Ipoh 2023 - Ipoh Cave Temples Sam Poh Tong (Part 1)

Next day favourite breakfast! Kai Si Hor Fun and White Coffee. Kai Si Hor Fun is an Ipoh dish, and its like a cross between Penang Hokkien Mee and Penang Koay Teow Teng, and I love it. I even eat this dish in Penang, paying almost 8rm a bowl for it. Here, it's around 7rm 2 years ago. So I make sure I always have a bowl here.  

After breakfast, we were going temple cave exploring! Something I've always wanted to do in Ipoh since they are famous for it. I've only ever been to one cave temple in Ipoh before, and that was during schooling days when I went to Ipoh for a state chess competition. I had a paranormal experience there, and have been avoiding cave temples in Ipoh since. I can't quite remember which cave temple I went to, but I'm pretty sure it's the one nearer to Tanjung Rambutan with cliff side stairs going up and down the temple. Anyway, we were going to be visiting 3 caves this time, all clustered together. 

The very first one was Sam Poh Tong, which translated to Three Treasure Cave. Actually all the three caves are on the same road, and this one is the inner most cave. So we took a Grab taxi there from town, and hope we will be able to get a taxi ride back when we were done. The thing about Malaysia is, sometimes the attraction sights are so far away with no good public transport taking you there. So sometimes it is actually cheaper for me to travel overseas than it is to travel in Malaysia, cause the transport cost itself would be high if I have to take a Grab taxi everywhere!

Upon arriving at the first cave entrance, you instantly felt like maybe you are no longer in Malaysia. Everything looked so Chinese here that this could have well been a temple in China. The limestone background with the pretty tress and green pond in front also add to the atmosphere. Instantly you also felt calm cause you are now away from the town and roads and civilisation. 

So this was just the outside of the temple, the tall traditional gate was actually the entrance into the temple. The multi-storey building outside would probably be accommodation area for the care takers and monks of the place. Later we found that there is also a vegetarian cafe here, but it was closed when we were there. 

A different angle of the outside of the temple. There seems to be a smaller temple complex further down. I think this was the prayer hall.

Making our way towards the entrance. Although the whole front looked so grand, the actual entrance was just a narrow walkway. This actually made sense cause this was after all, a cave temple. So this was the entrance into the cave itself! How cool is that.

Once inside, everything changes again. Temperature dropped since you're now inside the cave. You also had to adjust your eyesight to the dark, There are lightings inside the cave, but where there are no Gods or Idols, or no pathway, there it remains path. There are halls and pathway inside, even stairs. 

Yeah. somehow the Gods here looked much more majestic. Almost as if they are in their natural habitat!

The halls here are odd shaped cause it depends largely on the same of the caves. The altars are built into the cave walls as well. And lightings hung mid air. It's dry inside, but some area you could hear water dripping, or damn and wet corners. 

Some icon paintings on the wall with old tiles. 

Ipoh 2023 - Ipoh Traditional Dinner at Hoong Tho Restaurant

Time of dinner. I wanted to go back to an old traditional shop in Ipoh to eat this dying dish again called Hoong Tho Noodles. The shop itself has the same name, and it's always packed during dining hours. So we went early. My cousin's husband took me here before and I love the food there and wanted to share the experience with my husband. 

The whole shop is so retro vibe, with lots of chinese wordings everywhere.  We made our order. My husband didn't like the place instantly because the dish he wanted was out of stock..... But I still went ahead to order the dish I wanted and enjoyed myself.

The traditional noodle. You could also find a lighter version of this in Penang Tho Yuan Restaurant. But here, the taste is a lot more earthy. I recently met another lady who knows and like this dish, so I also shared this restaurant with her. Like I said, it's a dying dish and would soon disappear from this earth once people who cooked it retired, and the younger generations forgot about it. 

I ended my meal with a nice caramel. I don't know what is the big deal with caramel in Ipoh. I can make these at home too. But since I'm here, I just wanted to have one. Given an option between these and soya bean curd, I would prefer to go with the bean curd cause I don't know how to make bean curd at home :P

Ipoh 2023 - Ipoh Vibe

There is something just very calming about Ipoh. There really isn't much to do here, not much to see. Yet you find yourself always coming back for the vibe. To wander the alleys, to stop by for some coffee, to just slow down in life. So that was what we did. I took my husband mural hunting, but with not much plan in mind. 

So we just wander, by foot. There are hidden art and charm almost everywhere.

Murals can be found in cheesy alley ways. After coming back from Balkan, I think murals are so much better than graffiti. Balkan's beautiful town and city were just covered in so much graffiti that it was quite a sore eye to the whole place. And the people there were just so tired of it, leaving them outside their houses and work area. I wish their government could clean it up a bit, and have harsher laws against it, cause it's such a beautiful place.

Saw the above cute sign in one of the concubine lane. Ipoh ladies are famous for being beautiful, with their fair skin and thin figure. I guess their guys too? These days, it's hard to tell in Malaysia cause there are so many foreigners living here now. You see some tall good looking guy in a cafe, and when they speak, you realised they are Koreans working in Penang .....

A cute cafe entrance that is so unique and Japanese. It does really makes you want to walk in and be enchanted by it's secrets. But although I've always walked pass it on my visit to Ipoh, I've never walked in before. I'm not much of a cafe person when I travel, cause cafe prices are usually high. I am more of the road side coffee shop kind of traveller.

In every touristy country, there is always one cheesy alley filled with these rainbow colour deco. Usually it's umbrella. Here it looked like shredded flag? Perhaps due to the rain, or we were travelling on weekdays, the street was rather empty and nice to walk on. 

Even the roads were drawn on with cute cartoon or various retro games! Is Mario considered retro games?

I'm pretty sure Pac Man is considered a retro game! 

Lovely faded mural shown a slice of life in the past. It's fun looking at all these murals. I like those that shows life of the place, instead of the more modern or abstract kinda mural. The fact that these are slightly faded adds to it's charm. 

Nearer to new town, just next to a coffee shop, we found some newer murals of coffee by the alley.

I guess like Penang, people in Ipoh are also very proud of their town.

Nearer to new town there is a cluster of back alley that is filled with more modern murals. I've visited the place before but didn't venture in far since it was a deserted back alley. But this time, with my husband with me, I ventured deeper to find some cool murals. 

Love the vibrant colour of the mural with the mouldy backdrop of the old buildings.

Oh yeah, that cheese rainbow coloured umbrella alley! Found it!

A selfie of our walk. Love the red Volkswagen behind me. It really fits in to the themed of old town Ipoh.

Ipoh 2023 - Ipoh Shops and Tea Time

After a short 2 hours or so ride, we arrived at Ipoh with gloomy clouds. Same as Penang, Ipoh has beautiful colonial buildings that are in need of some maintenance. I hope things look better when I visit it in one week's time, so that when I blog about it again, I have more positive report to document!

 

This is the first time my husband is visiting Ipoh! (not counting the time the bus we took from Singapore to Penang where the engine overheated and we ended up in front of the Ipoh Police Station somewhere.....). So we took the heritage trail route and walked ourselves to our hotel. We were staying at Cititel Express Ipoh. We also booked the same hotel for our 2025 trip since it is in a convenient location. Basically I hate paying for taxi rides no matter where I am. For this trip of 4 days 3 night, I planned for us to spend 1 day cave temple exploring, and 1 day museum exploring. 

The rain did pour down in the afternoon, which made the often crowded alley of Concubine Lane almost empty. Rainy day sights were also quite calming and pretty, although pretty wet. Luckily the rain did not last long. 

I took my husband to wander around the old town. It isn't hard to explore everything on foot. I love looking at the old shops and houses. It's colours are always so contrasting. Old town Ipoh area is also pretty Chinese, although Little India is also around the area.

There are just so much Chinese wordings on the shops and houses. Everything looked so retro it's almost charming.

For some reason, I've never walked inside the Ipoh Park or Kinta River area before. They always looked so worn out, empty, or with some weird people inside. Perhaps I can try venturing into them on my upcoming trip since I will be having two men with me? 

Since we had a lot of time, we went in to some of the shops to take a look around. 

I also love these retro but new blinds you can find in Ipoh. These are becoming quite rare in Penang  now. You can see old dusty ones in Taiping, but here in Ipoh, they all looked so new and pretty. Every one is unique, and retro. Love them. 

There were a lot of traditional shops around along some of the deserted streets on this rainy afternoon. Since there weren't much to do, we went in to explore. Above is a dry good store that sells dry seafood and chinese cooking stuff. They looked pretty alien to me too! But my husband was pretty at home with the ingredients here. He bought some preserved vegetables that is used in some Hakka dishes.

They also sold a lot of pork products, as do most chinese shops......

A lot of fermented stuff too, mainly fermented soya beans and bean curd. I don't really like these, but I do like Japanase and Korean version of the same things (miso and gochuchang, samyang etc). I felt pretty much like a traitor here cause I didn't know how to cook with these chinese version of seasoning, but felt pretty at home with the Japanese and Korean version.

I don't know what are these. I took a photo of it cause they looked so gross! Hahaha. Fish? Lizard? Bats?

With nothing much to do on our first day, we went to have our tea at Nam Heong Kopitiam. The classic thing to order here is egg tart and white coffee. I'm pretty sure there are other things on the menu as well, but these two were my go-to tea time snack here. Basically, just order white coffee anywhere in Ipoh and it will probably been good.

I mean, look at that! Just by looking at the photo makes me drool. I can't wait to go back! 

Ipoh 2023 - Penang to Ipoh via Ferry and Train Ride

 

Ah, beautiful Penang. Will be going back soon, and will be making a short trip to Ipoh again with my friend and hubby, to meet another family of my hubby's friends there. When my friend asked me what is there to do and eat in Ipoh, I wanted to share with him my previous trip to Ipoh 2 years back, but when I checked this blog, I realised I haven't wrote about it yet! So here I am, scrambling to write everything up before I leave for Penang tomorrow. Yes, I could have started a few days ago, but it has not been a great week for me so far..... I've been addicted to my phone, games, and British talkshow...... But I am writing now! I need to complete 18 post before I leave! Hahahahahaha. The madness.....

So 2 years back, for our anniversary, I decided to bring my husband on a trip to Ipoh to show him around. I also wanted to explore more of that sleepy old town. We decided to spend 4 days and 3 nights there, and booked our trip to Ipoh via train. So on that faithful morning, as usual, it was a slow bus ride down to Georgetown area. We stopped around one stop from the jetty, so that we could admire the old heritage buildings in town while walking to the jetty itself.

The facade of the old colonial buildings were majestic, but seriously in need of some maintenance. But it was a beautiful day as we made our way to the ferry jetty.

Look at that sky and water! Plus the lovely colourful ferry. A great day for travel! The ferry ride from Penang Island to Butterworth cost 2rm per person per trip, and you could just buy the ticket online on the day itself. It's just a 15minutes ride, but do cater to some wait time for the ferry, especially if you are travelling on non-peak period.

It was a clear day, so we could see some lovely sight on our ride. Above the view of Penang as a boat sail by. The tall buildings in front of the hills as the background always made Penang looked so much bigger than it truly is.

We could also see Penang Bridge in the distance. This is the first bridge. The second bridge is further south and can't be seen from the ferry. But if you take a flight in or out of Penang, you could usually see one or both bridge on a clear day, or night.

The contrast between Penang Island and Penang Mainland is pretty stark, even when you compare it to the ferry, jetty and sights. When you see this blue ferry parked near the mainland jetty, you know you've reached the mainland. (It might not be there anymore when this post published as these photos were taken 2 years back).

Walking from the Jetty to the Train Station took around 10 to 15minutes. Everything is connected now, and sheltered. We saw some cute poster along the way. There is also Penang Sentral where you could stop by for a bite or some shopping. That's where you'll find the bus terminal as well. I read that an upgrade has been scheduled for the bus terminal as well as train station. Penang Train Station is quite a sorry sight as compared to KL or JB Train Station. So I'm looking forward to the upgrade, especially once they finally connect Penang with Singapore via the ETS trains. 

For this 2023 trip, I decided to try the Komuter Utara train to Ipoh. It cost 60% cheaper than an ETS train, and you have to book the ticket only on the day itself. Meaning no advance booking, and no assigned seats. But there are more frequent trains, and if you travel during non-peak period, there are always seats. But during period, you may be stuck with standing for 2 hours.....Or wait for a few trains before you could actually get into one!

So basically, it's like an MRT metro service.  There are no cafe or toilet on the train. It's basically a long distance public transport train.

And the seats also reflect it. For our trip in 2025, we have booked the ETS train both ways to ensure we got seats and travel in comfort, cause end of November is holiday season, and we didn't want to take any chances since we will be meeting up with friends in Ipoh itself.