Gypsy 28 catamaran building (Sept 2009)

The last few weeks I had been busy building the furnitures inside the cabin. It is not too difficult but I discovered that even though I am the son of a carpenter/furniture maker Ivcannot cut straight and square. This means a lot of time is spent fine tuning the squares. The inside of the cabin actually does not require to be glassed but I feel it looks and feels better so I have decided to glass the marine ply with 300 gm cloth and epoxy. The pieces are then glued together using epoxy. A lot of clamps are required when joining the pieces. I have in my pocession only 14 clamps of various sizes.Most nights I put in about an hour and a half after dinner and having fed my dogs. A rechargeable head lamp is a must at night. I try to avoid using the power tools as much as possible at night. I do most of the marking, measuring and planning at night.The actual cutting is normally done in day light..hopefully I can make a more accurate cut.This is the port side of the cuddy. It houses the cushioned seat which has a large storage space behind. These bits of furniture helps to strengthens the boat structurally. This is the starboard side of the cuddy. It is supposed to house the fridge and the cooker. However I may choose to put other items here. Notice the use of a long clamp to get a better joint between the pieces of wood. A car jack is also extremely useful as it can help to force the floorboard up slightly thus closing any gaps.For budding boat builders a good grinder is very important as it is being used almost on a daily basis. Most corners require a bit of fairing.The back of the cabin is being built here.It has to be framed using red meranti 2 in by 1 inch wood.The back of the cuddy is finally up. Now there is a" door" which I will have to use to enter the cabin.

Cycling up to Fraser's Hill (4100 ft)

Fraser's Hill is a hill station located about 90 km from Kuala Lumpur. I have been told by Min Chee that the trail leading up to Fraser's Hill is one of the best riding trail in the world. In fact it is a hidden jewel for budding cyclist. This has been confirmed by many of his oversea friends who rides up frequently. I have to attend a wedding dinner in Kl on Saturday night so I decided to come a day earlier so that I can do the ride on Saturday morning (12 Sept 09). I took along my Dahon Cadenza 26 inch folding bike for the ride. These folding bikes are really handy...you can see that it is neatly tucked behind the last row of seats on my Nissan Serena.
My RV with Min Chee was at 0700 hrs at the Shell petrol station in Bandar Utama area. He came along with his Volvo and took us to Kuala Kubu Bahru about 50 km away. This is the normal starting point for people going up to Fraser's Hill.

Of course we must have a good breakfast before our ride. Food in Kuala Kubu Bahru was cheap and very tasty. Soon after breakfast we were on our way. we have to ensure that we reach the Gap by 1100 hrs so that we do not have to wait. As the road from the Gap to Fraser's Hill is very narrow, you can only go up during the odd hours and down during even hours. I counted not more than 20 cars along the way so the road is quiet most of the time. As we were ascending and coupled with the shades from the big trees along the road it feels quite cool. The temperature was between 24 C to about 22 C at the top. It is like riding in an air cond room so it was very pleasant. The twist and turns of the road makes it interesting too. There were a few waterfalls along the way. This picture shows one of the larger one.At the Gap we were a few minutes early so it was an opportunity to give the tired legs a chance to rest. When it was time to go we waited another 10 minutes before we continued our ride up as we did not want to inhale vehicle exhaust in such fresh air!. From the Gap to the top of the hill is 8 km . The road is narrow and we had some steep gradients to work the heart up to its max permissible heart beat!So here we are at the top of Fraser's Hill. We had some hot tea in a coffee shop and started our return leg.

This is the MCA building located just at the entrance of Fraser's hill. When we were scouts we used to stay at a community hall i this building. It looked the same as itwas 35 years ago

After the ride up, the trip downhill was most enjoyable. We coasted down for almost 30 km using the stored potential energy of our uphill climb. yes....it is indeed a jewel . I had enjoyed the ride very much and this will not be the last trip but the beginning of more trips to come. Thank you again Min Chee.

A Cycling Trip To Kg Air Jerneh

Aha..another day OFF from flying. I have just purchased another Dahon Folding bike and it has not completed its 1000 km running in. I need to ascertain certain parameters for the bike..things like Vno (Velocity Normal ops), Vne (Velocity nver exceed), gear changing capabilities etc. I have also got to check any squeeking noise esp on hill climbs. With that in mind, I went for a 55 km riding circuit. Start from my house, go on main road to Kemasik, turn left to Air Jernih and from there go by the inland road to Kg Ibok and back home. I have my GPS logger with me and the route taken is downloaded to Google mapThe thing I like best about morning rides is the cool air and the natural misty conditions on the road. Just got to make sure that the rear red flashing light of the bike is on!This is my Dahon Cadenza 26 inch wheel folding bike. The bike is having a rest while the owner went inside the bush to answer a call of nature.The Cadenza is the 2009 model and has 16 speeds. My bike is fitted with slim road tyres but it can adapt easily to fat off road tyes.From Kemasik I made a right turn to Air Jernih.Immediately we have this snaky sign. It is cycling haven..winding and undulating road. The hills are not steep but just nice for a work out.This is the only photograph I took of myself. The camera was held in my right hand to capture this shot.Soon I arrived at Air Jerneh town. Actually it is just two rows of shop houses and it looks like a cowboy town. Along this row of shops is a coffee shop that sells good breakfast. There is no menu and patrons to the shop have to accept the chef's choice for the day!For today we have shredded chicken porridge with century egg. I had the porridge and a cup of coffee and it cost me RM4.10. Not bad..reasonably good food.HER restaurant serves excellent wild boar curry.It was one of our Hash House Harrier's favourite joint.After the coffee break, the journey continued inland to Kg Ibok.A traditional village house in Kg Ibok.I had always wanted to take a photo of the name of this shop.It has a very funny name. Translated in Chinese it literally means LEE FxxK LIM! What a name!
I was home before 1100 hrs and had a good rest before I comence the second part of my weekend...boat building.

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.