Day 22 :Mersing - Air Papan - Padang Endau - K.Rompin

Date : March 24th, 2009
Distance travelled : 79 km
Time taken : 4.50 hours

After yesterday's tough ride, we decided to take it easy and not head out too far to our next destination. We checked our map and decided that Kuala Rompin seemed like a nice place to stop :o)

Yes, we really were here!!

Boats parked along the river

Part of Mersing town...

In the morning, we walked around the town, just taking a look at how Mersing has boomed. It was the transfer point for those who wanted to go to Tioman island. Next time, we'll go to Tioman.....:o)

Mak decided to have a hair cut as he felt his hair was growing like wild grasses! Don't know why he was complaining as his hair was already short!! Anyway, after cutting, he looked more like a recruit from Korea....hahaha! Well, my fringe was getting long too so I asked the barber whether he could just trim my fringe a bit. Guess it must be his first time cutting for a girl but it turned out ok :o) Mak was so tickled by the fact that this was my first time sitting in a barber's chair....oh well, there's always a first for everything!! He said I looked "cute" with my new hair cut! hummpph!!

We left Mersing after having our lunch. The road leading to Air Papan was pretty scenic but had a bit of rolling hills. There were a few of Mak's "friends" hanging around by the roadside :o) There was one huge one just sitting by the roadside, chilling! Cool man!!

On our way out....with the Mersing sign behind on the hill

Nice scenic road with wide road shoulders :o)

and more of this to come...

Heading towards Padang Endau

Yes Mak, I can see that you are very happy with your new haircut! So cooling, right??

River mouth of the Endau river

We reached Kuala Rompin around 6pm and decided to check out places to stay. We cycled to the beach area but found out that there wasn't any places to stay there. We took a rest and had some "keropok lekor" and ice kacang to quench our thirst! We figured it should be easy to find a room on this weekday night but boy, were we in for a surprise!

The prawn must be representing this town....

this must be a place for fishing marlins

Our bikes taking a breather by the beach :o)

After cycling out to the town, we found out that all the hotels were fully booked! What? On a Tuesday night?? We ended up going out of Rompin town for one last try at another hotel. Alas, they too were full! We were contemplating camping out at the last hotel when the reception lady told us that there was one more resort...it was called Rompin River Chalet and it was about 15 minutes away from their hotel. Since there were also 3 other guys looking for a room, we told them about it and asked them to try it since they had a car. We asked them to please call us should there be any more rooms available as we didn't want to cycle in the dark if they were full too!

Finally, they called us and said yes, there were rooms available! Yahoo! We didn't have to camp after all :o) We set out in the dark onto the main road and managed to find the sign that said "Rompin River Chalet" and turned into a dark and lonely road! It was a really interesting experience as we cycled further in. All was in total darkness except for our bike lights! I looked up to the sky and saw beautiful stars twinkling down! I told Mak to have a look but he obviously didn't bother hehehe....Suddenly, our friend started letting out some expletives and I asked him why, what did he see? There were a group of cows in front of us and he was afraid of them!!Poor guy!! ! I told him that they were only harmless cows and when I rang my bell, they all moved to the side of the road :o) He said they were big and scary!! It' s ok, we all have our little phobias and cows were one of his :o)

We cycled further until we came to the end of the tarred road and had to veer off to the right to where the lights were further down. We really didn't know what to expect when we reached there. But lo and behold, we landed right smack into a open air Chinese seafood restaurant!! How crazy was that??

We also found out that the restaurant owner did have a room for us!! Cheap and nice!! Yay!! Man, it was pretty amazing how we stumbled upon this little treasure! That night, we had the best prawn and fish dish ever!! Sorry, we forgot to take pictures of them as we were too busy enjoying the food!!

Highly recommended to those interested in deep sea fishing and good seafood!!