Kuala Lumpur : Sg Pencala Recce Ride 2012/09/19

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Kuala Lumpur - Sg. Pencala Recce Ride 
Royal Selangor Club Bukit Kiara to Desa Parkcity, 19th September 2012

Trio-Ride from Royal Selangor Club, Bukit Kiara > Kuala Lumpur Golf & Country Club > Taman Tun Dr. Ismail > Kampong Sg Pencala > Desa Parkcity & back.

Distance covered : 20.7km.
Starting Time : 5:00pm
Time Taken : approx. 2 hrs. (excluding stops)


PRELUDE

Sg Pencala Exploratory Ride Map  (click for Map Link)

Sin, Nash & me had rode around the Kiara, Tmn Tun Dr. Ismail & Sg Pencala area a few times and found the route interesting. But we were wondering where can this route extend to? Is there any way it connects to Desa Parkcity? Well, what better way to find out than to explore further!

The Ride

We set off from the Royal Selangor Club Bukit Kiara Annexe, it is a relatively new branch of the original Club which is close to 100 years old. But the building's architecture replicates that of the old club building at Dataran Merdeka.

From there we headed in towards Jalan Bukit Kiara 1, the road that skirts the Kuala Lumpur Golf & Country Club. Riding by the golfing greens were soothing to our eyes.

Passing the entrance to the Golf Club building, we prepared ourselves for a short and relatively steep climb upwards towards Changkat Abang Haji Openg.

Going down Changkat Abang Haji Openg was easy, sloping all the way down. But reaching the bottom, I turned around to look back. This is what we will have to climb on the way back!

And we were into Taman Tun Dr. Ismail. Avoiding the busier main roads of this small township, we rode along the Haji Openg & Datuk Suleiman areas, only exiting to the main road as we approached Sg. Pencala.

To reach Sg. Pencala we had no choice but to cycle a short stretch of the TTDI main road Jalan Dato Suleiman. This road gets pretty heavy as many motorist use it a detour when the LDP-Jalan Damansara Highway gets choked up.

We are at the underpass of the SPRINT Highway. Above is the SPRINT-Pencala Link. This part of the highway forms a boundary point. At the side where we stopped is Taman Tun Dr. Ismail, a up-market township.

Cross over and the modern world changes into a kampong area, the Sungei Pencala Kampong.

Crossing over into the kampong, we found it fairly busy with many cars parked at the roadside - the reason being the weekly night market at the right. Looks interesting, we will visit it later, on our way back.

At the T-junction facing the mosque, we made a right turn to ride along Jalan Sungei Pencala. This road skirts the foot hills and we hoped that that will lead us somewhere near to Desa Parkcity.

We are now feeling like explorers of old. Forward!

The road was shady and cooling, with rolling hills of gentle slopes, making our ride more interesting.

We passed by kampong houses built onto the hill slopes, nicely nestled into the greenery.

And kampong houses in a valley.

Soon that road came to an end, with a narrower road sloping steeply upwards and another narrow path beside it. That slope looks daunting.

As we got nearer, we saw that the narrow road sloped downwards and there was a barricade at the end. But what was interesting was the other side of this barrier.

On this side the kampong foilage grew naturally wild. On the other side....

On the other side the landscape looks neatly planned and there was no sight of kampong houses.

Is this it?

The barricade seems pretty hard to pass, with a top railing too high and a bottom railing too low.

But it was not a solid single barrier. It was actually two parallel railings with a break in between.

Voila! Like magic we could go through!

Immediately after crossing over, on our left we say this guard-house with a prison-like tall fencing. The Nepalese Gurkha guard eyed us suspiciously, for this is the rear entrance to Country Heights Damansara - a really upmarket residential area consisting only of bungalows.

We must be on the right track as this place is suppose to be next to Desa Parkcity.

But how far away is our destination.

Well just move on.... ONWARDS EXPLORERS!

Ahead we saw this viaduct tall flyover, this must be the NKVE leading towards Jalan Duta.

We are below the viaduct of the NKVE-Duta Link, it's piers supporting the road 70-80 feet above. One this side is the Country Heights Damansara, crossing over should be Desa Parkcity (that's what we are hoping!)

UPDATE JANUARY 2021: This passage is not accessible anymore by bicycles, a long stretch of hoarding/fencing has blockade out the access. It is still possible to hike around the barrier via a narrow steep off-road trail to the right.

And it was right, another 1km. further could be seen bungalows perching on top of cliffs.

And we were soon riding down the well planned landscaped roads of this township.

EUREKA!

We reached the Waterfront of Desa Parkcity, our destination.

After resting a while and basking in our achievement, we made our way back; following more or less the route we came from.

Remember the night market we passed by earlier, well we dropped by one of the stalls and bought bandannas for ourselves. Cheap too. At RM4-00 each!

Riding does work up one's appetite, the Sambal Hijau Restaurant in Kampung Sg. Pencala looks like a good place to eat.

So we went in, the interior looks nice and clean. Satisfied with the place, we made our orders.

We had Mee Kong Fu. It's not one of those martial arts food, but Cantonese Fried Mee.

And also Mee Hailam or Hainaniese Mee... Hey! Wait a minute, isn't this a Malay Restaurant in a Malay Kampong? Well, it's Malaysia - multicultural so this mix is not surprising.

And lastly - Sambal Hijau Nasi Goreng Special, one of the house specialty.

Well time to go as we will be attending another ride, the Damansara Heights Ride organized by Folding Bike Malaysia.

Heading back towards the Royal Selangor Club via Taman Tun Dr. Ismail (TTDI), we felt satisfied that our exploratory ride was fruitful

So what's next?

Stay tuned to AhPek Biker's blogs and be sure we will cook something up!

Postscript :

We did a couple more of these recce rides and later we organized a group ride.

Delicious Gado-gado at Subak

During one of these later recce rides, we stopped by at Subak @ Sg. Pencala to have a good meal and a tete-a-tete.

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