The epic journey to Sekeping Serendah

breakfast

The trip started off normally enough – it was supposed to be an overnight stay at a relaxing retreat about an hour away from KL. We had breakfast and bought some groceries for the barbecue at night before driving down…

serenti

…I even managed to drop by my alma mater. πŸ˜‰

Sekeping Serendah
is supposed to be about 10 km after Serenti Serendah. I drove up too far, got some wrong directions from a local and drove into a gravel stretch of road. The website did mention a “narrow road” so I pushed on despite the numerous hazards on the road, nay, gravel path.

stuck

I drove into a deep pothole about 2 kilometers in. I tried to reverse,
failed to get a grip on the sandy gravel and had to get out. We came
out with this idea of putting rocks under the tires for traction and I
managed (with much acceleration and damage to the car) to reverse out…

…straight into another deep pothole. -_-“

ideas

This time I was really stuck and Joyce and Windy came out with a couple of…er, innovative ideas, including jacking up the front of the car (Windy: You have comprehensive car insurance right?) but it was to no avail. We were stuck in the middle of nowhere!

arrive

Thus, I called the retreat and asked for a tow truck. We were stranded there for two hours while waiting for the tow truck guys to come. It was certainly an Experience (TM). πŸ˜‰

tow

The people fixed a length of rope to my car…

out

…and I reversed it out with the help of the 4WD towing me. The strange thing about these kind souls is that they wouldn’t accept payment of any sort. Cheers!

shop

The ordeal gave me cracks on both my rear tires and it was decided that a trip to the tire shop was in order so I won’t burst it driving back, lose control of the car, crash, and kill everyone. Damage for replacing both rear tires: RM 320.

fail

Oh well, at least I got a certificate as a testament to my driving skillz. πŸ˜‰

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32 thoughts on “The epic journey to Sekeping Serendah”

  1. Lol, Windy wrote that.
    The idea of using the word “Shi Bai”, meaning “FAIL” came from Huai Bin himself. Haha…
    Oh my! You should have seen how this comprehensively-insured Vios shook like a rag doll when it was towed out of that evil pothole!
    But that was FUN!

    Reply
  2. luckily you had won some money in genting to pay off the repairs and damage… but waiting for 2 hours in the middle of nowhere is really a torture…
    haha…your driving skill is not yet qualified for that cert… cuz its a big car and u wouldn’t have guess that there would be a pit hole

    Reply
  3. KY: Windy wrote that. πŸ™‚ Very FAIL. I was given the wrong directions and my mistake was pushing on despite the fact that the road was in no condition to be driven on.
    Joyce: I think I will run up a very hefty bill when the car goes to the workshop. The suspension is seriously messed up now and there are unusual noises from the chassis. It was a fun experience, the two hours passed by surprisingly quick. Great trip! πŸ™‚
    Jac: Thanks!
    e: I don’t like 4WD/SUVs. I don’t know why. Perhaps it’s coz it’s so common in Sibu that I never did like those cars. I prefer sedan style cars. πŸ™‚
    cindy khor: Yeah. The winnings from the Genting trip are fully used up but at least we had fun. πŸ™‚
    I’m not sure the car enjoyed it very much though. :S
    Yeah, I didn’t know there were so many pot holes in that gravel road. It’s not even a road! I’m not even sure what the path is, but it’s definitely not the way to Sekeping Serendah. Hazards abound. There be monsters. πŸ˜‰
    choonie: Haha! I don’t think that would work very well. I’ll probably be mowing people down like GTA and end up in prison. πŸ˜‰
    I don’t really like 4WDs. It’s just my personal preference. πŸ™‚

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  4. Look, tell us the amount when you got the bill from the workshop, you hear me? No matter how, I’ll pay some. Deal! And that’s a statement. πŸ™‚

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  5. Joyce: Don’t worry about it. It’s fine. πŸ™‚
    It was my decision to drive down the insane road. Haha!
    We had fun, that’s all that matters.
    I would appreciate a ride when my car is in the workshop though. πŸ˜‰

    Reply
  6. HB, I am not sure if this will actually help, but just something I learnt from experience. I was stuck in the sandy land in Santubong years ago. Then one kind soul came to the rescue. He asked for my rubber mat in the car, and put it behind the front wheel that was stucked. It was just too easy for the wheel to reverse without having it to sink deeper into the sand pool. It probably will work with the stones too. Somehow, I dont think this will be your only time to be be stucked again. πŸ˜›

    Reply
  7. ive been an avid reader from the castitas days and i can honestly say, u really get into rough stuff with your car.
    be like any other sarawakian would do. its time to get a 4wd. hehehe
    pot holes? no problem, can speed through
    trees? no problem just ram through
    a stuck vios? no problem can help pull out :p
    looking forward for more interesting posts from you.long live sixthseal!!
    cheers.

    Reply
  8. Looking at your photos reminded me of my trip to Hawaii. Went with friends around the island Ohau. He wanted to see pineapple fields and took this path which we all thought was short cut. Ended up stuck in a ditch. Lucky we all came out of car and push it out ditch. Never again being stupid tourists.

    Reply
  9. fish fish: Hey, that’s a really neat trick! Thanks for the tip, I shall keep that in mind. Hmm…I wish I tried that when we got stuck. You’re right, it would have worked with gravel too.
    Joyce: Thanks! πŸ™‚
    I have been looking at the map, postmorten to see where I went wrong. It seems that I drove up the road INTO Serenti. It kinda explains the poor state of the road, people get shuffled in by trucks, which causes potholes and mini trenches like the ones we got stuck in…twice. πŸ™‚
    Myhorng: Haha! Thanks, but I’m not really into SUVs. πŸ™‚
    stupidhead8: Greetings! πŸ™‚
    Thank you for reading, I miss my castitas posts and I never did do any backups on that.
    Yeah, my car has been through a lot, the previous one, even more. πŸ˜‰
    Cheers and be well, my friend. πŸ™‚
    imantulen: Unfortunately, there is no GPRS/EDGE connection there. I use Google Maps + GPS instead of a dedicated GPS program.
    I was concerned that we were stuck there WITHOUT a signal coz we haven’t been getting one since going up (there is no signal in Sekeping Serendah), but thankfully there were two bars on the signal strength indicator so I could call out. We would be fucked if there wasn’t a line…I don’t think it was 2 km, probably about 3-5km in.
    Michael (Mike): Getting stuck in a ditch must really suck. Luckily ours was a bit of a smaller trench type thing. πŸ™‚
    Fleece Master: Yup, Uncle Lim giveth and he taketh away. πŸ˜‰
    Paul: I’m not. I’m just…adventurous. πŸ˜‰
    pm: Yes dude, it’s me. I’m still alive. I went off the radar to go to a rehab center for about a year, which was why I went MIA.
    I haven’t touched the stuff ever since, and you’re right, I feel much better and more importantly, SANER now.
    Congrats bro for kicking the habit! πŸ™‚

    Reply
  10. All I can say is that the women who travelled with you can be counted on in any emergency. Haha. They at least had the brains to come with innovative ideas instead of piling the blame on everyone.
    Love to have them for travel companions anytime mate!

    Reply
  11. Well at least you had good company in that difficult time, can laugh about it. Better than being stuck alone. Should have taken video of the event. Very kind of the tow guy not to accept payment.

    Reply
  12. janelgrace: Yup, going to a retreat so dressing casual. πŸ˜‰
    Darren: Haha! The road wasn’t that bad, it was the trucks going through that caused a lot of potholes and trenches to develop…which was how my car got stuck.
    eiling: I thought that was the road into Serendah. -_-!
    It turns out that it wasn’t…
    Ediη₯ž: Yeah, and this morning the front mud guard fell off. πŸ™
    naruto: Yeah, my two coworkers are great! It was a fun trip, it’s more about the company than the destination any day. πŸ™‚
    Jeff: Yeah, having company beats being stuck alone. I only had my dSLR and that doesn’t take videos. I only remembered Windy has a digicam much later. I was sunburnt from the heat and couldn’t really think.
    We headed straight for the swimming pool as soon as we reached the resort.

    Reply
  13. Omg,that pic of you doing the ‘chinese squat’ is really ugly.Thats very uncool!Don’t ever do that again.

    Reply
  14. ShaolinTiger: Yeah, but we managed to get there! πŸ™‚
    No chinese style squatting please!: It’s intentional. πŸ™‚
    It goes with the Chinese characters, which means FAIL. Haha!
    Vivien: It’s a nice place eh? We drove down on Sunday morning and came back yesterday. πŸ™‚

    Reply

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