Canoeing Down Sg Jengai and Cycling Back

I have been told that there are a lot of good fishing grounds for Ikan Kelah and Sebarau in Sg Jengai. Sg Jengai is a small tributary of Sg Dungun. This weekend my comrade in crime Cheong is in town so we decided to have a go at canoeing down Sg Jengai to explore for ourselves the luboks and to also to have a nice relaxing trip going with the current down the river. There was only one problem......how are we going to come back to the launching point 18 km away after we have reached Kuala Jengai? To solve this problem, I took along my Dahon Mu 8 folding bike and canoed with the bike on the canoe. At the end of the trip I will unfold the bike and cycle the 18 km back to my Ford Ranger and then drive the truck to Kuala Jengai to pick up the canoe.

It had been raining every evening for the past few days and the river is not clear but a little yellowish due to the rain. This is where the river intersects Km 19 Jalan Pasir Raja and we decided to launch our canoe from this point. The bridge is quite high over the river so we had to look for a place to go down.A track through this orchard leads us to the side of the river. There were a lot of ripe mangosteens in this orchard and we helped ourselves to a fruitful feast before the start of the journey.Thank You, Mr Farmer....The canoe and other supplies had to be carried about 200 meters over some bushes to the launching point. This place is infested with leeches and several of them feasted on our blood.The Dahon folding bike had to be carried to the canoe as well.This is the starting point of our canoeing trip. By the time we started it was almost 1230 hrs. The total river journey is about 12 km. and I anticipated we shall be taking about 2.5 hrs to reach Kuala Jengai.Notice the blood from the leech bites on my leg. The trouble with leech bites are the itch that comes along with it and they often leave a mark on the body.Along most of the way we have big trees on the river banks and this provides us with shade. In fact it was quite cooling as well.There are some lovely sandy beaches along the river bank. We saw a lot of wild boar prints on the sand. of course there are a lot of monkeys monkeying up on the trees above.The only obstacle that we encountered along the way was a damaged raft blocking the river. We had to squeeze through a small opening under a fallen tree to continue the journey.It looks like the kampong folks have better family bonding. Here the whole family including mama and the kids goes fishing when papa decides to go fishing. This rarely happens to town folks!On one of these sandy and shady beaches we stopped for a dip in the river and cooked ourselves a simple lunch. The ambience was nice and the maggie mee with tuna tasted very good. Music was provided by an orchestra of birds. By 1500 hrs we arrived at Kuala Jengai.

After this I unfolded my dahon bike and had a nice ride for 18 km along the undulating road back to wher I parked my car. Within an hour I was back in Kuala Jengai and that ends our trip.Malaysia has a lot of beautiful places to be explored. Would you like to join me for the next trip?

Progress on building My Gypsy 28 catamaran

fTime seems to fly..The last 30 days I managed to assemble up the cuddy sides of the Gypsy.I then made the furnitures for the cabin. With only a dozen G clamps,the framing of the 1 by 1 wood to the panels had to be done slowly. Next,a layer of 300 gm glass cloth with epoxy is applied to the floor of the cuddy. I can see that my glass laying skills are improving but still there is a lot of rooms for improvement to make a piece of perfect laminate! Never mind..what I have done will not show in the finished boat because the cushions and furnitures will go on top of the glass!It took me a few days to build a very important component of the catamaran..the central mast beam. For that I selected the best wood available..the Kunin tropical hardwood.All the joints are epoxied and a generous coating is applied to the internal part of the beam. When the catamaran is completed, this beam supports the whole weight of the 11.5 meters mast and the forces generated during sailing so i am extra cautious and careful when I built this beam. The beam is then attached to the floor of the catamaran as shown in this photo.

I am also making the cuddy back which has a door opening to enter the cuddy.It is getting interesting as I can see the bits of puzzle joing up into a picture. I hope to complete the cuddy in 2 months time before the monsoon sets in.

Ultralight Flying (1983 to 1985)

I looked back at some old photo albums and found some photos of me flying microlights so I feel obligated to write something about this sport as I was one of the pioneers in the sport.

Ultralights were a craze in the early 1980s. The Americans call these tube and dacron chain saw engined aircraft ultralights and the British called them microlights. Technically, these flying machines must be foot launchable (yes..you have to run with the machine to take off and land while running .Only done during the certification process), not more than 254 lbs and a stalling speed of not more than 20 kts. The max speed should not be more than 55 kts. These were the figures as far as I can remember in 1983. Given these figures there were a lot of innovative designs..some safe and some not so safe! A lot of ultralight magazines reporters ended up as being "test pilots" for the brand new machines that they evaluate for the magazine readers and quite a few ended 6 ft under ground!

In Malaysia ultralights were brought in by Capt Moid an ex commando officer who made a lot of money teaching civilians sports parachuting. Under the company name of Para Aviation Sdn Bhd, he brought in 2 twin seater Eipper Quicksilver MX2 and 2 Single seater MX. Albert Anthony and Capt Hussein of DCA went to the US for the initial training. In 1983 I was doing a staff job just prior to leaving the Air Force and I was based in Kinrara, KL. Being a guy who cannot sit still on ground, I volunteered to be an instructor for them. Some training was given and I was given an instructor's licence for ultralights. My licence number was 004 . The other instructors were Capt Hussein, Albert Anthony, Capt Nordin (MHS pilot, later became FOM) and Low KC. From this small group of us we trained a lot of pilots and instructors.

The original flight park was gazetted in Bangi, Selangor. After a year, I formed up a company called Micro Air Services to operate a flight park in Pandermaran, Port Klang. My partners were Mej Johnny Loo and Wong Kim Hoong and we had a two seater and a single seater Quicksilver. The aircraft was registered under 9M WYF (Me) and 9M WKH (Kim Hoong). It was fun flying these flying lawn mowers....low and slow but the 2 stoke Rotax engines were inverted and we had a lot of engine malfunctions in the air and on the ground. Due to its slow stalling speed and low inertia a forced landing is almost an uneventful event! We need a few hundred feet of cleared area for landing. Of course for brakes we had to use our shoes to provide friction with the ground, Flintstone style....on the average our shoes last us a month only!

My wife always followed me and ended up as a ballast for a lot of ferry flights.

1983 was a bad year. The economy was bad. On National day the RMAF could not afford to do a fly past with their jets and helicopters . We volunteered and flew Ultralights with 50 ft Gasser Banners over the city of KL. A very scrry experience to fly these machines over the city. BUT we were young, dashing and never think much. I would not do it again now even if I were to be paid. We never got a cent from that flight!

It was very cheap to fly those days. We charged RM 700 for a new comer to start flying until he goes solo. After that he flies on the single seater at the rate of RM1 per minute. A total of 25 hrs is required for a Microlight pilot's licence (Group D PPL). I think today the ultralight operators charge ten times more. THAT was one of the reasons that our company went bankrupt 2 years later!

An Mx single seater. the only instrument that we had were an Air Speed indicator which is the plastic tube with a small diaphram .

Decision to Build a Gypsy 28 Catamaran

It has been said that building a boat is like childbirth..there is going to be a lot of pain for the pleasure! I have been toying with the idea of building my ideal catamaran for a long time. In fact this idea mooted out after meeting several people who have built their own boats.My group of water minded ex Air Force friends had also shown interest(all of us are boat owners and sailors). And amongst us , Robin Tan, had already DESIGNED and BUILT his own 24 catamaran , a RobinShark24 many years ago. He is a wizard with boat building and knows his stuff when it comes to composite materials. And he has agreed help us if we go ahead with our project.Spending hundreds of hours on the internet and communicating with complete strangers and asking a lot of questions on forums makes it look like a viable project.

Some of my personal considerations for building my own catamaran were:

* Cost saving..I can have a bigger , better and a new boat for the same amount of money as buying a smaller used boat
* Knowing the boat so that when repairs are needed in some remote islands I can attend to it
* I don't have to take out one lump sum of money at once.
* Keeps me and my mind busy for a while!
* Pride and a sense of PERSONAL achievement for the project.

I had narrowed down my boat to a Woods designed Gypsy 28 catamaran after reading a review of the boat on Practical Boat Owners magazine. The thing that attracted at first was this boat is a much bigger and more comfortable version of my existing boat , a Strider 24 catamaran AND Richard Woods designs good catamarans that are meant specifically for the homebuilders.

I bought a study plan for the catamaran and drove many hundreds of miles to meet up with my "water minded" group. Various people have different ideas..some wanted to make the Gypsy into a Speedy Gypsy (fast on power), some wanted to add many inches here and there!This went on for a few years.

Finally Richard Woods announced that he will be increasing the prices of his plans by 30 %. This is it....I must buy the plans before paying 30% more and so somewhere end of last year I bought the complete Gypsy 28 Budget Ocean Going Catamaran Complete Building Plans and within a few minutes the e copy was emailed to me. I spent many many hours starring at the plans and material list. Getting boat building material is never easy. Even marine plywood I had to spend a few months sourcing them. Luckily we have the powerful tool called the Internet and sourcing for materials is a little easier.

I have decided to build the cabin first. In fact for this catamaran you can build either the hulls first or the cabin first and later at the end of the project the two hulls and the cabin are assembled together.

Malaysia exports Meranti marine plywood but since there is no local market it is very difficult to buy a small quantity. Their normal answer is how many containers do you need? It is such a shame. Through a brother in law of mine I managed to get BS1088 standard marine plywood for the project.

To play it safe, I boiled many hours and cooled a small piece of the marine plywood when it arrived. This process was repeated several times to ensure that the plywood does not delaminate.Next came the drawing and cutting of the bulkheads. I do not have a big space for storing the plywood . I made a 4 ft by 8 ft flat panel using polyester and PU foam. This was a practice session so that when it comes to making the hulls I will have some experience. PU foam cannot be used for boat building. In the real boat I will have to use PVC foam which has to be imported from Australia.Eventually I built a 20 ft by 20 ft canvas shed in a corner of my house. By then I had completed quite a few pieces of the panels required to build the cabin. As I have a full time flying job and some small business to run, I have to work at nights sometimes. As you can see, even my dogs seems to be excited about the new boat!

A lot of my friend wanted to know how long it will take me to complete the boat.Richard Woods, the designer says it will take about 1200 hrs to build this catamaran but I have spoken to people who has taken 3000 hours for the catamaran. And this does not include the time spent starring at the plans and wondering what to do. It will probably take about 3 years for me BUT I have not givent hem the starting date yet! Maybe from today ........

If you want to know more about this catamaran go to:

http://www.sailingcatamarans.com/gypsy.htm

Gambang to Sg Lembing Eco Heritage Ride 2009

Today we had a wonderful mountain bike riding trip. The weather was cloudy and most of the route went through shaded forest.About 200 cyclist turned out for this ride. The local Kuantan based cyclist assembled in Wisma Belia Kuantan to be ferried to the start point, while the outstation cyclist stayed in the new Gambang Water World Resort.


The RMAF assisted by providing 3 tonner transport to ferry the bicycles to the start point which is at the new Gambang Water World Resort. It has been many many years since I went on a 3 tonner.
The riders were driven in a separate 3 tonner. The ride was bumpy and all the riders were busy chatting loudly. It was almost like a scene from Alex Haley's book "ROOTS" on the over loaded 3 tonner truck.

At the Gambang Water World resort we met up with the other cyclist who came from other parts of the country.

This uncle is one of the "senior"rider. He is 64 years young and is a fast rider too. Shit...I have a lot of people calling me Uncle as well. Do I look that old?The siren for the start was sounded at 0910 hrs. The first 4.3 km was on the old trunk road and there were Police Escort. After 4.3 km we made a right turn and it was trail riding all the way until Sg Lembing. At first it was Palm oil estate but after 5km of undulating terrain we were greeted by the primary jungle. Hill climbing started straight away and after another 2 km we crossed the first river. No problem as it was quite shallow All in all we had to cross 5 rivers . One of it was quite swift and I had to carry my bike so that it does not get carried away by the current. BUT the rivers were crystal clear and cold.. This trail is interesting because the climbs were alternated with some gentle descending. I thought this is going to be an easy outing but the Grand Final climb was at about 18 km. Almost 45 degrees slopes UP and winding and twisting almost like no end! A few of the marshalls were on 250 cc scramblers and they had problem going up all the way. It was slippery as it was raining yesterday. This climb was along and tough one. Pushing the bike is the only way to go but because of the slope the (Mg Sine 45 degrees...Newton's law) downwards force of the bike was a real burden! The scramblers had to make 2 stops to cool their engines. Forget the Hilux rescue vehicles. they backtracked and entered from Sg Lembing to the other side of the slope.Then came the long downhill stretch. It was steep and there were a lot of ruts and erosion. Quite a few cyclist fell and chicken out at the steepest stretch..I got down and push the bike.At the bottom of this 3 km stretch was a stream again. This time a lot of riders took a few minutes to have a nice dip and to give the bike a wash as the tyres were full of mud by then.Time to go again and this time the terrain was more manageable. We began to see signs of civilisation again..Power line on top, more cleared areas again.At the 28 km mark the old faithful Milo van was here waiting for us. I took a few cups and then left for the next 7 km home to Sg Lembing. This time it was through oil palm estates again. Not so hot as the trees provided some shadesSoon we arrived at the village and as you can see from the photo it is a beautiful sight. Can you see the suspension bridge in the picture? We had to ride across the bridge and another bridge before we reached the town. I consider riding on these two suspension bridges to be the highlight of the trip. It brings back memories of the time when we had to walk on top of the Berlin Wall at Castle Camp during our obstacle courses training when I was a Boy Scout and I used to have cold feet! I am scared of heights! The trip took about 3.5 hours. At the end of it a good lunch was served. Participants were given a nice T shirt each.

My observation is that most of the rider were from the 30 to 50 age group. Where are all the young riders? Those from school going age to 25 years old.....Are they still playing Warcraft over the internet?

A visit by my old scout from 10th KL ......

In 1974 and 1975 when I was doing my Sixth form in MBS KL, I was the Assistant Scoutmaster. The scoutmaster was a school teacher who always had other more important things to do so I was given a free hand to run both the Boy Scouts (Form 1 and 2) and Senoir Scouts (Form 3 and 4). Being moulded by scouting since my younger days it is now my turn to mould out more young boys to experience scouting. I was blessed to have a very good bunch of boys under me.....The friendship and brotherhood that we had developed held us together all these while. Incidentally, these are the boys who gave me the nickname Python Joe, which I take great pride in upholding! I got a call last two days from one of my old boys, Teck Meng saying that he is in the East Coast on vacation and would like to meet up. Sure, I said for Teck Meng is now staying in Tenesse , USA and we have not met almost since I left school!That is a longggg while ago!

I have with me a good colection of old photos and when I brought these photos out he almost cannot recognise himself!His family was with him and his son could not even pick him out from any of these pictures.Most of our weekends were spent in the jungles and rivers near to KL...Bukit Belacan, Ulu Kancing, Klang Gates and Bukit Tinggi were some of our favourite spots.

All of these small boys are now in their late 40s and most of them are professionals doing extremely well. We did not have tution those days. Instead our tution was scouting.

Of course I had to cook him a dinner to prove my worth that my Master Cook badge was not a "Kopi O" one! I am really very happy that they took the effort to pop in. The whole night was spent bull shitting about Good Old Times!