Gopeng - There is still fun beyond ipoh
Gopeng - A humble town with hidden wonders
Gopeng Town is not new to every Malaysian. While heading to ipoh, you will pass through Tg Malim - Slim River - Tapah - Bidor and lastly Gopeng before entering to Ipoh.
As Gopeng is the closest town to ipoh, many of us will unrealiazingly pass over it and straight to ipoh due to ipoh city seems having more bold and outshine attractions. However, Gopeng Town is having the charm that you'll tend to fall in love to it, expecially the most authentic and humble look of the old town & taste, the virginity and unpolluted forest, everything seems so friendly and welcoming.
Do stop over in this wonderful small town and discover their beautiful and lovely sights.
1. HOGA Gaharu Tea Valley
This is a Gaharu plantation open for visitation. Other than exhibiting the Gaharu plantation processes, tourist is allowed to hike up to the hill to overseeing the Gaharu trees and its surroundings. There are 3 key attractions include
- Lovers trees Garden
- Watch Tower
- Tree painting
Unfortunately, during RMCO, tourist is only allowed to reach the Lovers Tree Garden due to the shutter service is not available during this time. It's a very relaxing and informative place to gain some knowledge on this rare Agarwood. Let the soothing scent welcome you to its territory.
Venue :
GAHARU TEA VALLEY GOPENG
(Open daily : 09:00 - 18.00, GMT+8)
Address : Lot 9840, Mukim Teja, 31600 Gopeng, Perak.
(GPS: 4.458523, 101.192998)
Entrance :
RM 10 per pax including shutter service to the hilltop and all 3 destinations.
During MCO
RM 5 - Shutter Service is not available. Via walking and only till lovers tree. The rest 2 destinations are temporarily closed.
2. Museum Gopeng
It's a very decent and small museum showing all the collection of antiques. This museum premise is contributed by EU Yan Sang and converted froma stable. It also exhibits the history of EU Yan Sang establishment. Worth to pay a visit if you're here. Entrance is FOC.
The most eye catching is the lantern handcrafted by the locals. Once winning a lot awards nationwide.
3. Museum Heritage House
This is another museum run by the private entity. Entrance fees is needed. This museum is operated in a heritage house. Besides all the antiques display, one would have the chance to sight the unique architecture of this heritage house used to be owned by a tycoon in the past.
It's a very informative museum house, all the tools and equipment for mining industries are displayed to let us reminisce some of the previous memories in past.
Address:
Gopeng Heritage House: 6, Jalan Sungai Itek, 31600 Gopeng, Perak.
Open on weekends from 9am to 3pm.
Phone:+60 12-598 7857/ 016-542 1287 ( Mr. Phang)
Admission : Free but Donation is required.
4. Tanjung Tualang Tin Dredge
This is an abandoned tin mining platform which has been converted to a tourist spot now. The entire place has been remained with its original texture and all the tin mining machines & equipment are still fitted within the platform. We can now have a chance to tour around the real dredging platform and gain an overview of how this giant machines used to operate for harvesting the tin mineral in those days. Its a very massive and uneasy process.
Open everyday except Monday
Opening Hours : 9am to 6pm, lunch break 1pm - 2.30pm.
Guided Tin Dredge Tours start at 10am, 11am, 12 noon, 2.30pm, 3.30pm and 4.30pm.
Entrance Fees:
International Visitors
- Adult: RM 20
- Child (ages 8-12): RM 10
- Seniors (65+): RM 20
- Children 7 and below are free.
MyKad Rate
- Adult: RM 10
- Child (ages 8-12): RM 5
- Seniors (65+): RM 5
- Children 7 and below are free.
Address: 9th KM, Jalan Tanjung Tualang, 31000 Batu Gajah, Perak, Malaysia
Enquiries: +6014 9043 255
5. Heritage Cafe Gopeng (雅聚轩）
This cafe is using modern classic theme and serving some localised food menu. The cafe is designed using some vintage decorative items and mimic the old timer traditional Chinese Tycoon houses. The recommended foods are as below :
1. Pineapple fried Friced- with super prawns and generous amount of seafood toppings.
2. Paku Vege (Wild Fern) Squid Rojak - Must try! Unbelievably awesome. The rojak surface is fully covered by sesame, every bite is full of satisfaction with the scent of sesame and the aromatic home made rojak sauce.
This cafe is separated into 2 sessions. One is within the old cafe house and another is open concept. But both are just opposite to each other. The open sided is only operating during night time. This open area is elaborately decorated alike a small Shanghai Town. Using all the old architecture building concept and archaic furnitures and displays as their key themes. Super cool and it will certainly feast the foodies' craves and photographers' desiration.
Indoor
Outdoor
Address : 104, Jalan Tasik, Pekan Gopeng.
(Close by Gopeng Museum)
Indoor
Opening Hours :
Sunday to Monday. Closed on Tuesday
Time : 11am - 5pm
Outdoor
Opening hours : Daily
Time : 5pm - 11pm
***The squid paku vege stall : Closed on Monday.
6. Kellie's Castle
This is an old castle left over by a Scottish Planter named William Kellie-Smith. Built in 1915. But it's an unfinished and ruined castle. The castle was supposedly built as a gift to William's wife and son. However, his departure in a pneumonia desease in Lisbon had devastated the wife and they'd eventually given up this castle and moved back to scotland.
The interior of this castle is unbelievably splendid and sophisticated. The structure of the building is strong due to it's built in full brick. There are a lot of secret tunnel within the castle as an emergency escape exit. It proves how detail and strategic William is in characteristic. It worth to pay a visit if you're here. Heard that the castle is haunting too!
Waze : Kellie's Castle
Kellie's castle is open daily from 9am to 6pm.
Admission Charges:
Foreigners RM 10 adult and RM 9 for kids.
Malaysians RM 5 adult and RM3 for children.
7. Paip Besar Gopeng
Do stop over this landmark in Gopeng (Giant Pipe) to snap a memorable picture. This giant pipe has been kept with a small portion as a remembrance of the mining business in good old days. It has been initiated by government to display it as a banner for a landmark in Gopeng.
8. Grape Farm Gopeng
Grape plantation is not common in Asia country. So when given a chance to walk into the grape yard and see bunches of grapes hanging above you, it's truly exciting. Came across this grape yard farm near to Sementra Resort. Through the arrangement by the resort, we manage to visit this grape farm and witness the grapes planting and nursery process.
There are other plantations within the farm too including vegetable, raspberries, and a small petting zoo. Hold on to your itchy hands although the grapes look attractively to be picked.
Address : 1 km from Sementra Resort
Entrance : temporary is FOC
Tel : 019-5562329 (Mr. Chong) / 012-5755364 ( Mr. Leong)
Foods
One of the best and common foods in Gopeng is *Lai Fun*. It's a kind of noodles commonly seen in Gopeng & Ipoh. This noodles is very smooth and slippery, soft and pearly white in colour. Most of the hawkers are skillful on making this noodles at their own. Without having *Lai Fun*, one is said never visit Gopeng Town.
Few places below where you can have your best Lai Fun.
9. Breakfast at Gopeng Pasar Besar Awam
One of the ideal breakfast place in Gopeng. More than 30 over stalls at one roof. Price is super reasonable too. Foods sharing is always the best practice as you would be able to taste variety of different foods. Personally, I like their Hakka Noodles, Hong Kong Chee Cheong Fun and of course the custom made coffee with toast. See my recommendations below.
Address : Opposite Pasar Besar Awam Gopeng
Opening hours : 6am - 1pm
Highlights : HK chee Cheong fun (RM 3.50), Hakka Noodles (RM 5.00)
10. Gopeng Pusat Penjaja Lawan Kuda
This is another recommended stall you could try out the best Lai Fun. It's operated in a small stall within a food court in Gopeng. The name of this Lai fun stall called *Shan Lun Che* means trishaw. The lady owner is very friendly and she patiently introduce all the best foods sold at her stall. Foods is superb especially the tofu and Lai Fun Noodles.
Address : Pusat Penjaja Awam Lawan Kuda, Teja Gopeng
Opening Hours : 6am - 2pm
Higghlights : San Lun Che (Trishaw) rice noodles (Lai Fun)
11. Kopi San Village
Kopi San is a small village in Gopeng. Usually the market Street is busy in the morning. There are few best coffee shops in this village operating from early morning until noon. Do catch up a nice breakfast here to start up your beautiful day.
11.1 Da Ming Gopeng restaurant
There are several coffee shop serving Lai Fun. We'd randomly chosen one which was shown below. The coffee shop is situated at the end of the market street. It attracted us due to variety of assorted fried ingredients pletifully displayed on a tray. So tempting.
Address : Same Row with Kheng Bee Kopitiam. Along Jalan Kopisan Baru. Locate the banner as shown in the picture : Perniagaan Da Ming.
Opening hours : 6am - 1pm
11. 2 Kheng Bee Hainanese Kopitiam
Another local kopitiam in Kopisan village which is well known with its localised breakfast. A toast, a pack of banana leave nasi lemak + a cup of in house signature white coffee, nothing is better than this combination.
📧: chopkhengbee@gmail.com
☎️: 05-3591530
⏰: Monday to Saturday : 7am till 4pm Sunday : 7am till 2pm
11.3 Wall Mural
This small and peaceful village is full of neighbourhood delights. Villagers are giving their best efforts to keep their village clean and tidy. Wall mural is one of the initiative taken to beautify the entire village wall. Every piece of master art showing how dedicated the people are in this village.
Location -: once turning into the kopisan, you can see the all the wall murals lining up at the T junction.
Accomodation
12. Sementra resort
We discovered this resort during the same day we visited Gopeng. This resort is situated very remotely on a hillside and surrounded by forestry environment. It's a new resort opening only on Jan 2020. Hence not many people know about its presence yet.
The pathway to the resort is uneasy. You need to drive through a very narrow zig zag cliff Road before reaching the resort. Most challenging is the narrow road has to accomodate 2 ways traffic. It's approximately 8km from Gaharu Tea Valley. Generally, it's located along the same road where Adeline resort is located. About 3 km further in from Adeline resort. S
Sementra Resort emphasises on Natural Stay. It comes with several type of villas accommodating different group capacity. All the villas are built along the lake and the balcony in every room is extended further out to the lake to enable a floating concept. The view from the balcony is very awesome. It seems combining the lake and the forest in one contrast oil painting.
Besides, a very special species of butterfly called Raja Brook can be largely seen in this resort. That's also one of the reason that the resort logo is created after this butterfly existence.
Sementra Nature Resort
Website :
https://www.sementra.my/
Cost :
RM 388.00 for 2 pax deluxe room inclusive 1 breakfast and 1 dinner for 2 pax.
13. Adeline Villa & Rest House
Another option of the best stay. Adeline's resort is situated in the same area as Sementra. You will pass by Adeline's before Sementra.
Adeline's resort has been operating quite some years ago. The uniqueness is its resort location. Its built in the core of a hillside and all the lodge is facing full forest view. Air is super fresh and the seafood buffet dinner is very awesome too.
All the wooden lodges come with diffrent theme and design. No concrete wall yet it's erected with finest architecture.
Address : Adeline Villa & Rest House
Tel : 05-3592833 ( office)
Mobile : 010-366 7113 / 0195561113
Villa 2D1N
RM 220 per pax multiple sharing
PAPAN (PUSING)
Papan is a very small village and not much development in this town. That's why it still reserves all the old building and some shadows of the colonial era.
Surrounded by all the mother nature, Papan is having a lot of natural reserves which allows the city boys or girls to come for a retreat.
Before reaching the Tmn Herba, you will pass through some old building as shown below :-
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1. Taman Herba
Further down from Gopeng town via the inner road, before reaching ipoh, there is a very small and low profile village called Papan (PUSING). We knew about this town through the introduction from a local restaurant owner beside the Tmn Herba Gopeng. As Tmn Herba Gopeng has been closed down permanently, she recommended us to try another Tmn Herba in Papan.
It's very hard to locate this Tmn Herba Park. It's situated very remotely inside a Jungle place. Not known by many and surrounded by a virgin forest. You've to drive through a very narrow jungle road before reaching this Tmn Herba. There is a fall cascading all the way from this tmn herba. So you may shower at the fall after visiting the park. Super rejuvenating!
Our arrival coincided to the voluntary campaign of a group of staff. A staff named Encik Fauzi and his colleague patiently explained all kind of herbs and trees to ua. Very educational tour.
Address : Taman Herba Papan. When you reach papan town, after passing through the BHP petrol station on your right, then will come across a row of shop lot on left. Then you will notice a small blue colour signboard indicating PAPAN. Turn into the left and drive till the dead end. The inner road journey takes about 5km.
2. Pastry at Papan
Coming to Papan mustn't miss this trishaw pastry. It was highly recommended by a local chap wehn we were asking for the direction to the Tmn Herba Papan. There are few mobile stalls beside the road. Variety of pastries attracted us with their colourful and elaborative texture. Super toothsome.
Location : in the centre Of Pusing Town. This uncle has been selling the Chinese pastries for decades. Do locate his stall at the picture shown above.
When arriving the T junction in Pusing Town, turn to left and you will see his stall.
Tel :
012-5247933 (Michael)
Start you cuti-cuti Malaysia today.
When is the right time to travel? What's your time now? That's the right time to do it.
Check out my blog below for other cuti-cuti Malaysia destinations at road to local delights
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