Denison: Master Rider
Eugene: Tail Rider
Frenchbiker: Newbie Rider
Janus: Photo and cam operator
We decided to leave and ride at night so it would be cooler with less traffic as we had to ride the NS Hwy all the way from Tuas to the Thai border.
We met a Petronas GP at 9pm, Tuas was damn busy with all the JB commuters going back home, and of course just a handful of customs booth were open.
Denison, gave us a Police radio, so we could at least talk to each others while riding. I had to work out a system so I would not compromise one earphone side of my Ipod.
One of Eugene's buddy met us at the Petronas GP and gave us some pointers as to where to exit and stop during this night ride.
We also decided to stop anytime someone would feel like to, for any reasons, no questions asked.
After 1 hour of quenching our thirst and loading on energy food, we finally decided to hit the road for our longest stretch to the next stop of 280km.
We were not tired at the beginning of the night so we covered the longest stretch in 2 hours at very respectable 140km/h average speed.
We gassed up, stretched our legs, got on the magic Red Bull and on our way we went, trying this time to make it all the way to Ipoh.
10 min into the 2nd leg, came down the tricky part, the only exit not to miss during our entire ride, exit 214 to bypass Kuala Lumpur.
Eugene's friend had given us precisely this exit number.
Guess what, we missed it and exited at exit 218, the one we were told not to take.
We ended up in the middle of nowhere, behind KLIA, but eventually one lost soul, brave enough to talk to 4 riders put us back on the right track.
The night ride was nice, cool, no traffic, but we could not make it to Ipoh, as fatigue started to kick in and we decided to stop every 200km.
We ended up stopping far more than that. But it was fine. Safety was paramount.
The 3rd stop was the hardest, Eugene and Denison were sleeping on the Shell station floor.
And , yes, Eugene can sleep while smoking, he is that dedicated!!
After a hearty "not home made" noodle soup, we left, hoping this time to make it all the way to the border.
After 20 min of ride, Denison signaled us he was getting sleepy, so we stopped on the shoulder and screamed our fatigue out.
Eugene could not believe that I was not sleepy...
Watch your back while you sleep, you may have a Eugene behind you.
Lack of sleep will point you the wrong way...
For some reason the last leg at dawn was the fastest, reaching speed way above 200km/h, I guess we all wanted the ride to be over as fast as possible.
One more stop and we topped up on the Malaysian side before the Thai border as we did not want to use the Thai lower grade gas.
Denison is proudly showing me how to use Ringgits. Don't blame him, he had no sleep!!
WE MADE IT!!
We finally, reached the border after 10h30 of trip time, probably 7 hours of effective riding, so we did stop a lot.
The border cross was hell, very busy, it took us one hour to get our passport stamped and our bike registered.
We had only 80km to Hat Yai, but it started to rain heavily and the road was really dangerous with traffic and poor visibility. It took us another hour to finally reach our final rest stop. But we were soaked, we had to hand dry all our boots, helmets and gear with the bathroom hair dryer.
Being Eugene's organization we had not hotel booked. It happened to be a holiday week end, so the our first choice the Novotel was sold out.
Denison asked for the Presidential Suite but it would have been with four beds, so we all said no.
We ended up across the street in the Lee Garden hotel, a dump, but OK for 2 nights, as long as I did not have to share a room with Eugene, I was fine with any rooms.
Hat Yai has some great joints to eat, cheap shopping at the market, and the fact that all Thai there spoke Hokkien helped the Singapore dudes to communicate efficiently, the Frenchbiker was of course left out of any conversations!!
Then after a long day came my "initiation" ride, organized by Father Eugene.
Being the newbie in this group, i had to ask permission to the master rider to be accepted within.
Ms Seah, would you take me as your fellow rider in your Adventurer group?
The Thai security guard of the hotel obliged to be my witness!!
After 2 fun days, we had to do the long return journey back to Singapore.
Some of us were still tired.
We were hit 3 times by the central Malaysia monsoon, and we were drenched 3 times.
The Ipoh mountain area was very nice, as we did not get to see it on the northbound since we were riding at night.
At least the return trip was unfamiliar to me.
We made very poor progress due to the rain all the way to Ipoh, but after that it cleared nicely and we made it all the way to KL pretty quickly.
After gassing up, I lost my riding buddies as it was very difficult to stay together in this heavy KL traffic and Denison's gauge betrayed him. So he had to stop way earlier than Shell GP.
Anyway, we all ended up at Shell GP safely, the 3 guys a few minutes behind me at Tuas, which was hell to cross on Sunday evening.
It was a fantastic adventure, great time with great buddies.
Absolutely no incidents. We came back all, better and closer friends.
I would like to do it again but in the dry season.
Total distance covered back and forth Tuas-Tuas, 1860 Kms.
