Road Trip to Taiping, Malaysia

I love road trips! While I was living in the USA, I have taken a few road trips with different groups of friends, and I have wonderful memories of those trips because when you are trapped in a vehicle for hours and hours, you get to bond with your travel mates...or end up hating them! But for me, it has always been a good one.

So when a wedding invitation came through calling us to Taiping, I jumped at the opportunity of going on a road trip! I've never been to Taiping and heard many wonderful things about that little town. I was ecstatic!

Taiping is about 3 to 4 hours' drive from Kuala Lumpur. It is one of the oldest towns in the country and garnered many "firsts" such as the first mosque in the country, the first hill resort in the country, the first museum in the country, the first English school in the country...As such, it is a common sight to see old colonial buildings and street signs with old English street names.

Colonial buildings around town centre

When we were driving around near the mountains, it reminds me of Penang with the trees, the mountains and the huge sparsely situated bungalow homes. It would be nice to have a house there for retirement, facing the beautiful mountains. Yes, I LOVE mountains - they give me a sense of serenity and stability. I love staring at them...not hiking them...

The scenery around town centre. Notice the mountain at the back view. That is the famous Maxwell Hill which houses the first hill resort in the country.

So what is there to do in Taiping? For city dwellers who can't live without their Starbucks coffee, there is the newly opened Central Taiping which has the first cinema in town and many other firsts, I believe.

For nature lover, there are the options of hiking the Maxwell Hill, strolling around the beautiful Taiping Lake Garden just down the foothill of Maxwell, Night Safari or the Taiping Zoo.

I've visited some really nice zoos around the world. So I wasn't really excited about this Taiping Zoo simply because I don't have any confidence in Malaysia when it comes to maintenance.

Surprisingly, I have to admit, the Taiping Zoo is not bad by Malaysian standard. At least the surrounding is clean, the animals are alive and don't look like they have been starved for the last two years. The variety of animals are limited but I'm quite impressed nonetheless. So thumb's up for the zoo!

Visitors can take the tram that goes around the zoo for free. It's the perfect way to look around especially when it is a hot day and you just don't feel like walking under the sun.

Now on to my favourite part of any trip - FOOD! A place with no good food does not attract me; a place with good food will make me re-visit again and again.

As we were only there for the weekend and it was for a wedding, we didn't have much time to venture out searching for food. On the day before we left, we went to the famous bazaar where there is a huge food centre and had our breakfast, lunch and tea there - all at the same time!

The crowded bazaar.

The leng chee kang that is apparently famous. The ingredient is slightly different from what I am used to with the additions of jelly and sago but without the other items which I don't know what they are called.

The nearby town of Ipoh is famous for its Hor Fun. I supposed Taiping gets the secret too for being a near neighbour.

Now this is one dish that I was not impressed with - fried hor fun. I was expecting it to be like char kueh teow but it turned out to be soggy and sticky. I didn't like it but it's a signature dish in Taiping.

My favourite - the snow mountain. Have been hearing about it for days and finally getting it seems precious. I grew up eating Ais Batu Kacang (ABC) at a stall near my childhood home. I can still remember the taste in my mouth. Over the years, ABC has advanced to much variety that the traditional style of ABC is hardly to be found. Something is still missing with the ABC in Taiping. I think it must be syrup.

There is also a stall in front of the bazaar which opens at 12 noon selling kuihs. There are a huge variety to choose from and some are not commonly found in KL. I enjoyed it tremendously. Another noteworthy snack we had was sent to us by the newly-wed groom from a nearby coffee shop. There were steamed buns, char siew bau. It was really good with the thin outer layer and juicy stuffing of shredded pork.

Our hunt for good food continued on while we were driving home. About 1.5 hours from Taiping, we stopped by Bidor to have its famous duck noodle. I've stopped by Bidor several times but never eaten the noodle before. I was determined to try it on this trip. Unfortunately, to my disappointment, it was not as delicious as I had expected. I think KL has many places with better ones. The soup is supposed to be a herbal soup but I think it got diluted so much that it tasted funny.

The duck noodle with a whole duck thigh.

My friend had the pork ribs noodle.

Though the Bidor food hunt was disappointing, we went home with bags and bags of local produce. Chicken biscuits is probably my favourite. Can't get enough of it!