AhPek Biker - Old Dog Rides Again: Perak : Tour de Kampar 2019 Day 1: Cycling Gopeng To Batu Gajah & Pusing

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Perak : Tour de Kampar Day 1: Gopeng To Batu Gajah & Pusing - Of Castles & Murals

Day 1 - Cycling Gopeng To Batu Gajah & Pusing and Back - Saturday 1st August 2020:

Kampar>drive>Gopeng>Kampung Tekkah>Kellie's Castle>Batu Gajah>Pusing>Sri Maha Mariamman Temple>Gopeng>drive>Gaharu Tea Valley>drive>Disney Avenue>drive>Kampar.
Distance: 50.62 km. | Level: Easy/Medium

Cycling Time : 7:30 am to 3:15pm
Cycling Time Taken : 7 hrs 45 mins. (including stops for lunch, tea, stops at Kellie's Castle, temple, Batu Gajah wall murals, Batu Gajah colonial town centre, rests & regrouping and lots of photo opps.

This is blog comes in two parts, Day 1 here is on our ride from Gopeng to Batu Gajah & Pusing and back. Day 2 will take us from Kampar to Tanjung Tualang & back.
Click the following to go to the second part:

- Tour de Kampar 2020 Day 2 : Cycling from Kampar to Tanjung Tualang.

Route Recommendations:
1. The route is flat with some shady sections at the rural roads, but the main roads may not have much tree cover, so do cover up or apply sun-block.
2. Places of interest:
Along these route were several places of interests, some of which we visited and others we did not for lack of time (note: click on GPS coordinates for directional map to respective places):
- KZ Aneka Kerepek (GPS: 4.21002, 101.26569), a shop that sells a large variety of keropok, located near the Tapah Toll Plaza.
- Gopeng Museum (Heritage House) (GPS: 4.47370, 101.16676).
- Gopeng Street Art (GPS: 4.47447, 101.16679) near the Gopeng Museum.
- Kellie's Castle (GPS: 4.47515, 101.08744).
- Arulmigi Sri Maha Mariamman Temple (GPS: 4.47376, 101.08147), interesting as there's a statue of William Kellie-Smith among the idols on the roof.
- Batu Gajah Street Art (GPS: 4.47162, 101.04147) located at side lane opposite Marry Brown Batu Gajah.
- Batu Gajah Hospital (GPS: 4.47901, 101.03488), the old building of timber Tudorian architecture.
- Pejabat Daerah dan Tanah Kinta (GPS: 4.47636, 101.03585), a stately colonial building of Edwardian architecture.
- Batu Gajah Prison (GPS: 4.47880, 101.0327), the second oldest prison in the country, the oldest being Taiping Prison.
- Batu Gajah Clock Tower (GPS: 4.47239, 101.04110).
- Tanjung Tualang Tin Dredge No. 5 (GPS: 4.39664, 101.05316) at Tanjung Tualang.
- Gaharu Tea Valley (GPS: 4.45915, 101.19297) in Gopeng.
- Adeline's Villa (GPS: 4.45811, 101.20847) in Gopeng.
- UTAR Bird Sanctuary (GPS: 4.34006, 101.14297).
- Disney Avenue (GPS: 4.32276, 101.12568).
3. Food
a. Dinner (a day earlier): Claypot chicken rice at Heng Kee Claypot Chicken Rice (GPS: 4.31248, 101.15249) in Kampar.
b. Breakfast: Curry noodles with yong tau foo at Gopeng Food Court (GPS:4.47529, 101.16817) in Gopeng.
c. Morning Tea: Take-away Ipoh white coffee from Ah Bui Coffee-shop (肥肥茶餐室) (GPS: 4.46965, 101.04212) in Batu Gajah.
d. Lunch: Ming Feong Restaurant (GPS: 4.49348, 101.01012) at Pusing - rice with Hakka dishes (Fried tofu with Pumpkin, Puppy duck (Kow Chai Ngap / 狗仔鸭), kao yoke, Self-pulled noodle with pork ribs and bitter gourd, stir fried salted fish meehoon.
e. Dinner: Mixed hawker food with Pegaga Juice at Kampar Food Centre (GPS: 4.31419, 101.15044).
4. Weather
Morning temperatures in Gopeng was a crisp 23°C while afternoon temperature at the locality was a hot 33°C, so do cover up or apply sun-block.

5. Accommodations

Two nights for a double/twin room at RM70 per night at a rented homestay in Taman Bandar Baru, Kampar.

____________________________________________________________________________________PRELUDE

Of late, many of us have been joining Andrew Lau for many of his Sunday rides .... there's always an impetus drawing us to these rides other than the route. See, Andrew likes to bake, and often a few days before he will dangle some of his freshly made pastries and Nyonya Kueh to entice us to join his rides, as he would be bring those yummy stuff along. But don't get us wrong, we are not greedy pigs; it's always good to meet up with friends and ride together - those yummylicious treats were a good bonus!
Fast forward a bit, and he felt that we all should have a weekend ride further away from the Klang Valley. And our target this time was Kampar, an easy hour away from Kuala Lumpur - quick to reach but still having a different atmosphere than that of the big city. With Kampar as a base we would have rides over the Saturday and Sunday.

Most of us arrived the night before, and when in Kampar one must not miss their Claypot Chicken Rice. We used to have this decades back enroute on regular family trips from Penang to my Grandad's home town of Teluk Intan. Back then, Claypot Chicken Rice was only available in Kampar, these days they can be found in almost all major towns of Peninsular Malaysia. One of the best and oldest place that sells clay-pot chicken rice is Heng Kee which has been around for three generations. They have perfected this claypot style of cooking, their rice is fluffy with a hint of hardness and yet has lingering flavors of the chicken, Chinese sausage and salted fish.
It was a good meal, nice but not too fanciful and good enough to tie the tummy until the next day of more eats exploration.
___________________________________________________________________________________
THE RIDE

Cycling Route: Kampar>drive>Gopeng>Kampung Tekkah>Kellie's Castle>Batu Gajah>Pusing>Sri Maha Mariamman Temple>Gopeng>drive>Gaharu Tea Valley>drive>Disney Avenue>drive>Kampar.

Distance: 50.62 km. | Level: Easy/Medium

From Gopeng, the route goes a short distance on the Federal Route M1 trunk road up till Kampung Tekkah, and continues onto less busy secondary roads to Batu Gajah & Pusing. The return route is almost a reverse loop. It is a fairly flat route, easy to ride on but with only nominal shady roads.
(Zoom out to see places of interest in Kampar)

(Click Here for Google route map link)

7:30am - We arrive in Gopeng for breakfast after a drive convoy from Kampar. In view of the varied cycling skill and stamina of today's group, Andrew had decided to start from Gopeng instead instead of Kampar, shaving a 40km distance from the total ride route; making it more manageable for this mix and varied group of riders.
Breakfast was at the Gopeng Food Court where most of us had a local favourite - yong tau foo with curry noodles. One pick the types of yong tau foo to one's own liking and it's served in a soup, separately from the noodles. This is such a favourite local dish that many stalls sell the same thing, with the exception that each of them make their own yong tau foo. The stall that we ate from had very good mince meat-vegetable patties - crispy, crunchy and yet juicy on the inside.

8:00 am - We were all geared to ride off but then, even before we could roll off Lamberry found her rear wheel punctured and it was Andrew to the rescue of the poor damsel. It was caused by a nasty slit near the valve.
Over these next two days, we suffered more punctures than the average that I was tempted to name this tour the Puntured Tour 🙄.

But more of these punctures later, let's get back to our ride. As we rode out, I notice the varied types of buildings, among the new shops were the older, stately colonial pre-war buildings, some with their embellished windows, columns and arches proudly restored (see top section of above photo), and just opposite it was an old ramshackle timber building with cute horses. I am not sure what horses have to do with Gopeng, but nearby there's a town called Lawan Kuda (Fighting Horse).
By the way, Gopeng does have it's fair share of street art, but sadly many of these are faded. And just round the corner is the Gopeng Museum, which proudly list the history of the town and how it got it's name from a pimply (Mopeng in Chinese) fellow.

Within 1/2 a kilometre we turned off from the local roads onto the busier Federal Route 1. Despite it being hardly shaded, the crisp 23°C morning air made our ride comfortable.

But we will be just riding along this federal road for a short four kilometre stretch before we turn back onto quieter roads.

At Kampung Tekkah, we turned left into Jalan Gopeng to head for Batu Gajah. HS who stopped to buy some water lagged somewhat behind, overshot the junction and SOS called me. Giving him instructions, I waited for him at the kampung and was greeted with a seldom seen sight. Today is Hari Raya Haji (or called Eid al-Adha) During the celebration of this day, a sacrifical rite called Qurbani is carried out.
"It is a demonstration of submission to God, complete obedience to God's will or command. Qurbani calls for the slaughter of one's innate desires by placing the knife of courage and resistance on hatred, jealousy, pride, greed, animosity, love for the world and other such maladies of the heart. This practice can be traced back to Ibrahim (Abraham), who was willing to sacrifice his most precious thing, his son to God. God intervened and informed him that his sacrifice had been accepted, and replaced his son with a sheep. From that day onward, every Eid al-Adha once a year, Muslims around the world slaughter an animal to commemorate Ibrahim's sacrifice and to remind themselves of self-sacrifice." - Wikipedia.

Further down the road, pots and clay-work lined a side of the road. Perak is famous for it's renown pot, the Labu Sayong.

Suddenly ahead we saw our other buddies grouping at the road side; how nice of them to wait for us! But no, they were not waiting for us but was attending to a friend who suffered a small mishap. A rusty screw of PC's bicycle seat had broken causing him to fall; fortunately other that some small cuts and minor abrasions, he was not seriously injured. Being the sporting guy, he asked us not to worry about him and urged us to continue on. He will attend to himself and his bicycle and meet up with us later.

9:30am - We arrived at Kellie's Castle, rode into the car-park just before the ticketing booth and tried to take a group photo there. Oddly, an attendant informed that even if we take photos from the car-park we would have to pay the castle entry fee of RM5/- each. Since we did not have the time to visit and explore the castle, we just made a U-turn and saved some money by taking a group photo from the road side..... Dang! the castle seem so small.
But no worries, there is another car-park at the rear and from there we took a better photo that showed the castle close up!

Further along is the Arulmigi Sri Maha Mariamman Temple which has a uniqueness of it's own: amongst the statues at the temple's roof is that of an English planter - it's that of Mr. Kellie himself. William Kellie Smith sponsored the full cost for building the temple which was put up to protect the devotees from the Spanish Flu pandemic that was spreading throughout the world during the early 1900s. A statue resembling him was carved and placed among other gods at the roof of the temple as a token of appreciation. There are rumors of a secret tunnel leading from the castle to the temple.

Another interesting thing about cycling along the rural routes here are the sights of many Rumah Perak. Malay kampong houses are beautifully built, but the Rumah Perak is at a class of it's own in terms of the intricate detailing of their windows and roof eaves.

Arriving at Batu Gajah, the first place we visited was a short side-lane opposite Marrybrown outlet. Over here can be seen some Batu Gajah street art which conspicuously depicted from top: the towns namesake Gajah (that's Malay for elephants), Kellie's Castle and TT5 Tin Dredge. The TT5 (Tanjung Tualang Tin Dredge #5) is sometimes called the Last Tin Dredge, but actually there's another tin dredge in Dengkil, Selangor.

The town has many new buildings but it is a couple of old timber buildings that caught our eyes; first were a row of blue shop houses (GPS: 4.47066, 101.04213) and then a couple of run-down timber pre-war colonial houses (GPS: 4.46911, 101.04226) at Jalan Pandak Akhat.

Also when in this part of Perak, one should not to miss the Ipoh white coffee. The term ‘White coffee’ has nothing to do with the color in this instance, but is rather a reference to the way the coffee is roasted. Traditionally, Malaysian style ‘black’ coffee roast (Kopi-O) is produced by roasting the beans with sugar, margarine and wheat. ‘White’ coffee, on the other hand, is produced with only margarine and without any sugar, resulting in a less dark roast. There are some coffee producers who also add in broken coconut husks into the roasts to further improve the aroma.

No prizes for guessing which one the held by Joel above is White Coffee.

From the town centre, we rode slightly uphill pass Taman Awam Changkat to head for the colonial administrative centre of Batu Gajah. This is a section which many visitors (including yours truly) missed when visiting the town. In it's tin -mining boom heydays of the late 1800's, Batu Gajah, not Ipoh, was the capital of the Kinta District. The above Edwardian building was the the old courthouse; it is now occupied by the Kinta District and Land Office.

Further down, are several building - this time of Tudorian architecture - which was the Batu Gajah Hospital. It is still in used as a hospital and newer buildings have been added to complement it.

The above animated photo shows an interesting, contrasting mix; one is the long walls of the Batu Gajah Prison and the other a long row of pre-war colonial shop-houses at Pusing, a small town five kilometres away.

Our lunch place in Pusing was Ming Feong Restaurant, an old shop that serves Hakka fare, located at one of those super long colonial houses. With nice Chinese calligraphy hanging from it's wall, it has retained it's old charm.
Curious, we asked the owner how Pusing got its name; back then the road to the town was a dead end without any further development ahead. When visitors reached the town, they will "pusing" (that's Bahasa Malaysia for turn around) and make a U-turn to head back.

I always like these old place, besides retaining it's old feel, much of the food served stays close to their traditional tastes. We started with a dish which is funnily called Puppy duck (Kow Chai Ngap /狗仔鸭) which got its odd name because the creators love dog meat but at the same time love their pet dogs and so created a dish that tasted like dog meat but cooked with a duck. So don't get weird ideas of a mutant dog-duck 🙄.

Anyways, this is a tasty duck stew cooked in a clay-pot which made the duck meat more tender.

Next was the Pumpkin Tofu. I have had a similarly named dish in Ipoh, which was soft Japanese tofu served in a smooth pumpkin puree. This one here is a totally different dish, it uses pre-fried Hakka tofu stir fried into a stew with cuts of pumpkins, the version here is one of the better ones I have had.

Some tasty noodles to fill up the tummy: Salted Fish Beehoon and Self-pulled noodles with Pork Ribs.

A dish that we never miss in a Hakka Restaurant: Hakka kao yoke!
The one here looks more reddish as it had more Five-spiced Powder.

After lunch, more eats at road-side stalls (GPS: 4.49365, 101.0097) at a lane round the corner - desserts of cendul & taufu fah (soybean pudding/豆腐花)!

On our ride back - at the Batu Gajah Clock Tower.

The only serious climb along the route - a ramp over the railway tracks at Batu Gajah.

Back at Gopeng, we collected our cars and drove over to the Gaharu Tea Valley for a visit....

.... and later visited the Disney Avenue in Kampar.

Some photos with my GoPro Hero 8 - Super Wide Angle is great to get everything in but the distortion that comes with it can sometimes be somewhat comical ..... sorry Lamb 🙄.

After refreshing ourselves at our home-stay, it was out to the Kampar Food Centre for dinner of Yee Sang Kai Choke (Raw fish & Poached Chicken Porridge) and Hong Kong style Chee Cheong Fun. The Poached Chicken was so good - soft, tender and juicy - that we ordered seconds!

Many thanks Andrew for a good ride to Batu Gajah and Pusing.

Selamat Malam!
(That's Good Night in Bahasa Malaysia)
Tomorrow we ride to Tanjung Tualang!

Click here for a Relive bird's eye view of the ride from Gopeng>Bt.Gajah>Pusing.
(For more photos of the Day 1 Ride, click here)