We turned into the plantations after the Tanjung Pengelih Secondary School and soon found ourselves struggling up the windy trail of a hill. The view was magnificent though, a reward for our hard work. Of course, with the ups came the downs. I am sure all of us were game for the descends.
It was a wet day and certain sections were pretty slippery, not to mention muddy. In no time, we were all muddy (comparable to Plentong!). I thought the trails, view and lack of mosquitoes made it a better experience on a whole as compared to Plentong. That said, the bumboat ride cost us S$22 for a return trip, so Plentong will be a more economical option to get down and dirty with mud!
The road bikers were attempting to cycle to Desaru and back but the plan was to meet for lunch together in Sungei Rengit at 1pm. Past noon, we attempted to cut out from the trail to the main road but found ourselves cut off by huge ditches and impregnable foliage. After discussing with Vincent, we decided to stick to the original route but as we back-tracked, we heard and then saw a vehicle roar by, obscured partly by dense vegetation. The “view” gave us optimism. We could see other vehicles passing on the road but again and again, a huge ditch blocked us. Even when we managed to get across the ditch, we were stopped by the vegetation. There was no way through. Then, Vincent had a tire puncture and as the others set about to get a new tube in, I tried to make contact with the road bikers. Amazingly, I couldn’t get through to any of them. Later, I heard that they had tried to contact me (even through a public phone) but all communication means had failed.
Civilization meant there was a road somewhere hence we decided to head back to the bird nest farm where we had made a U-turn. In my mind, I knew it was pretty tricky. We had to get out of the plantations and our time was fast running out. In desperation, we crossed a water-logged ditch, forming a human chain to get our bikes across first, then ourselves.
We found ourselves in the bird nest farm (trespassing private property). There was a locked gate in front of us and we were literally fenced-in. No one seemed to be at home but dogs were barking and threatening us as we neared the house. Fortunately, the creatures left us alone when we moved off to the gate. Man-made obstacles now stood in our way. Two of us climbed over first and facilitated in getting the bikes over. Then the others climbed the gate and jumped off to relative safety. I was so glad to be on tarmac again. With help from a couple of kind locals, we managed to make our way back to the main road, emerging some 10km away from Sungei Rengit. It was pretty late to continue to town so we decided to have lunch at the simple food stalls in the area. Fortunately, Shirley managed to get through to Joey and saved me a ride down to Rengit.
Lunch was a really simple affair. Nasi goreng cost no more than RM3 and for me, it was decent enough to stem my hunger. The headwind on the ride back to the jetty was pretty significant but we were taking turns to draft each other and that really helped a lot! =)
We hung around the jetty waiting for our boat and spent most of the time taking pictures. Wen Jie and Joey pulled in ahead of the road bikers, and Joey joined us on the boat back while Wen Jie remained behind to link up with the others. On the boat, it was more photo-taking and just slacking as we made out way back to rainy Singapore.
The ride home was a very wet and cold affair. I was pretty hungry and my vision was blurred out by the rain. It was a relief to get home but washing up was a complete nightmare! I drained four pails of water to get most of the mud off my bike but looking at the Dakar in my room now, anyone would be disgusted at the mud-crusted machine. So much for my efforts to get it cleaned!
- 1 July 2010 – Causeway Point – 10km run
- 4 July 2010 – Sembawang Circuit – 7km run
Total distance: 25km (off-road), 73km (on-road)
Money spent: S$22, RM7
Participants: LSH, NTU Cycling
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