Today we rode from Taiping to Kuala Gula, and then on to Kuala Kurau. If you don't know these places that's perfectly normal, we also didn't before today... Kuala Gula is at the edge of th Matang Mangrove Forest Reserve, a nice resort at the riverside but we got there much too early to stay - and to visit the forest reserve it's better to go to Kuala Sepetang it seems. From Kuala Gula there is not much you can do to explore the reserve, So we had our coffee instead 😋 in a nice shelter near the river. We saw lots and lots of birds, and... an otter!!!
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| Yes, we went the wrong way, but this was our reward! |
It was the first time today we did some extra involuntary km's... We followed some small roads to get out of Taiping, and for some reason there was a rail line that was not yet on Google maps nor our other maps! So at some point, we were at a dead-end road and had to turn back. No worries, some locals pointed us to a shortcut, a beautiful trail with a small passing under a low railway bridge. And with that, we did about 10km more than foreseen. No problem at all - they were beautiful km's anyway!
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| Fish farms on the river near Kuala Kurau; an eyesore or not? Much more sustainable than open fishing in any case... |
We ended up in Kuala Kurau today, a fishing village at the Sungai Kurau river mouth. Yin at Sojourn recommended a homestay here, a place called
Ikan Kurau. It's a little bit more expensive than the budget we try to stick to, but well worth it, another warm recommendation! Other than that it was such a cheap day: breakfast 5MYR, lunch 12MYR, dinner 17MYR! Really, once you get out of the cities, Malaysia is still really cheap.
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| View from the super terrace at the back of the homestay |
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| View from the terrace, to the side now
Kuala Kurau is a fishing town, very Chinese. All housing lies at the riverside and at the back of nearly each house, there is a at least one fishing boat. There are also many fish farms in the river, no idea which fish they farm there though... We cycled a bit through the town and the surroundings, nice, interesting to see all the activity and quite beautiful to see in some places. But also, a lot of litter and very polluted, especially a lot of the smaller waterways are very filthy... Too many people, too little awareness...
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| A nice one to end with, picture from the first floor. We'll go through the roof here! |