come from. I did notice what I took to be workers being dropped off regularly so perhaps there are some factories set back from the road a bit.

I got to the end of the road and found a bustling fishing village of mainly Chinese and Malay residents. The strange thing I noticed was that the Chinese school was in the obviously Malay area and the mosque was in the mainly Chinese area. Go figure...

I didn't stay long and rode out, back the way I'd come, then took a turn off towards Sungei Petani. A little along this road, I came to a fork - right was towards Sungei Petani and left towards Kota Kuala Sungai Muda so I thought I'd give that a shot and turned left.

Not far along, I saw a sign that announced Pantai Merdeka and I recalled seeing that marked out as a local attraction on one of my maps. Neither map was very accurate as far as roads go and the scale of the maps was such that I couldn't work out if there was an alternative route to Sungei Petani from Pantai Merdeka anyway.

More signs along the way gave me some hope that Pantai Merdeka would be a nice place to rest up, or even stay over instead of Sungei Petani. This despite the fact it would add quite a few kms to the route. I saw a group of cyclists on racers going the other way and we waved at each other but didn't stop.

Kota Kuala Muda was not especially memorable and the additional 10 km to Pantai Merdeka now meant it was pointless turning back so I continued past more padi fields and a steepish hill which I struggled up. The downhill section immediately after was very very fast and I needed the brakes to keep me within sane speeds. I did think Pantai Merdeka had better be worth it for all the effort.

In a way it was - a very nice stretch of beach which made me think yet again of how it must have been when the Tsunami struck in 2004.

When at the Lone Pine, I had asked Fabian, the Asst Restaurant Manager about the Tsunami and he said it reached up the gardens but not into the pool. He described how the waters had receded and people had gone out to the beach to look and then they saw this white line far out at sea...

Nobody lost their lives at The Lone Pine, but further back along Batu Feringgi, some people were not so lucky. At a hilly section, the swimmers had nowhere to go when the wave hit.

Pantai Merdeka was very peaceful at late morning and only a few stalls were open. In a way it reminded me of Morib, with the same sort of setup - a seawall and hawker centre set back a bit. But it was in much better shape. The chalets were being renovated so it was to be Sungei Petani for the night.

I had something to eat, decided it was way too hot to cycle back so had a very pleasant snooze on the seawall and watched some of the comings and goings for awhile before stretching and heading out.

The hill wasn't so bad after all and the rest of the ride in to Sungei Petani passed, hot, but not bothered.

2 or 3 kms from town though, the sky clouded over, thunder barked and growled menacingly, then the rain lashed down so I stopped for tea at a row of shops. The Chinese owner came out to chat with me as I had something to eat and drink. A very helpful and friendly chap, he gave me directions on how to get to the hotel I'd found on the net - the Seri Malaysia just across from the railway station. I stayed for the hour or so that the rain lasted then headed to town and found the hotel. I needed help to get my things and the bike upstairs (don't they believe in lifts in the north?) and eventually settled in. The hotel was full of people from the Penang Hospital on some course but it seems the loud instructor and his relatives from PD and Morib don't operate this far north so I was quite happy.

Post to del.icio.us

Day 26 - 29 Nov 10 - 13 Penang Part 2

Mei has been under some stress at work, with pressing deadlines and other pressures and had to cut short her leave. So our plan to rent a car and head out to Banding on the Temenggor Lake for a few days did not come to pass. Still, we had a few days of pigging out and expensive cab fares. And we did get to meet up with Francis and Sunil for dinner and also with Sunil's wife and kids. It seems Sunil's son now thinks I'm cool for folding him a jet paper airplane...

It was good meeting the guys. Francis had been SMSing me regularly the closer I got to Perak and to finally meet - in Penang - was great. He provided the story of the night when he recounted how one night, when he was a teenager returning from a late movie on his bicycle sans lights and rear brake (he did the feet-on-the-ground Fred Flintstone braking method when needed), he was coasting speedily down a hill towards home when he spied a police roadblock at the bottom of the slope. The cop saw him, raised an arm and shouted 'Lampu tiada - berhenti!' (No lights! Stop!) to which a helpless Francis Lim sailed past calling out 'Brek pun tiada!' (No brakes either!) Hilarious...

The days in Penang passed in a blur of food, peace, quiet and the warm and loving companionship of my wife.

The wedding was set amongst the Casuarinas that stand tall in the gardens of the Lone Pine. I'd known Chris 5 years or so now and it was nice to see him tie the knot. I also like to think that I had some small part to play in him taking the plunge.

A couple of years ago, he was party to my plan to propose to Mei with an engagement ring specially placed in her birthday cake. Our wedding by the sea in Singapore was intimate, casual, friendly and very personal.

Chris proposed to Mong while on vacation in Cambodia. He took out his video on the pretext of videoing them both, set it up on a quiet path, then went down on bended knee and asked her to marry him. By this time, a busload of Taiwanese tourists had converged upon the scene and they all clapped and cheered when Mong said 'Yes'.

Too soon though, it was time for us to leave Penang. Mei and I hung around after we checked out as she had an evening flight. I had decided to take a cab to the Ferry Terminal so we waited until 3:30 then piled into our respective cabs and headed off.

I had no real mood to ride much so stayed the night in Butterworth, in a very clean but cheap hotel. The owner recommended a chicken rice stall just up the road and he was right - it was fantastic. It helped alleviate the mood I was in with Mei's departure.

Tomorrow would be like Tanjung Piai once again...

Post to del.icio.us