March 27th: Kuantan to Nenasi – 86.62km
Day 165
We woke up refreshed and ready. Surveying the road ahead, we guessed that we would either have a very short or extremely long day. A search for hotels revealed only 2 between us and the next major city, 133 km away. We stopped at the first hotel after 50 km and since it was only 11am and we didn’t fancy wasting such a beautiful day in such an average spot we moved on. Pekan appeared to be more of a way station with a couple of expensive touristy restaurants and not much else. The only “budget hotel” in town was way above our budget so once again, a short day turned into a long one.
Luckily the road was flat, and well paved. Adding to our enthusiasm, this small strip of tarmac was one of the few man-made things cutting through long extents of uninterrupted forest on our right and blue waters on our left. Within the forest were black and brown, burnt and dead trees contrasting with the pure blue sky and the clear waters were rimmed with saffron yellow as the tidal waters gathered the inland soil and carried it out to sea. Gorgeous scenery and a smooth road drew us on, and we cruised at 19 km per hour.
We stopped at around 70km to investigate a sign for a resort and found a couple of abandoned buildings built much too close to the water and some men gathering coconuts in a wheel barrow. There was nothing for rent. We have found a lot of big dreams, with bad plans.
Although the road is right next to the sea, there are very few resorts. The waters are muddy next to the shore and there are no bars since alcohol is banned in much of the region, with punishment of caning if you are Muslim. We suspect that many people have the if I build it they will come philosophy, but the people never materialized. We stopped at another resort and found a few run down bungalows. We were quoted 100 RM and I counter offered with 50 RM, and she accepted.
Cher wanted to keep going but for once I was the voice of reason and we stayed. We had seen very few businesses and although we felt fine now there was no telling how we would feel after another 50 km. Headwinds, hills, or even a lack of water become greater obstacles the more tired you become. We had air-conditioning and although our bathroom door and front door had gaps big enough for birds to fly through and lizards to crawl under we stayed. We made ourselves comfortable. I lit some mosquito coils, sealed the bottom of the front door with some prayer mats, covered the bathroom door with a dirty blanket, got out our sleeping bags and hit the hay. (I wish it was hay, our plastic covered bed really made us sweat and dream of ice-cold sacrilegious beers.)
