Monday, May 14, 2012

Canoeing down Sg Nipah

My friend Martin Lee is around this weekend and I so happened to be off from flying this weekend too.He is quite willing to follow me around for some adventures and also to have some exercise.We pedalled our bicycle to Air Jerneh for breakfast yesterday and today we are going to paddle down SgNipah in Ulu Kemaman.   I have been eyeing to get a Perodua Rusa to be converted to a solo campervan and this is a good chance for me to test out the van in rough terrain. So I planned an outing to Sungai Nipah and from there we will canoe down to the village of Ayer Putih(White Water Village)
We drove about 12 km to a small tributary to launch my canoe. This area is in the vicinity of Jeram Gajah(Elephant Rapids). The water here is crystal clear . The rapids here are not too technical but having a novice co pilot means some extra work. in the first rapid we had to dismount from the canoe and push a little. I was careless and I hurt my right leg when I banged against a rock whilst trying to manoeuvre the canoe.
After the bad stretch of rapids the journey was more pleasant. The current was about 4 to 5 Km per hour and with a bit of paddling we were doing a little faster than that. However, the river meanders a lot so the straight line distance covered is very little.
This is Martin Lee, normally a weekend husband in Kuala Lumpur
I believe he is having a reasonably good time here.
By the time we arrived Air Puteh village I was supposed to ride my mountain bike to the launching point to collect the van. Dark clouds were looming every where so i tried my old trick of stopping a motorist and paying him some money to take me up to the van. This time I paid RM 15 to a villager to send me up .All in all we had a wonderful wseekend and this was ended with a good dinner in River View Restaurant.