Monday, 18 July 2016

A different route through Perlis - a shaman , the small lake and a giant donut


 When Penang is crawling with traffic and people , we sometimes go further up north and  explore the quiet countryside in Perlis .
There are many routes you can take besides the regular North South expressway . Because of the vast rice fields , you can go into a town one way and exit another way via another thoroughfare .

Boring is what you make of it and have we had some stories to tell each time we made it through the smallest state in Malaysia .

We have been to Wang Kelian , walked across to Thailand and back without a passport . That was amazing . You can't do that anymore mind you . 
Driven through the massive sugarcane plantations in Chuping . Beautiful then , not so now .
Taken the old highway all the way up to Kangar .....Once during a normal morning where the farmers had just come out for breakfast ( very quaint experience ) another during the muslim fasting month ( which we never want to do again as the entire state was almost devoid of people and other conveniences therefore soooooo creeepy !!!!) .

This time however , we took a different route






Cutting out from the NSE into Jitra town , we took the roundabout at 12 o'clock , turned right and headed all the way towards Arau .
Almost fainted when I spotted a witchdoctor's sign along the way . The Bomoh Patah can supposedly cure broken bones with the help of supernatural beings that well , have to reside in your body in order for that to happen ! 
* silent scream *

That aside , I was pretty much taken by the surprisingly clean roads , waterways and town , as well as the abundance of sweetcorn sold by farmers on the side of the roads .

This structure below is replica of a Bunga Emas . Once upon a time when the region was under the rule of the Siamese Kingdom , gold had to be sourced , moulded into leaf form and presented to the Siamese King .






Once past Arau , we went off the normal road and ended up slightly panicky on a strictly one vehicle at a time, in Berseri , after kepoh-cying our way into an agricultural area which cultivated Bamboo Shoots called Rebung Madu as a cash crop .
I'll never look at bamboo thickets the same way again . 

Thinking we were more clever than google maps , we ended up thinking we had found Timah Tasoh Dam at this location , when in fact it was not .





Turned out , this was a small but well maintained park for picnicing as well as angling , called Tasik Melati .
Oh well , it's been forever since I've stepped near a lotus pond that looks so natural as well as stood next to reeds that rise to frame the mirrored limestone cliff  .
So I'm not that annoyed . However , a storm seems to be brewing and that makes us want to leave before we completely cannot navigate our way out .





Outside the lake , we found a little cafe with the biggest donuts I have ever seen or eaten . D' Melati Bakery does not look inviting however once we walked in and looked around , we giggled .
Big as a steak , this not so little donut made our little trip , totally unforgettable . 
Pictures were taken with wide eyed amusement and before long, we were soon on our way out .




....by cutting through to Changloon , past rubber estates and some ranch like homes , where we saw this monster mouthed cave with scary jagged edged teeth like opening !
Yeah ...out through another route !

And how was your weekend ? 

Location : Perlis 

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