Day 1, finally. After months and months of dreaming and preparing, we're finally off! Jochen and Sofie dropped by for an early morning coffee, and by 7.30am we were on our way.
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| Ready to go! |
Leaving KL is never the best part of a bike trip, but the traffic today was not too bad at all. I guess the school holidays helped! So we went through the usual Kota Damansara area to get away, found our way through a bit of an industrial zone - where we went against the busy traffic luckily - and got into the kampungs after 1 or 1,5h on our way.
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| Nice peaceful and safe riding on kampung roads |
On our trip to Seremban we did not find too much food, so this time we were better prepared and brought enough with us. No need of course, as now it was the usual Malaysian way: food everywhere!
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| Time for a break, with juice and roti |
Well, we did have some heavy traffic as well. We had to go a few km on the busy main road towards kuala selangor, with lots of lorries. Not your best friends on a bike, but we both found that all the drivers seemed very careful to slow down and overtake only when safe! Totally positively surprised! As much as we could, we followed smaller roads leading us through kampungs, palm and rubber plantations, along rivers - some very smelly, some much nicer - and fields with all kinds of crops.
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| Once you get to the kampungs, the pace of life slows down tremendously, everything feels peaceful and relax - even cars drive slowly and carefully. Buffaloes watch us in surprise; never saw 2 Belgians on a bike I guess?... |
After only 4,5 hours of easy riding, we arrived in kuala selangor already, just after noon. This went well! It was our first time fully packed, and it was not too hard at all. It was a relatively flat ride today, that helped of course.
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| Cycling makes you hungry: lunch at a Chinese noodle shop with temple |
As we really wish to be close to nature this trip, we will be trying to stay in nature parks as often as possible. This time, we checked out the Kuala Selangor Nature Park and decided to stay in one of the wooden chalets. Close to nature indeed - full of monkeys and... mozzies here. Nevertheless, this is our kind of place, this is where we like to be and to some degree, why we do this bike trip!
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| The mud flats of Kuala Selangor Nature Park, great place to watch some wildlife, from egrets (flying away in the back) to mudskippers (try to spot some 😄) |
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| Young red leaves in a green landscape |
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| The majestic beauty of the tropical jungle; I love it! |
That's it for today folks! It's almost time for the next important part of the day: the fantastic Kuala Selangor seafood!!!