Peninsula Trip Part 2 – Day 1: Kuala Lipis, Gua Musang at MyTwentyFive.com

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Peninsula Trip Part 2 – Introduction

After leaving the schooling life, there are not many reasons to wake up early morning at wee hour anymore; except traveling. I woke up on 17th May at 4.30am to give a few morning calls, took an early cold shower, stuffed some last-minute-recalled items into my bag, put on my new Makan Trip blue jersey and admire myself in front of the mirror for a moment (no no no.. the mirror didn’t break), and finally was fetched by Wai Pei to Jason’s house in Kepong – our meeting point.

Jason and Edwin (both also surname Yap, but not brothers la) have prepared a stack of Gardenia breads for us. Yup, a stack of Gardenia breaks packed in the Gardenia plastic bag.

Jason: “ei! got bread… eat la”
Me: “hm.. it’s ok… you all eat. I took breakfast liao” (but I was thinking in my mind: wah lao eh, white breads only a? never mind la, reached Kuala Lipis only I eat)
Jason: “you think these are plain white breads a? its spreaded with tuna a!”
Me: “hahahaha….. paiseh paiseh.. I thought these are plain white breads, that’s why don’t want to eat haha”

Jason and Edwin: as commented by Micol, next time put a lil bit more efforts in “packaging” hehe. I was conned away by the deceiving appearance of the stack of breads.

At Jason’s house before departure, we have also surprised Wai Pei by giving her a brand new Kata A22Q Focus Q camera bag as birthday present, to house her Canon 450D. At the split second, she just looked too stoned, didn’t know what to respond.

Soon, before the sun brightens up the day, we departed from Jason’s house at 6.43:09am, in 3 cars – Ford Ranger by George, Honda Jazz by Edwin and Perodua Myvi by Blake. Heading to the hilly Karak Highway (which proven to be a tough up-hill journey for Blake’s full-load Myvi), we made our way to the very first food stop – Kuala Lipis.

Kuala Lipis, Pahang

Location: Kuala Lipis town center
Arrival time: 8.59:35am
Impression: The town center assembles the feel of a typical small old town with a few rows of old shop houses constructed before World War II. Like many other towns in Peninsula Malaysia, you will know that you’ve entered Kuala Lipis town center when you crossed a river – Sungai Jelai. It’s the kind of significant feel that says “after this river, it’s a bustling town”.

Kuala Lipis Food Stop 1 – Jalan Silang (横街)

GPS Coordinate: N4 11.247 E102 03.299 (show location map)

We went to an ascending sheltered lane with small shops on both sides, and a few sets of staircase accompanying the upward lane. Locals refer to this lane as Jalan Silang in Malay or 横街 in Chinese. Majority of the shops along this lane are selling food. At the middle of the lane, is where our targeted food stop found – Chong Ko Hakka Noodle.

The noodles are homemade by themselves, thus creating an absolute competitive edge, not easily replaced by new market entrants. Though served in simple and plain broth, but still tasty with the springy noodles.

Price: RM2.50 (S), RM3.00 (B), RM0.50 (add more fish balls)

We also order a plate of clams served with 2 sunshine eggs and a plate of fried noodles from a food stall neighboring to Chong Ko Hakka Noodle. It was the first time for most (could be all) of us to eat in combination of clams and sunshine eggs; but, it was indeed a very gooooood combination.

Kuala Lipis Food Stop 2 – Tong Kok Hotel (中国菜馆旅店)

Well, this is a makan trip, we will definitely maximize the variety of foods that we can eat in every place.

Within short walking distance from Jalan Silang, we came to Tong Kok Hotel.

GPS Coordinate: N4 11.192 E102 03.248 (show location map)

Though it’s named Tong Kok Hotel, but at present, it’s very hard for old traditional style hotel to stand in the market anymore without some rebranding and facility up-keeping efforts. However, we were not there for accommodation, but food.

Upstair with 5 or 6 simple rooms, and downstair is housing an authentic kopitiam, especially well known for its half-boiled eggs and toasted breads with homemade kaya. Most interestingly, this kopitiam is still cooking with charcoals!

I must say, the kaya spread is simply irresistible. Nowadays, it’s not easy to find good homemade kaya anymore; it takes time to be made too. One interesting thing to be done when eating half-boiled eggs in a group, is to observe how everyone eats it Surprisingly, this simple food will reveal many interesting sights. Some prefer to break the yolk, some insist to swallow in the yolk in a piece (I am in this category), some take it spoon by spoon like drinking soup, some swallow in the plate-full of yolk and egg white all at once, some will dip their breads in the smashed yolk, and many many more styles.

Gua Musang, Kelantan

All the way from Kuala Lips to Gua Musang, George let me drove his Ford Ranger hahaha. This is a very nice stretch of road to drive his Ranger, as there are many uphill trunks, and many sharp bends stretches. When we’re passing by Taman Negara on our right, the GPS map is showing many warnings for sharp bend ahead. But, this is the fun part for me. hehe… driving at highway with straight stretch not so shiok lo :p

Didn’t I tell you in earlier post that this is also a photography trip? Along the way to Gua Musang, the geeks from The Third Eye couldn’t resist but to call for a stop by the roadside, to take a few pictures with the surrounding limestone hills as background.

At 12.34:35pm, we reached the Gua Musang old town for our lunch.

We saw quite a number of Singapore-registered vehicles around us. When seeing Singapore cars in Melaka is a daily norm, but I was surprised to see them in Gua Musang, northern Peninsula Malaysia! All of the cars were labeled with treasure hunt stickers. They were so semangat, treasure hunt all the way from the very south to the north.

Gua Musang Food Stop – GM Food Garden

GPS Coordinate: N4 52.954 E101 57.899 (show location map)

The lunch plan at GM Food Garden, was to order a rare river fish found in Sungai Pahang – Ikan Tapah. But, unfortunately, there wasn’t any Tapah in stock. Well, it’s rare, and you have to be lucky to have a chance to stumble upon Ikan Tapah river catch.

So, we ended up with steamed Patin fish, curry wild boar, herbal kampung chicken, and other common dishes. Hm… I don’t want to comment too much about the food here, cos’ nothing good, and rather disappointing in fact. The curry wild boar doesn’t have the oomph of curry, herbal kampung chicken has no herbal taste, and the bill came up at the expensive side too.

Photography at Gua Musang

After lunch, we left Gua Musang and continue our convoy to the next destination – Kota Bharu.

Once again, the photography geeks were thrilled with the picturesque landscape of Gua Musang limestone hills. Grey limestone within absolute greenery on a sunny day, this is something that none of the photography enthusiasts would like to miss, if given the opportunity.