I started off from home on this cool cloudy Wednesday morning to meet up with Ganesan at the traffic-lights junction near Kampar Sentral, the entrance to Bandar Baru Kampar, at seven o'clock.
We rode northwards along the moderately busy trunk-road to meet Hanif and the three of us then proceeded to Jeram New Village for our breakfast about 8 km away.
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| 0700 Bandar Baru 0734 First time at Jeram Breakfast 8.61km |
After a hearty chat at breakfast with Hanif, Ganesan (who bought all of us idiapam aka puttumayam), Ng Wan Thim (the PKR chairman of Jeram branch who bought us drinks), Fabian Wylie and his wife Lee Lean, the three of us proceeded towards Gua Tempurung at 0823hr, another six km away.
We reached the main entrance to the Gua Tempurung caves at about nine o'clock and headed for the off-road trail that skirts around the foot-hills. I have not been riding off-road for some time and the first couple of km was taxing, maintaining my balance over loose stones and uneven tracks while trying to catch up with Hanif and Ganesan ahead of me. They had to stop and wait for me a couple of times.
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| 0905hr Gua Tempurung 16.64km. Off road for the last 2km |
After a few km of off-road riding, we stopped briefly to look at the tranquil and refreshing scenery across a small bridge.
By about half-past nine, we arrived at the foot-bridge over the north-south highway. We stopped again briefly before heading on the final stretch of the trail leading to our destination.
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| 0920hr across the plus highway. 17.92km heading north |
My hands felt rather light and "empty" this morning. Then I realised that I have forgotten to wear my cycling gloves.
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| Forgot to bring my gloves. My palms felt sticky on the rubber handle. |
We reached the illegal dump-site at about 0925hr. Ganesan took some photos of some new bags of rubbish thrown into the ditch that has been covered up with some land fill.
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| 0925hr 18.56km We arrived at the rubbish dump-site that Ganesan complained about |
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| Another look at the scenic hills around us before resuming our ride. |
After Ganesan and Hanif had had a good look over the partially covered-up dump site, we proceeded to ride to Kg Jahang a couple of km away. There we stop briefly by the rocky bank of the Sungei Jahang with its clear inviting waters splashing over many rocks in a small rapid.
This stream is part of a popular whitewater rafting course.
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| 0940hr The Jahang River at Kampung Jahang 20.24km |
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| Whitewater rafting site |
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| Me, with the little rapid in the background |
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| My three year-old Raleigh Echo taking a short rest |
Soon it was time for us to embark on our journey home.
After getting back onto the trunk road via SK Gunung Panjang, we rode southwards, stopping for tea at Kafé Gua on the return leg from Gua Tempurung.
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| 1020hr 26.07km With Hanif, waiting for roti bakar telor goyang (half-boiled egg on toast) at Kafe Gua |
1052hr: After another round of chit-chat with lots of laughter thrown in, we rode our last ten km home. Hanif broke away from us at the Malim Nawar junction towards Bandar Agacia Kampar via Malim Nawar town while Ganesan and I carried on riding on the trunk road towards Kampar town.
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| 1135hr Home |
I reached home at about half-past eleven, one of the few times I finished cycling before noon. It was a cool and pleasant ride today along some mildly demanding off-road trails under cloudy skies with lots of shade from trees along the way. I have nick-named today's ride, "Gua Tempurung: the Shadowy Trail".
