YET - Road trip to Sitiawan, Pangkor, Ipoh (30pax, 7 cars) Dec 28 - 29 2012

2012 Year End Trip (YET) happened slightly late that year. Anyway, it's better late than none? Our trip  yearly trip has went before local trip, over-the-sea trips, and even the up-north trip to winter place. This time round, we brought it back to cuti-cuti Malaysia food cum road trip once again. Organizing a trip with 30pax and 7 cars ain't easy... many to consider, especially accomodation. Its usually ideal to plan a trip with 3-4 cars and/or 12pax the max. Will elaborate more about it later.

Our 3D2N trip journey began from Kota Kemuning, morning 9AM. Our very first destination was Sekinchan, our local paddy fields town. PLS Marketing Sdn. Bhd. factory (detailed map provided at this site) provides paddy processing visits, worth an educational visit, especially for today's younger generations.

Pearl rice, origin from Taiwan and been successfully cultivated here locally. Bought some brown pearl rice, its nice to mix them with my 5 grain rice. The factory is worth a visit, specially for road trip like us whom could explore along the way for some good stop over. 

PLS Marketing

Young paddy

Local Pearl Rice

Paddy Processing

Processing Machines

The Address

Rice Price list

Our lunch was intended to stop over at Bagan Sekinchan. Loong Wah Restaurant (blog in Chinese), to me its nothing great about this seafood place. It's just the location that made us stop by for lunch. All with pre-planned itinerary.

Village walkway to the restaurant

Was it 咕嚕肉？

Nice fish - common dish of the olden days

Had a few of this

Our journey to destination, Sitiawan restarted after lunch. We arrived at the town of Sitiawan around 3PM, as we needed to arrange for homestay places (2 houses) around Seri Manjung area. Will further 

explain condition of both the homestay houses.

大伯公 temple

After settling down our luggages at both homes, we headed to our next destination in itinerary, 大伯公 Temple. Weather wasn't friendly, we were trapped in the rain. Glad skies gradually cleared after about an hour. This temple has been one of tourist attraction in the town, I first visited this place during a friend's wedding last 2011. Actual location of the temple is at Kampung Pasir Panjang.

We headed for dinner, before heading home. Restaurant Happy (雙喜) was the choice made by our local tour guide. Since we requested to try out local Hock Chiew food. Again, in fact I had wedding lunch at this restaurant before. I missed the 8 treasure dish, which comprised of a unique yam based steamed glutinous rice. According to my friend, this needs special order as they wouldn't be able to serve on demand. Since the group couldn't decide the food place up front, we couldn't have it pre-ordered. Nevertheless, we had other Hock Chiew dishes to try on.

Loh-Mee

Sweet & Sour Yam Fish

Tofu soup

Sweet & sour Yam pork

Dinner concluded our Day 1 activities. Next day will be a full packed day for outdoor. 

Next morning, our local tour guide brought us to Kg Koh's market's noodle stall. Again, I had been here a year ago! It was such a memorable trip the last time, with my very closed friends and we shared numerous jokes and laughters. Those were the days. Anyways, memories gone across, hope to treasure it once a while.

I remembered I tried the Loh-Mee the last time, and didn't quite like the bamboo shoot's smell. This time round I tried their kon-lo noodle, made out of self made tapioca flour, so called 蛋燕. Texture seems like chewy glassy noodle, not bad. I compared the price list to what we had last 2011, a bowl of noodle had increased from RM2.40 to RM2.60. Inflation is obviously hitting us every other day. Check out this blog for Sitiawan food, in fact it was still RM2.40 in 2009. In fact I kinda like the kon-lo mee from the opposite coffee shop, 安華 for its long waited noodle. Tried in my previous visit.

Kg Koh Market's noodle stall

乾撈蛋燕

Nice Kuih Talam from Market stall

Shopping was a must. We headed for some biscuits, mainly served vegetarian biscuits, i.e. green bean, red bean all freshly baked and seems famous in town. I had this biscuits since many years ago when my parents temporarily immigrated to Bruas, my kinda 2nd or 3rd hometown :) It was merely 30min drive away.

Biscuits shopping

Our highlight of the trip was Pangkor Island. It had been 15 years I have not been back to this island, there were other sets of memories lied here in the fishing village island, ahemm... don't think I will reveal them here. Overall experience this time, good! The island is much more tourist friendly. Though they have very limited tourist spot, but they are all well organized. At least transport wasn't an issue for a large group like us.

We experienced its new ferry ride from Marina Island to Pangkor Island. Marina island is a man-made connected island from Lumut. Comprised of many high-end properties like condominiums and shop complexes. Check out their official website for more details, i.e. ferry schedule, how to get there. 

This jetty complex was beyond my expectation. Perhaps its still new, think it was officially launched mid-2012. Check out their ticketing area below, air-conditioned with ample space to maneuver around with large crowd, 30pax of us. RM10/adult, RM5/children for ferry both ways.

Marina Island Jetty Building

Boards of Pangkor island map

Ticketing area

Beach seats

Air-Con Ferry 200pax

RM10/adult, both ways

Automated gate, still manned?

Here we arrived Pangkor Jetty at Sungai Pinang Besar, the main jetty. Newly renovated? Impressed. It was rather cleaner than I expected. 

Upon arrival, our large group was contemplating what type of transport we could rely on. It wasn't a good idea to hike onto a motorcycle, how many would we need? Bicycle? Oh gosh, its gonna be hilly ride all the way. Glad the local authority has a well organized company that operates the pink mini bus. One bus could fit 10pax, 3 busses were just nice for us. We negotiated the price and location/time they could drop us for our day trip visit. 

Pink Bus for Hire

Group discussion

First tourist stop - The Dutch Ford. This place had been renovated and it has much better view, looks more like a mini garden now.

The Ford

Next was a little shopping place for dried fishes and other seafood. Local called it satay fish, great for snacks. The factory located along the fishing villages.

Dried Crispy fish factory

We even passed by fishing boat factory, along towards another jetty.

Fishing boat in making

We visited the famous Chinese temple on the island. So called it has a mini great wall up hill, I didn't hit the hill as it was extremely sunny hot that morning.

Temple

Mini tourist bazaar

Post temple visit, we went along towards out final destination and the most relaxing one - the beach! Had some small sight seeing along the hilly roads. Saw a mini airport in the island.

Airport

The Chinese bus drive dropped us at somewhere near Coral beach, where a little temple located. This beach indeed is a nice spot and its rather quiet, except for some intruder monkeys whom will come snatched our food once a while.

Shady spot to lie on

Beach view from the Kuan-Yin temple

Mini Temple

Another scenic view from the temple

Here was the super irritating creature whom snatched my fish snacks while I was enjoying my breeze. Look how humanize they are... they grab whatever found from the dustbin. Enjoy the leftover as if they knew how to use a spoon and plate!

Humanized Monkeys

Since we didn't had our lunch, we left the beach slightly earlier in order for us to catch our late lunch nearby the jetty. We hit whichever stall that still operating at that hour.

Dried Mee Sua

Noodle stall

Fried Mee Sua

We left the island around 4PM, thinking to grab some fresh dessert from the ever famous James Cendol back in Sitiawan. Unfortunately, the stall hit its sales target of the day and packed earlier than expected. We had to miss that. :(

Anyway, instead of heading back home and come out dinner again. We decided to continue our dinner straight at the locally famous coconut villa seafood restaurant, Ah Mu at Kg Cina. Not far away from Kg Koh. This restaurant had changed somehow, they no longer has the small coconut styled verandah. 

Highlight of this meal was its toddy (coconut flower fragmented drink) + Guinness Stout. The while + black. I learned about this alcoholic drink here first time ever, and the experience was extremely 'kick'. Alcohol obviously was high. Sea food was not too bad, we had different menu compared to previous day's Sekinchan seafood. I remembered their fried sotong, it was nice pairing them with toddy.

Ah Mu Seafood Restaurant, Kg Cina

Toddy + Guinness Stout

Dinner

We finished dinner slightly early. Here comes the review of our homestays. First house was where I stayed during friends wedding visit. We enjoyed this place as it was clean and spacious. Unfortunately, I had never expect the crowd to be 30pax, where this place couldn't fit us all comfortably, unless all has sleeping bags and willing to q up every morning for shower. Hence, we had no choice but to seek another homestay nearby. Unfortunately, the other bungalow wasn't in a good condition as most thought it was not well kept. Dust mites found around the house, gloomy and shabby thought its a bungalow. 

Homestay @ Venice Raya 5

Day 3 finally arrived. It's time to head home. Our local guide ran out of idea where to bring us for breakfast. A few suggested places, like what mentioned in Motormouth's blog was closed that Sunday. Hence, we managed to try out this noodle stall, but we gotta wait longer as its the one and only noodle stall serving in the coffee shop, so called self owned. According to our guide, the business was brought up by the current owner's mom, who's a Hokkien and called this Hokkien noodle. Not Penang styled Prawn me or KL styled dark noodle. It's just a simple soup based noodle. I liked the crispy fish cake topped on it. The coffee shop is located nearby the biscuit shop shown above.

Hokkien Noodle

Our journey headed over to Ipoh, time for food.. before heading back to KL that evening. We stopped by Ipoh New Town for Chicken Taugeh Noodle and other stuffs. It was a free and easy afternoon where we all find foods around that corners. 

We continue explored the Pamelo farm in Tambun. First timer, we hit and stumbled around the corner searching for the place. The shop attendant was helpful enough to guide us there. 

Pamelo Farm

Pamelo Tree

Another expedition went by as we were around the Pamelo farm area. From our organizer's research, there is a Tibetan temple around nearby. To our surprise, this temple seems quiet. Sounds a bit scary to me, but since we had quite a crowd to stay close, some of us managed to climb up the tower. View from top was scenic. It's a place good for photography due to its colorful surroundings.

Lastly, before headed home we gotta stop by for dinner. Sungkai was the small town we intend to stop by. According to google, there's a famous Chinese restaurant namely Choy Kee. Blog reference here. They are famous for their braised pork knuckle. Their pork knuckle and steamed Patin fish being slightly pricy. Overall, its rated not to bad for a decent dinner place. Oh, by the way in case one is using Google Map POI to search for this restaurant, one might end up at Bidor town. Seems the place is being tagged wrongly, while many had enquired the same to the restaurant before. It's advisable to book a place prior to visit, as it usually crowded.

Patin Fish

Braised Pork Knuckle

The end our trip report. We marked the end of 2012 with an 'full-filling' road trip like this. It's not easy to organize such trip, especially with such crowd and convoy cars. Anyway, its been a great experience after all.

Coffee Appreciation - Knowledge of Coffee!

I wouldn't say I am a coffee addict, but with the many of cafe and coffee place mushrooming around the heart of city, plus some easy access to many coffee chain stores around... This made me kind of curious for the taste and aroma of - Coffee!

Most of all, I do have a simple coffee machine to experiment with. Which made me even more hungry for such knowledge.

I signed up for a session with my neighborhood cafe - Grandeur Gallery Cafe some time earlier this year, and the session was conducted by Barista Guild Asia. Learned to identify arabica vs robusta coffee beans, interesting facts were shared. Had a great shot of espresso, it's tiny all black coffee! Tasted slight soury but rich in aroma, it was interesting.

It was great, the session was not as boring as I thought. We had some hands on experiences in brewing and preparing cappuccino with the skillful milk frothier. I learned how to differentiate latte, cappuccino and flat white coffee. Indeed, cappuccino is the richest with milk among all. In such, I prefer flat white if I were to have my coffee goes with milk.

I do appreciate black coffee a.k.a americano (espresso + hot water) more these days, all black without sugar and milk. As much, pure black coffee serves only 2calories :) The most, I would always like my afogato (espresso + vanilla ice cream) when I brew at home.

Coffee Beans

Baristot Tiziano bean

Coffee Bean Grinder

Coffee Machine

Grandeur Gallery's Decor

Explain what's Cappuccino vs Latte

My Cappuccino

This Lemon Cheese Cake was yummy

Great to learn and understand more... but I wouldn't wish to become a barista (any more) as I learned that its such difficult to handle coffee machines in order to brew a nice coffee. It requires lots of patients and 'heart' in serving the customers. Great salutes to those good baristas out there, who serves coffee up right from their heart, have the patient glow in the cuppa they presented to their customer.

Flat Tyre - 20130110

Nothing much but to document something in my diary for my poor car. This is my 3rd owned car and yet, this was the 2nd time its tyre needed to be replaced at the shoulder of the road. In my driving history, what a sigh...

Did I mentioned this is the 2nd time on my 3rd car, well... all went well for my 2nd car as though there was no emergency needed for that, phew! I did the tyre replacement on my 1st car, all by myself! Some college mates passer by saw me at that time, but I couldn't remember if any offered help. Nevertheless, I was happy I managed to change the flat tyre on my own [at that time].

This time round... well, I wasn't the driver but though I did not change the tyre on my own.

• Reason #1 - couldn't locate the tool in the dark, 
• Reason #2 - simply because we know the highway authority and assistance could be a reliable one - it was a test!

Simply, there are several lessons learned one could adopt here.

• Safety tip #1 - Make sure one is familiar with own car's emergency tool, if not could at least ensure a torch is fully function at all times. Perhaps a rehearsal for tyre change may be a good idea. 
• Safety tip #2 - Keep authority or auto assistance emergencies phone number handy [Thanks to my broadband service & google search].

Check out KESAS Ronda emergency no. here.
Despite the heavy traffic during rush hour, they manage to assist me within 30min, and completed the mission in 2min. Salute and thank you very much for all the support.

Kesas Ronda in action

Here's the damage!

Cycle circle with Foldable bike!

Here's what I owed my readers... The so called horse riding similarity outdoor sports. Guess it was last September 2012, partner and I were shopping for a foldable bike each.

*agrhhhhh* I lost all my previously drafted post!! Now I'd need to-write! Thanks to the co-existance of mobile blogger apps & lappy, it's all my fault! Let's recall what I had written..... 

I did share how lousy I was in riding a bicycle during my childhood days. Though I did owned a BMX (seems to be the most 'in' bike in those days), I had never cycle more than 1KM at a time. Another unforgettable experience was on my aunt's kampung bike, where once she asked me to follow her around the village. I did, but I ended up in a mud fall :P. My aunt comment was "Ops... never know she can't balance!", but I did climbed onto it and try. A real 大番薯 a.k.a potato!

Here's the reason why I insisted in getting a foldable bicycle. I don't feel comfortable with those normal high frame bicycle - poor balancing. Secondly, I wish to travel out from town further, to cycle around botanical garden or so. A foldable made easier for commute/transfer.

Therefore, I have got myself a China brand foldable, namely TianXS (天喜盛) from my neighborhood bicycle accessories shop, GS Bikers Styles & Accessories. To be more accurate, my model is FKA 083. Don't ask me what type of gear and specification it has... I am just too lousy with that. Upon owning a bicycle like this, I consider myself good enough to balance it throughout the corner and road :).

My group ride so far being interesting and started from a super challenging 20+KM ride (1st ride  though!!) then moved gradually from 10+KM to the longest 36KM couple of weeks ago. On an average, we usually stays around 20ish KM.

2nd Group Ride

Without a watch, I found it difficult to keep up on the time. It's impossible to keep checking on my mobile phone. Hence I got myself a simple sports watch by Timex, flew all the way from Amazon US. It's not a complicated GPS watch or so, in fact its a lap chrono watch :).

My 1st Timex

The below picture were taken from one of the most challenging ride I had. The journey begun from Kota Kemuning all the way to Taman Puchong Mas. The ride was rather interesting, where we had to pass by pod holes (non-tar road) and along the Sg Klang river. If I recalled correctly, we clocked a 36KM here.

Pod holes road

Sg Klang River

Taman Puchong Mas

Other accessories came long couple of weeks after I owned a bike. Such replica sports sunglasses was put into play! We got it from some online store or Groupon, I couldn't remember as I wasn't the one who did the shopping.

Sunglasses

Nasi lemak or Roti Canai for breakfast around Kg Bukit Kemuning has been a must for the group.

Nasi Lemak for Breakfast

Ride to Puchong MAS

Further on, I got myself another arm warmer. This is my favorite so far, as it has UV guard and its made out of some cooling material. The partner got this from an online Korean stuff market place, namely http://www.qoo10.my/. I am kind of skeptical of this product, as I couldn't find its write up any where in the internet. Perhaps its not a genuine product, but then Coolon seems to be a registered Korean brand. No matter what, as long as it serves its purpose well enough - UV protect!

Korean Arm Warmer

That's me with the Purple Arm Warmer

Other than that, I had got one of this flexible bag for foldable bike. It looks nice ya... this can be found at GS Bikers shop.

Foldable Bike's Flexi Bag

In fact, I had got myself another accessory today. hihi... till then, don't get the chance to post it now, or else my write up will be flushed and deleted once again :) *phew*

Happy Biking & Happy Exercising !

Dive Trip @ Mataking Island, Tawau Dec 13-17 2012

December is my holiday month! Yes... had my last dive trip of the year to a luxury island off Semporna, East Sabah. It was good to enjoy the sun and beach back on my home state, people are just as warm, the 'bah' slang been just around the corner... hearing them speaking on the native slang been just made me feel back home.

My favorite shot

Mataking island, it may not be as famous as other dive resorts surrounding Sipadan island, such has Kapalai, SeaVenture and Mabul's Sipadan Water Village (SWV). I knew this place many years ago through some of my dive buddies (at those days I haven't even interested to get my diving license). Overheard its an exclusive yet expansive resort to stay, on those days. Fortunate enough, we have got ourselves some good deal from MIDE 2012 dive expo at PWTC.

Upon checking in to the island, we were greeted with warm live singer at the jetty. I can feel the luxury and exclusiveness attention. It's just such good to be there. Food was awesome, nice ambience and most importantly clean! No sticky foot steps in the dining hall. We had varieties of salad every day, be it Thai styled, Kampung styled (with rice), and all kinds... Varieties of bread made everyday fresh from the kitchen.

Breakfast - love the homemade papaya jam

Views from the resort are just such spectacular. Be it day or night (except cloudy day). The bright sky in the day reflects the bluish of the ocean, it was just such lovely. In the evening, sun will set in front of the resort, the glory sun will smile as much as it could before downing into the deep ocean.

A Romantic Dinner Table

Romantic Sunset

In the dawn, the moonlight would come in just in time to join into the crowd, we had a lovely half moon.

Dawn with the moon

Over on a night with clear sky, we could enjoy the sky full of stars! On the east facing of the island, benches and gathering place are just conveniently available for us to gather and chat. One of a night, we managed to walk along the beach and grab a nice place for star watching, on with breeze that kisses our faces. Awesomely romantic! Only if I am accompanied with a lovely partner, with a glass of champagne or wine... that would have been perfect (*dreaming*)

We woke up early on the day we about to leave, hoping for a perfect sunrise. Unfortunately, we couldn't get it all. Sky was covered with thick black cloud. There goes our beauty sleep on 5AM in the morning.

Sunrise Watch

No sunrise :(

Nevertheless, it was worth it. Slow morning walk brought us to the little Mataking island. One could walk towards the little romantic island when low tide. The view was superb, but it rained half way through. 

Nice sandy beach

Beautiful Scene

Enough of the beautiful skies from the island... made me dreamy while blogging :)

Next is on the dive experiences here. Many would have expect better or similar marine existence since 6 or even 10 years ago. If you have that hope, don't come to Sipadan island and its surrounding islands for the next 10 years, else you will be absolutely disappointed. For me, I didn't expect much as I am just a new diver whom still struggle much with my buoyancy. As long as I am able to buoyant well, any dive will be perfect for me. No doubt, one may be disappointed when there are just too little marine creature to see. One could have complaining, and comparing with other dive sites one has been before. Oh well, I would say we need to accept what's there today and admit the fact that -- mother nature is seriously in danger. How much chance we could preserve the value of marine life underwater? How many would supply they energy to preserve. We all know -- not many! Hence, nothing much we could do except to accept the fact and encourage more to love mother nature.

Fish booming has been a killer to the underwater world. I remember one of the dive at Barracuda point of Sipadan island.. I saw an aftermath with corals crashes all over the place. Only left with some new born soft corals and nudibranches, such a sad scene.

Stop Fish Booming!

We did most our dives surrounding Mataking island and its opposite island, namely Bohayan and Timba-Timba. Seriously, none of the sites gave me enough UW memories, as the creatures were so disperse and visibility rather poor, 5M at most. Nothing exciting to share except MANTA RAY! Yes, we saw manta ray as we decent on a deep dive, 1st dive of the day. Can't remember the site name (wait, will check my dive log next time). This creature was HUGE! To me, it looks like an eagle UW (haha!) Sorry, I don't have UW camera, hence no picture to share. :P

Dive Center

Our dive center was good. Nice DMs around to help, they are such hardworking... maintaining the center every morning, help out with our tanks, get organize with our request and so. But one thing which almost disappoint us.... was the arrangement of boatman and DM. The management was about to change our DM throughout all dives, in which we requested to avoid that since we were not comfortable on such arrangement.

Dive center and its crews

Good to know, we were in time for new born turtle! Mataking Reef resort does turtle hatching. They do look for sponsors, and we were part of the lucky one who managed to sponsor some. My buddies have some nice pictures on the turtles, too bad I am just too lazy to hunt for the pictures.

Turtles are born!

Oh dear, I am getting tired in writing. In fact, I have been writing this since 2012... and its now 2013! Hope you won't get bored with my post later.

Lastly, here's my recent gear in 2012. Bio fin was bought during 2011 MIDE but was used 1st time during my 2012 Redang trip. Dive computer was bought in 2012.. oh, I missed my Neilpryde bootie bought in 2012 MIDE. Dive LED torch was the latest in my collection. Bought from DX Deal extreme (dx.com) online store and collected it a few days just before my dive... it was a long wait, for close to 4 weeks upon order.

My dive gears

2012 has been filled with the most dive trips for me. Whether I will continue scuba diving, not too sure. It's all depends what I am off with, in the year 2013. Life goes on, goes along with an open heart! I am on for any adventure, any experiences to fulfill my life with  the greatest company, laughter and memories. To certain extend, some memories just couldn't be wiped off. Hope the deep ocean will continue to help me treasure them deep into the sea. ^.^

Happy  New Year 2013!