Gawds! Good trip to Gua Tempurong and Ipoh! Lesse: otousan, lad, Puddy plus their colleagues Dmn, Kly and Aunty EK - a happy party of seven with us and Aunty EK as the drivers (by the way, entire trip was 617km!). Managed to wake up early as had to meet at otousan's at 7am so that we could reach Gua Tempurong in time for Grand Tour. That bit is described by otousan as 'sweaty, dirty and wet'. And it's true - sweaty during the early bit where it's all steps and railings, and thanks to a good guide, good fun. Once off the track there's loads climbing, sliding, tracking and crawling about! [Note to self: don't wear non-grip shoes as midway the trip there's literally places with no handholds/footholds, might as well try sandals. Sandals would also be easier to clean. Also, pack food in waterproof baggie as had sugar crash and starvation attack midjourney.]Things to note is that since it's a cave with bats and half the time we're trekking on crumbly limestone, the earth can suddenly feel 'pasty'. Search immediately for river. Also, as there can be some 40 people in one group be sure to wash face upstream of those washing socks in same river. Torches are essential (headlights seems most convenient but lad's Maglite most effective!), or else do like us, keep up with the guide as he's literally skipping all over the place!
After a quick shower it was off to lunch, buying chicken biscuits followed by mooching on durians! Lovely. Then onwards to * - hot spring spa! otousan was crazy enough to want to race on a reflexology foot path, and we (lad and us) were crazy enough to race him. Heh, he lost both races but must credit him - he raced once with us (while we were eating an ice cream!) and once more with lad. Until now the heels of our feet are killing us so much so that we're limping badly. The VIP room that we booked had some technical problem and so we'd to settle for a Family Spa room but that was also enjoyable. First cold shower, then into the steaming jacuzzi pool, then shower, then pool...if only it was made such that one could just sleep in the pool! At one point we went back to the car, and when we came back the pool temperature must have somewhat increased. Could not, repeat, COULD NOT enter pool! Attempts to immerse self in pool led to us jumping straight out of pool with our scrapes from the spelunking session burning!Then it was back to Ipoh to dump our stuff at ** before dinner. Fried noodles, kuey teow, crab, sotong, lala and some weird shelled thing *** that had the others sucking at.
Next morning was totally food! Breakfast was dim sum at **** (avoid/limit the lo mai kai and paus if on makan marathon) that as ab-so-lute deee-lish! This was followed by a white coffee break with some odd pork mix mince ball (wethinks the place was called OldTown somethingsomethingsomething). Meal break - trip to *****. Lunch? Aun Kheng Lim's salted chicken and ice cream soda (syrup, a scoop of vanilla ice cream and F&N's Ice Cream Soda). We skipped the rojak, not being a fan. Final Ipoh stop: soya bean curd! Then it was, "Say goodbye to Ipoh!" as we headed back home stopping at Tapah to get guavas.* "Say what's the name of the hot springs place again ar?"
"Sungai Klah Hot Springs. Exit at Trolak/Sungkai."
** "How about the name of the budget hotel that we'd stayed in?"
"Regal Lodge Hotel."
*** "Eh you know the name of the place we had dinner ar? Near the MAN U restaurant one?"
"Don't remember woh."
"How about that shelled things?"
"Balitong?"
"Balitong? What are they ar?"
"Snails. Live in sand one."
**** "How about the name of the place we went for dim sum? With the advertisement one?"
"Fuh San. F-U-H S-A-N."
***** "Then the temple we went to was called Temple Caves ya?"
"Cave Temple."
No comments:
Post a Comment