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Peninsula Trip Part 2 – Introduction
Day 1: Kuala Lipis, Gua Musang

This is already the third post of the Peninsula Trip Part 2 travelogue, and I’m still writing on day 1. Wah … don’t know when only I’ll be finish writing for the whole trip :p

After about 20 minutes of photography session with Gua Musang limestone hills as background, we departed at 2.11:41pm, heading to Kota Bharu, which is a journey of 182 km. By the way, there’s a KTM train station at Gua Musang; Micol is interested to take a train journey to northern east coast of Peninsula Malaysia.

The route from Gua Musang to Kuala Krai (the mid-way town that we were passing by before reaching Kota Bharu) before the Kelantan River has a few hot landslide spots. Better watch out if driving through this route during year end or early of the year, when the rainfall density is high.

According to our plan, the first activity at Kota Bharu is to visit Wat Pracacinaram (or Wat Prachacinaram) for herbal steam bath. However, none of us was sure about the availability of this service, and we didn’t have any idea about its operating hour as well. All we had was a phone number.

At Kuala Krai, I dialed 019-9812441, contact number of Wat Pracacinaram in-charge that we got from Internet.

Me: 哈喽！请问可以讲华语吗? (halo! Can I speak in Mandarin?)
Siamese: #$#$#$#$#$ (sorry but I couldn’t understand what he was talking)
Me: may I speak in English?
Siamese: #$#$#$#$#$ …. lak diam lak diam (though I was sweating the first part as well, but this time, I caught the last few words – “lak diam lak diam”, which means “6 o’clock 6 o’clock” in Hokkien. Ok now I know, he can speak a bit of Hokkien)
Me: hi! qia meng zi keng si sin beui bo? (Hi! Is this a temple?)
Siamese: si si… (yes yes…)
Me: wu hang zang zui eh si bo? (Can take shower there right?)
Siamese: si si… sauna (yes yes… sauna)
Siamese: lak diam lak diam (6 o’clock 6 o’clock)
(ok… now I can confirm that this temple is, as what we understand, provides steam bath or some sort of sauna facility. And it closes at 6pm)
Me: OK kam siah kam siah (OK thank you thank you)

Kota Bharu, Kelantan

It was almost 5pm when we reached Kota Bharu. Surprisingly, there was quite a heavy traffic in Kota Bharu town. We were stuck in the jam for about 10 minutes, at a route of only 800m long.

OK now, before I write further about our Kota Bharu experience, I have an important guest to introduce here – Ah Fai (or Fai siew). Ah Fai is Paullie’s friend, a Kelantanese. He is very kind to offer us 1-night stay at his bungalow, for all the 14 of us! Wah lao.. not a small gang of us you know.

After meeting up with Ah Fai at the Shell petrol station opposite KB Mall, we crossed Kelantan River from the Kota Bharu new town and proceeded to Wat Pracacinaram (or Wat Prachacinaram) located at Wakaf Bharu. Continue reading ‘Peninsula Trip Part 2 – Day 1: Kota Bharu’