Kampung Chang, A Hari Raya Haji Reccee, 16 March 2000

It was supposed to be a 4 day reccee trip that Francis would like to keep a small group. Reason: Since it is a reccee trip, it is wise to keep a smaller group of riders instead of getting a bunch of mixture of newbies and gung ho knights. Well, we didn't know what would be the condition of the trail that we were going to go. We had no idea whatsoever about the distance, difficulty and rideability of the place that we were going. Instead of spending four days busting our butts to survive in a sometimes not so human friendly environment in the virgin forest, it was shortened to just one day on Hari Raya Haji. ST was not able to take extra leave on Friday due to his job assignment!

We gathered at the Belia Dan Sukan building, which was just opposite to the entrance of USM Penang at 0630 hours. Instead of four people, as mentioned in Francis mail a day before the trip, we had 5 riders that decided to take the ultimate challenge in Bidor, Perak. I was introduced to William Neoh, a new rider who just joined us in our last Sunday ride(which I didn't join FYI!). A tall and handsome chap from somewhere in Penang. Hell, I am straight and he's no beautiful chic from Hua Lien, why should I find more about him? Hehe... Anyway, the surprise came from Lim, who I only met him once and I have never saw him again. It ended up that Sunday was his family day, so cannot ride with the KOTRT lar! Whatever lar. Someone told me before that he couldn't join us because he had to take care of his pregnant wife at home. Well, tough luck for him. I saw him flirting with one young chic at Star Buck, Island Plaza during one Sunday! Anyway, this is a free country. Everybody has their own agenda and priority to take care of right?

We reached the trail head of Kampung Chang, Bidor after spending a delicious half an hour at Fu Sang Dim Sum restaurant(somehow I wonder if dim sum in Fu Sang were really that good? Anyway, it just happens to be personal preference. I find dim sum in the Forum court is as good as the one we had in that place!). After we unloaded our gears and fixed them up, we were all set to go!

Remember, this was a reccee trip. No one knew what kind of stuff were we going to face in front of us. By the time I climbed on my saddle and headed to the trail, I was greeted by one steep climb that led to the sky! My jaw dropped and the rest looked at me! My heart started racing and my inner self started telling me to chicken out, "Come on, don't worth it lar!" "Lazy Rider! Lazy Rider!" Man, you won't believe how tough was the climb unless you try it yourself! There was no smooth pave to help the ride. The trail was full of little channels that I believed were created by running water during the raining days. None of us was able to sit on saddle and continue peddling. We all were forced to come down from our bicycle and push!

It was a bright sunny day. The trail was supposed to be dry. We were wrong! There were mud pond everywhere and guest what? Leeches!! There were leeches all around the places! We just stood idle at one place for couple of seconds and we would start seeing these gruesome tiny creatures crawling towards us! Man, they were fast! Next thing we knew was our shoes were already full of them! Poor William, who was a typical city slicker and never had such experience before. I swore I saw the fear from his eyes when he saw the leeches crawling towards him! Due to the mud pond and thanks to it, I started experienced chain suck again. The ride after the climb wasn't bad except there were tons of leeches and the annoying chain suck that bothered when I needed the cranking to tackle the little slope on the way.

I finally found a running stream to clean the chain and the rear derailuer. It helped little. Why? Because when I was washing the bike, I have to be beware of leeches! You won't know how fast they crawl. My foot touched the ground, 1,2, and 3 seconds later, a 3 inch long brown color thinggy on my shoe! Lesson learned: Bring chain lube and apply soap on my shoe next time!

This was a short but tough trail. Tough is not because of steep uphill climb. It was tough because of leeches and rough terrain. I saw trail washing away due to rain maybe a couple of days before. The soil was the sticky and muddy, which made riding a miserable task. We spent three and half hours to cover a mere seven kilometers(approx.)! We couldn't go further after we reached a folk. At the right, there was a trail leading to river and an animal track that was next to impossible to ride. We tried it and we came back to the trail end with leeches in our shoes! The one at the left was an abandon trail, which was not rideable judging from the growth of grass and trees. We decided to turn back since we couldn't proceed anymore.

The return was a fast and fun ride. I decided to the first to start the journey. It was a fast and thrilling ride! There no smooth down hill slope to go. I always ended up bumping around and risked thrown off from my bike due to the rough terrain. Thanks to my weekday sweating moments at Batu Kawan, I would have kissed the ground. It didn't mean there was no accident. I fell to the ground at one corner that most of the trail was washed away. I was trying to point my Diamondback to cross the six inch wide surface but I did not realize that there was soft soil there. Next thing I knew was my bike went endo and I was thrown off from my bike with my left leg stuck in a hole! Worst of all, because of the twist, my leg started to cramp! It was painful but luckily I managed to grab my Diamondback and myself at place before me and my bike started sliding down to the cliff! I did not realize that I was stepping closer to hell until I sat down at the coffee shop in Bidor and thought about it. There was a deep cliff running down at least 12 feet deep! I was lucky to not to fall into that , or else I will be in hospital for a broken neck or spinal cord now!

We finished the ride at 1400 hours washed ourselves and bikes at the nice cold stream at the waterfall of the trail head. We spent three hours to go in and another hour or so to come out. This is not a trail for newbies. Although it is only a seven kilometer long jungle track under canopy, I think the mention of leeches everywhere and stinky animal odor would sure scare the newbies away! Guys, if you were looking for a place to experience leech bites and tough but short ride, this is the place but don't bring newbies along unless you want to discourage them from riding again!

Stay Tuned!