Pantai Remis Fun Ride

    Video of Ride

     Map of Ride

Time to time again, we hear about Pantai Remis, most notably the seafood is good here. Even Ipoh folks have choose to come here instead of of Kg. Cina in Sitiawan. I did a recce ride here a few months ago, the course is quite straight forward. When a few riders was suggesting new courses to ride, Pantai Remis popped up. As I have already recce-ed the place, I was delegated the task to lead. To be honest, I rather follow as I am a slow rider, hardly a candidate to lead, especially for fast riders.

The scheduled morning came and I was already in town at 6.30am, travelling from Taiping is actually quite near and near traffic free in the early hours. Hunting for a breakfast place, the rest messaged me and before I can actually suggest anything, they were already seated in a 'coffee shop' having their breakfast.

I rode past and saw their transport and I too stopped there to join them

After breakfast, we all assembled at an empty space near the wet market. The place was big enough to park a hundred cars and also it is just a walk away from our intended lunch venue later after the ride. One rider was late and Fookson requested us to wait. When everyone is accounted for, all 28 of us is ready, we started off. I actually did not anticipate a big group.

I leaded them to the fishing jetties first and we soon came to the edge of town where a new temple was built. Most fishing communities offer their prayers to the 'Mazu' godess. From Kuala Selangor to the north till Tg. Dawai, there must be a temple dedicated to 'Mazu' in every 'Bagans' or chinese fishing villages.

After a photo session, we set off again. We will be going on the main trunk road for a kilometer before we hit the gravel trail to the the lakes and sea shore. The lakes were created when tin mining was also a major activity here. 

For those who don't know about the mining landslide in Dec 11, 1993 can click here , https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5XupgwBIBCw This was how one of the bay was created! 

They mining activity, as in other places has ceased now and we can see duck rearing activity starting to go in a big way here. Most don't know that exporting duck is a major earner now for Malaysia. But because we locally don't actually consume that much, it is a hidden industry, quite unknown.

The ride is relatively easy but because the weather was quite dry although it was shady today, anglers in their cars were zooming past  us, peppering us with the dust. Reaching a small path, I guided them to one of the lake shores. Though not scenic, it was a calming sensation just to be around there. Watching the wind blowing the grass and the silence around, well, maybe except for the boisterous bantering of the riders.

Spent quite some time at this lakeside as many were trying to get the best scenic shots as possible. Parading and posturing with their close friends, selfies, we-fies etc. Now to continue to the seashore. The course although easy, there are one or two high slopes and even after comforting the new riders to go slow, they were too eager to catch up with the others.

We reached the shore in just a few strokes and as usual, being a scenic location, lots and lots of photo sessions here. we were actually near the wharf where LaFarge loads their cement raw materials onto barges here. Although gated , many anglers are seen doing fishing here for groupers and catfish.

See the picture above, that's the cape where we will be going after here. A little real mountain biking needs to be done here.

That we did and actually , this part was more fun as there's real foliage and real trails. There was a trail branching out to the left but that's not for today. As usual, the group was bantering and laughing while the cooler ones just sat by the rocks enjoying the breeze.

We moved back out using the same trail for a while and turn right just before the lake. This trail will leads us straight to the power station in Segari. We reached a junction where the remaining course will be on tarmac now. In Segari, there's also a turtle hatchery center operated by our Fisheries Department. This is our next destination. Also beside the center, there's also one of the spots where moon sightings are taken, usually to pinpoint the date of the Muslim calendar. More like an astronomical center which are scattered over many strategic locations around the peninsular.

I was surprised at the number of visitors here as the last few times I was here, there was hardly 4 cars, even on a Sunday! I didn't go in as I have been there quite a number of times. So, I just waited outside, buying a can of cold ice lemon tea and enjoying it.

I noticed one of the new rider, first time going off-road, has 'butt pains' and this is not good for cyclist. This means if you don't really rest them, you will have to ride in pain. I consulted his husband and told him to lead others from here on wards back to our cars. He will lead the fast riders as fast as he possible could and then drive his pickup to fetch his wife. I will sweep behind her and we will ride back easy!

So, the rest all zoomed off and the distance remaining is 6.3 km to the main trunk road and another 9.3 km to Pantai Remis, totalling another 15.6 km but this will all be tarmac.

Another patient and considerate rider who decided to ride with me and wife, who were sweeping the troubled rider. All four of us were taking it slow to make the ride back as easy as possible for her. When we reached the main road junction, it was only less than half an hour and the pickup truck was still not here. I suggested we wait at the junction but she said she can still ride so we carried on. This was on the main trunk road now and cars and lorries were fast here. It's still another 9.3 km to go.

With another 5 kilometers to go, we saw her husband on the opposite and we stopped for him to do a U-turn. I must commend her on her first offroad. She did about 34 kilometers today! All of us hopped onto the pickup as we don't want to slow down lunch time as it was already noon.

All 4 bikes were loaded on the pickup and we reached Pantai Remis in just 10 minutes. Then to lunch. We were separated into 3 tables and each ordered their own dishes. We choose Ling Song Kee Seafood Restaurant today as it was near our car park. I ordered 5  and when we were almost finished , the next table said the squid was NOT TO BE MISSED ! So, we ordered the squid as well. We did not regret, the squid was really nice ! And so was the other dishes.

There is a special dish here where yam paste is inserted into a pumpkin and steamed for a few hours. I tried reserving the dish the day before but it was not available as the operator said they can't find suitable sized pumpkin.

Food                 -  Good ****

Damage            -  RM271.00  for 10 person. ****

Place                -   Ling Song Kee Seafood Restaurant

Address               -    No. 17, Lorong 1, Taman Pantai Indah, 34900 Pantai

                            Remis, Perak 

GPS                  -   4.446419, 100.626198

Opening hours   -   12.00noon till 3.00pm  , 6.00pm till 11.00pm

Phone               -   05-6772803

Taiping  -  1st Ride.

Beautiful sunrise in Kuala Gula.

It's become a trend for biking event managers to flip flop their event dates as fickle as they want to! Last year, the Penang Merdeka Ride clashed big time with the CFAL ride. I think Biketown is actually going against other biking events and actually very selfishly for their own pockets and not doing for the sake of the riding community. I chose wrongly last year and after that, I want nothing to do with the Merdeka Ride! I didn't even want other riders to know I did registered with their event. In fact, during CFAL I did not even ride as I chose the wrong event.

Fast forward this year, I was interested to ride the 'Taiping Fun Ride'. It is not as easy as the organizers think. We arranged so that there will be someone at home to feed the cats and dogs, my wife has to take leave in advance etc.etc. My son in-law from Singapore took leave so as to accompany my daughter at home when she was alone taking care of the house and the pets. When 'Taiping Fun Ride' was post phoned till the end of the month, I just can't tell him," Hey, don't come. The event is post phoned." I can't do that, can I?

The event organizer for the Merdeka Ride intentionally chose a date to clash with the Taiping Ride. This is off course my opinion and also opinions of many other riders. Anyway, I think I will stop talking about these event managers as I am resolving not to join any major events from here onwards. Not even if they offer Pearl Izumi jerseys, not that I can shove my body into one, hahaha!

In fact, my opinion is Taiping Ride shouldn't have post phoned too, just because most riders are riding up north.

1. The Taiping Lake Gardens.

So, there was only a handful of us riders planning to head for Taiping anyway. All in all we had 9 riders, namely, myself and Lilian, Irene and Freda, Rivern and Kenny, Alex and Julie and Kook Keong. For the first ride, I proposed we do the Kuala Gula to Kuala Kurau first rather than the Taiping Fun Ride course first. We need to drive back to KL after the 2nd ride so it's more easier to ride the further one first.

The ride starts!

We grouped in front of Ai Tee Restaurant in Kuala Gula. Me and Lilian started off early and was there even before sunrise. I drove into the fishing village, took a few snaps and hunt for a place for coffee. I really missed my 'daily Hainanese coffee' after taking a sip! Hehehe. I chatted with the locals, asking them about the place and where abouts are the seafood manufacturing places.

It's about 7.45am when I left the local watering hole and just as I was taking out my foldie, KK arrived. After a while everyone who is supposed to arrive, arrived! We then started off for Kuala Kurau. None of us has been here before but it shouldn't be too hard either. Although it was sunny already, it was still cooling. We rode on leisurely and in no time, we were already going up a slope and this is the bridge over the river. We are already in Kuala Kurau! I have mapped out the route a few days earlier, so with the help of the Garmin, it's quite easy.

Sunny but cool!

We were waiting to regroup after the bridge and the route to the village is just below the bridge. We need to make a U-turn but as there were no shade, we moved opposite to wait for the others. One by one, we rejoined and finally only KK was left. I think he must have been taking scenic photos on the bridge. Then we saw him, coming down from the bridge, then we saw him zooming past despite our hollering to him. We were all laughing out loud as he did not see a whole group of cyclist on the roadside. Irene went after him and Rivern gave him a call on the phone.

KK zooming past us and not noticing us!

After KK rejoined us, we started off into the village. The first turn, we saw rows and rows of salted fish and squids being dried out in the sun. Being city folks like us, we stopped and took photos of it, much to the astonishment of the giggling locals. My destination was a salted egg factory which I read about in the blogs. I have already map it out the location and now it's time to look for it. We did find it and we checked the place out, looking at how the process of producing the salted eggs. Lilian bought a few too.

Rows and rows of salted fish drying in the sun.

Salted eggs everywhere!

After a short rest, having 100 plus we were off and now I was looking for the pedestrian bridge to ride back over the river. We took the main bridge over and there is another bridge mainly for residents. It's only for pedestrian and motorcycles and off course cyclist. The bridge actually leads opposite and also the local dwellings of the Kuala Kurau folks. We rode over it and then saw the local houses of the fisher folks. Most of them live fronting the river.

Riders on the pedestrian bridge.

After riding for a while, we rejoined back onto the main trunk road. Now I am headed for the Hua Seng Keng temple. Also read from local blogs, it's located in the middle of an oil palm plantation. I have also got the exact directions to the temple from my chat with a local this morning. When we reached the plantation's guard house, we were not allowed to ride in. The plantation manager has issued a directive not to allow outsiders into the plantation due to an accident that happened before. We need to ride out back to the trunk road and head in from there which is quite a ride! After cajoling and seeing us in bicycles, he finally relented and allowed us in.

Hua Seng Keng temple, right in the middle of a plantation.

We rode about 2 kilometers off road and finally reached the temple. The uniqueness of this temple is there's a dungeon where there are statues of how folklore beliefs of a person is rewarded or punished according to your deeds in hell. Although interesting, I did not venture there. A few did though. I took a rest at the temple compounds. Rivern was hungry again and he rode out first after waiting for a while. When the rest are out, we rode out to rejoin Rivern who was already at Ai Tee Restaurant.

We had lunch there and frankly, no matter how the blogs describe, the food here is not really as good as the blogs described. But it still good to fill our stomachs and also the price was fair. We each paid RM13 for the seafood lunch, so it was not that bad.

Clockwise from top left : Catfish curry , Fried squids, towfoo hotplate, kangkong sambal and clams.

After lunch, we wandered into the fishing village opposite. A local folk gave me his namecard this morning and after enquiring from a petrol pump attendant (yes! they do have petrol station in fishing villages, hehehe), a small boy volunteered to leads us to the 'belacan' or shrimp paste factory.

Packing 'belacan' or shrimp paste.

Here we went into the factory and see how 'belacan' was made. Quite informative too. Lilian bough a few items here, some dried shrimps and shrimp paste. I wanted some 'Kurau' salted fish but there was none, they only have red fish. After 'camwhoring' and checking out the place we left and headed for the Bird Santuary nearby. We were a bit disappointed  with the place though. There's no guides. no information counter, NO BIRD and also quite hap- hazard. Also the mangrove around there was littered with rubbish. So, that concludes our first ride and we rode back to our cars and stuffed it into our cars and left.

NO BIRD sanctuary!

We went back to Taiping and was to visit Burmese Pool near the lake gardens. We went round and round hunting for the place but then finally gave up as we were sweaty and also wee bit tired. On the way back to the hotel, I took another wrong turn and then all 5 cars had to take a U-turn out. I can see the laughter in all cars and ironically, we saw the signboard to the 'Burmese Pool' on the way out! We did not stop though.

Time for rest at the hotel before another drive to Kuala Sepetang for dinner. At 6.30pm, Alex and Julie arrived at the hotel (he was staying with a relative) while Freda and Irene was going out on another date. So, the 7 of us made our way to Kuala Sepetang in 2 cars for dinner. We dined at the same place I had dinner last night, " Kang Kao Riverside Restaurant ".

Clockwise from top left ; The really good breaded prawn curry, fried mantis prawn, sambal 4 variety vege, house speciality towfoo and the steamed golden snapper.

Luckily the dinner here was superb! It's been quite sometime since I last tasted REAL fresh fish. I think it was since Langkawi days. The curry prawn in baked bread needs a mention here too. They were really good. Also RM25 per pax for such wonderful seafood is not expensive. Many were intimidated by the front facade of the restaurant but the price is fair.

After a good nights sleep, comes tomorrow, we ride to Kuala Sepetang!