Shorter ride out from home to RV point, about 2 km.
Hopefully early start and end early, with decent distance.
These were the two reasons that steered me towards Cactus Inn, to join Wa Cycles' Sunday offroad ride. I rode from home at 7.15am, to be on time for their normal 7.30am ride.
Riders from Larkin, Pasir Gudang, Singapore, New Zealand, England, Italy, and of course, Seri Alam got together. Okay, the ones from foreign countries are expats. What a big crowd, seems like a micro jamboree. That makes the third reason - meeting new people. Well, there were (now) familiar faces too, such as Ganesan, Sue, Ah Meng, Nick, Joe (and
Apparently the ride lead, Steven, and a bunch of riders had gone in much earlier for a 5km 'warm-up'. So the rest of us waited at the parking lot.
Steven rallied everyone and gave a briefing prior to the ride. Front liners, middle riders and sweepers were identified. Tom, his son Tim and I volunteered for the headcount. I thought it would be around 30 or so, but there were 47. I made a re-count, and it was confirmed.
At 8.15am, we went in towards Plentong. Started from the side of Cactus Inn, went down towards jongkang-jongket. I was surprised to see the familiar small bump right at the end of the downhill was now cleared, good for a 4x4 to get across. We went up through singletrack lalang and another long zigzag uphill before turning for a long downhill at bukit Long Long. That's a first for me, down Long Long. A very long, enjoyable downhill (needless to say, it's a long uphill in reverse).
As usual, we bumped into other riders as well. We met with people from Cyclemotion (with EG, Lond and Helmy too) at Plentong. When we parted ways, Joe, Hairul and I were puzzled as one rider not belonging to our group was happily riding along. I asked him, are you with Cyclemotion? He said no, but from YMCA. Duh! Okay, I must've asked the wrong question. So I asked him, are you in the correct group? Then only he noticed. So he backtracked to join his original group.
:)
After that, the following trail brought us to parts in Plentong. Some of singletracks and routes are my first. I can say that I have never ridden through it before this. That shows how much Plentong has to offer. The number of riders in JB keeps increasing, and I bet Plentong can still cater for all of us.
On the way back, a group of the tailing riders got lost. Including myself. I know that we were near to the lake at the palm oil plantation entry. We backtracked and stopped at a T-junction. Hairul and Ah Meng went further to the right to look for directions, while Sue called Steven and Loo for help. I called EG for directions, and eventually we went with the right hand trun towards Sungai Daud and scaled up Bukit Panjang. We met with Loo on the way, meaning that we were on the right track. Anyway, my thanks to EG (and Lond) for guiding the way.
Up on the pylon, we met with Glen and Joe. Together, we journeyed back to CP2 of Epic 2010 where we met with Jason and another chap, on their bikes looking for us. Steven was there too. Much to my surprise, Cactus Inn is actually not very far from that point.
Well, this serves as a strong notice for me to collect and have a good sense of direction to at least get back from any point in the trails. As a post mortem, I think the reason why the trails in Plentong seems like a puzzle to me is down to a few factors. One, there was always a ride leader and I followed blindly. Two, the points in the trails are familiar, but I don't know where it actually is. And, most importantly which way from there would lead to where. There might be other factors, but I won't bore you with those.
Total ride was 32 km, and my ride ended at 12.30. Not too bad at all considering I reached home before 1.00pm. I had fun, especially on the 'new' trails. More so because of new acquaintances.
Photos are here.
Thanks for coming over.
Have a good one.
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