Ride Report #1: Round Island

Since MCO has been lifted there has been an itch to go riding to get rid of the PMS (Parked Motorcycle Syndrome). I have been planning to go for a round island trip since I first got my license to ride. Heck round island trip is even in my motorcycling bucket list.

Bikes used are the usual 2: 2015 Demak D7 Classic and the 2015 Vulcan S. It was an unplanned in the heat of the moment decision. Since Father's Day fell on a Sunday, my friend suggested to go for a round island riding in the morning.

 

This is how the entire trip is supposed to look like. The entire trip is about 70km round island and instead of 2 hours, we took 3 hours plus.

Gearing up before the ride

 

Left house at about 1618hrs and the first pit stop was the petrol station near the house as we had to refuel the Demak.

 

First pit stop of the ride: Feeding the hungry Demak before embarking on a round island ride

 

We rode from Tanjung Bungah to Teluk Bahang dam. We took a slow ride we were in no rush. Rode alongside the Straits of Malacca. Passed by a couple of beautiful views of the sea but sadly we were on the wrong side of the road to stop and take photos. The traffic was also heavy as the government allowed interstate travel and there were lots of out of state cars.

 

Route to Teluk Bahang dam. It took us more than 22 mins as we were enjoying the ride. It is not about the destination but the journey

 

When we reached the dam, there were 2 different groups of bikes parked there. We did a pit stop on our side of the road and was about to leave as there was no nice place to take photos but we noticed one of the group was about to leave so we hung around for awhile. When they left we did a quick U-turn to the other side and took our "we were here" photo of the bikes.

 

Both bikes at the Teluk Bahang dam

 

As we were getting ready to take the photo, the other group of bikers got ready to leave and gave us the wave as they were leaving. After the photo, we decided to continue to Balik Pulau. This was where my friend informed me that her version of round island was until Balik Pulau and turn back to go home. My version of round island is literally round island.

We took another slow ride up and down the mountain to Balik Pulau as there were a lot of blind corners, crazy car drivers who does not keep to their lane while taking the corner and rempits* racing each other up the mountains. One of them even overtook us on a blind corner almost clipping us. There was also some construction work at the Titi Kerawang waterfall where we plan to have another photo pit stop.

Rode to the Balik Pulau town and another group of bikers overtook. Some of them gave us thumbs up and wave which made my friend so excited and happy. This small gesture made her want to go for more riding which is good news for me. A note to those who does regular touring: please give those new riders a nod, wave or thumbs up to encourage them to ride more.

It was at this point that my behind was feeling strained from sitting on the bike and was getting dehydrated. I informed that I needed to pull over to have another pit stop to dehydrate and plan our next course of action as this was her destination. I did not know if she wanted to turn around of to continue on. It was at this pit stop that I did a major mistake of turning off the tracking app.

 

This is where the tracking roughly stopped. Recorded half of the journey which is a shame as when I was reaching home, I was so excited to view the entire journey but I got a shock of my life when I discovered that the app was closed. Silly me

Re-hydrated and decided to carry on, we hopped onto the bikes and continued our journey. Again we took a nice slow ride and when we reached the Teluk Kumbar town, there was massive traffic jam. This is where riding bikes are at the advantage as we manage to cut all the way to the front of the traffic. We were planning to head to Gertak Sanggul for sunset view but due to the heavy traffic and being too early for sunset we decided against it. It will be another trip for another day.

After the jam at Gertak Sanggul the traffic was clear. We had a blast riding the overhead until we reached Greenlane. There we made another pit stop at the Caltex petrol station to rest our heinies and to stretch our legs.This was also where we felt our hands getting the tingling sensation due to the vibration of the motorcycles.

 

4th pit stop of the round island ride. This is where we re-hydrated and complained to each other about our sore heinies and tingling sensation on both our hands

 

  

Bikes taking their well deserved rest after fighting through traffic jams, idiotic drivers and mountain roads

 

It was an uneventful ride back from this point onwards. The entire trip took us about 3 hours. We left house at about 1620hrs and reached home at about 1930hrs. Mentioned earlier in the post there was a minor hiccup with the tracking video at one of our pit stops and only found out about it when we got home. So instead of a full round island video, all I got was a half island video. Kicked myself for doing such a dumb thing but at least there is an excuse to go for another round island trip in the future.

From this short trip, there are a few things which has to be upgraded or changed for better comfort:

1. Better seat or air cushion

2. Gloves with gel padding

 

 

 

Rempits*:a Malaysian term for "an individual who participates in immoral activities and public disturbance with a motorcycle as their main transport, usually involving underbone motorcycles" Source from Wikipedia

Remember to ride safe, be vigilant and keep the rubber side down