Friday, December 14, 2012

Bicycle Tour in Holland (2nd day)

Next morning when I woke up breakfast was ready at my door at precisely 0800 hrs. It is breakfast in the room. While waiting for the sky to light up, i decided to take it easy in the room. Today the distance by bicycle path to Den Haag is about 40 km so it will be about 3 hours on the road.
It looks wet on the road as it had been raining. On closer inspection I saw that ice had been formed on the body of the car parked outside. No problem..the room here is cosy and the wi fi is fast. i will just drag on ...
Within the next hour I noticed it had started snowing and the streets were white just like Christmas morning! I know today is going to be a no cycling day.
I left the bed and breakfast at about 1100 hrs and cycled slowly towards the village train station. the streets were wet and it was very cols...possibly about 0 C so it is no fun to do a long ride.
The bicycles parked on the outside were collecting snow and ice.
Now do I look like a local Dutch man? This  is the train station and it cost me 3.5 Euro to go to Den Haag
Bicycles are the king of machines in Holland. Train or bus also no problem. just take it along.
After about 45 mins I reached Den Haag. Den Haag is famous because this is where the Queen stays. It is the third largest city in Holland so it is rather busy.


Using the GPS guidance  I cycled towards the Stayokay  Hostel in Den Haag.  Stayokay is nothing to shout about. I want it cheap so no complaints. But is is very CLEAN and everyone here is so friendly

  
 After checking in I decided to cycle around the town . it is still drizzling and is still very cold but I am not going to let the weather stop me from going out. First stop was to China Town to look for some roasted pork. Looking at the roasted pork and of course the 12 Euro price I decided to go for Dutch food again.The roasted pork will have to wait a few more days!
  

The commercial centre.


I was back in the room before 5 pm and I did not know what time I fell asleep. 


Saturday, December 8, 2012

Bicycle Tour of South Holland in Winter Again..(1st Day)

 I took an early morning flight from Marseille , France to Amsterdam. My sim session had finished at midnight the previous day so I hardly had more than 3 hours of sleep. At Marseille I was caught by the one bag rule on economy class(I knew I should have gone by TGV, the fast train!) and was slapped with a 55 Euro penalty. I had to bite the bullet to pay or I have to leave one of my bags behind! My baggage weight was only 21 kilos so weight was not a problem as I always travel light.
Upon arrival Amsterdam was the one million dollar question..shall I ride or shall I take a train to Gouda my destination. There was a slight drizzle and the temperature was about 4C...not too bad so I decided to ride. The distance is slightly less than 45 km but I am not sure about the distance using the bicycle path. In Holland you must use the bicycle path and these paths link the whole country.

Exiting from Schipol airport was not that easy. i had my Garmin 60CSX GPS with me but it was showing me all over the place. Turn left at 30 m, Turn right at 50 m.....real headache but eventually I found the bicycle path.






 After a few kilos towards the general direction of Rotterdam I came across a lift that was made just to carry the cyclist and bicycle up to an overhead crossing!

Come out from the lift and just continue to ride across the highway.

Huge acreage of farm land were being plowed to plant the winter crop..maybe it is potatoes but I am not sure. this route is quite isolated with very few people around. it must have been because of the weather as it was getting quite cold.

Boats! yes..they are just in the canals along the road side. Sometimes the boats are higher than the road!
 There are numerous signs along the way. They showed directions to all the places except to my destination GOUDA!
 I met this elderly dutch couple on electric assisted bicycles and they spoke English so I asked them for directions to Gouda. The main problem is the bicycle path does not follow the highway but goes along the villages(which makes it interesting but confusing). This couple had been to Langkawi for their holidays.

Finally I arrived at GOUDA a pretty small town that is famous for Cheese .
 I felt very hungry so I made a stop at a food stall to have a kebab. this shop is run by an Iraqi who had served the army during the war.
 With the help of my GPS I arrived at the doorstep of my booked Bed and Breakfast..Ann B and B in Gouda.
 I was happy with the quality of the room that I had and the whole area is very clean.
 Not too bad.. i did 47 km for the first day.There was a lot of stopping along the way so I probably average about 12 km per hr although I rode at about 20 km per hr.. Then again, riding an empty bicycle and riding with a 7 kilo haversack in slight rain and 3 C is different!
 Gouda is a beautiful village. This is the town council and it was built about 200 years ago.
  Since it is winter and temp at night is about0C, there are very few people on the street.

I went to bed early after a meal of burgers and chips



Thursday, November 15, 2012

Wild Pig hunting with Crossbow


After I left the Air Force I found civilian life to be a bit dull. I always feel a little insecure without a weapon. One of the first thing to do is to buy a piece of land to be made to an orchard and apply for a gun. The process is a long one and in the meantime I came to know that crossbows can be used to hunt big game. this is the result of reading too much Sports afield and Outdoor Life! I got my first crossbow, a PSE Starfire and within a few days "connected" my first game in my farm which at that time was still jungle.



Actually to be honest there were quite a few of these animals going after the young banana trees that I had just planted. To play safe I made a small platform at the edge of my farm and put in some bait too. Being creatures of habit, they always go by the same path and come at about the same time so that makes life a little easy for me.

The fun from the shooting is only a few minutes but the work afterwards are many hours! In the end the meat gets distributed to friends. I will always get the bites from the ticks!. 

Sometimes I sell the meat to my fellow Mat Salleh pilot / engineer friends and when there is a party coming up I have to work a little harder. The older pilots those days gave me the nickname RAMBO WONG because of my mode of hunting.

I have many more stories on hunting with various weapons and means so stay tuned in!


Friday, October 26, 2012

Squeezing in ....... .....

The two hulls are on it's side. I had tried to glass the front of the hulls by various means but was not successful.  I even tried to train a small sized person to squeeze in to apply the two layers of glass. No it does not work.



You can see for yourself how confined the area is. 
  

With the hull on it's side, no sweat. Just lie down and work.


It can be quite tough too. Ah...one of the joys of boat building..you get to suffer and enjoy at the same time!


It took only a few evenings to get the job done on both the hulls



When it was time for us to right the hulls again I only had two other friends. By now I know the hulls are light and we righted it easily.

Monday, September 17, 2012

Hiking up Gunong Nuang 4898 ft


My friends Martin Lee, Doc , Yeow and gang were training for their China Hiking trip in October. It was part of their fitness test for the trip. Since this trip coincided with my off days I took the opportunity to go down to KL for this trip and at the same time to pay a visit to our son Alwin at Monash Sunway. Gunong Nuang is the highest hill in Selangor. One can go up to the peak either from Ulu Langat or from Janda Baik. For our trip we started from Janda Baik

There was a heavy downpour when we arrived at our RV at the Mac Donald's restaurant in Genting Sempah. The twelve of us lingered around at the nearby food court while we waited for the rain to stop. Some of us were already making plans to proceed to Raub for a good makan ifthe rain does not stop by 1000hrs. Well the controllers upstairs decided that we should go hiking and the rain stopped at about 0830 rs. We then proceeded to our starting point at Janda Baik. The first river crossing was at the starting point so all of us wadded across the river barefooted and put on our shoes on the other side of the stream.

Doc, Yeow, ST Chan and Kok Meng were in high spirits at the starting point.


The trail started at a small vegetable farm. The track was wide and clear.


20 minutes later we arrived at an Orang Asli settlement.

We had a short rest here to wait for the slower trekkers to catch up.


 
Shirley and her family came along. She is a very fit climber.


Soon after the settlement the trail narrows down.


after about an hour of trekking we came to a waterfall. Here we had to take off our boots again to cross the river.


The rocks just below the summit

Hiking on a ridge before the rocks


And this is the view from the top of Gunong Nuang


Martin just before reaching the top.

At the summit another group from Raub arrived . They were using the trail from Ulu Langat so it was rather crowded at the top....now who says it can be lonely at the top!


It was a good trip. At the end of the trip for being good patients who took the doctor's advice on doing more exercises we were given a treat by Doc at a good restaurant in Bukit Tinggi.