Penang Hills and Trails - A Course of Leeches
Air Itam to Penang Hill (and back)

This is part of a series of pages on walking the hills of Penang. Click here for the index. This is a Grade 3 walk.  There is a sketch map at the bottom showing the route followed. 

Please visit my Penang buses page for information on accessing the starting point.

We actually again used the path up from Air Itam towards the dam but when we came to the small Tua Kok Peng temple, instead of taking the left road through the shed as we had each time previously, we were to carry on up the steep concrete motorcycle trail. Before we started, we had to buy the snacks for the journey, spoiled for choice would best sum it up.

However, since we are well known here, having passed by some half a dozen times, we were called over to have a slice of Papaya, it had been off the tree just a few minutes. Afterwards we headed upwards, glad for whatever shade the bamboo afforded.

It wasn't that far up, soon we passed a small shrine and then the stone which welcomed us to Tai Shang Lao Jun temple (Lean Fah Tong being an alternative name).

The sound of dogs barking had Yuehong reaching for her witch's broomstick, which was to become her latest walking stick. The actual temple is quite modern with four separate altars.

The first hall contained walking sticks, so we assume this is our old friend Tua Pek Kong. The central hall contained a statue of the gentleman who gives the temple its title and who has it in his power to grant all sorts of favours including eternal life...

The gentleman is also known as 'The Pure One' and the furthest hall had a series of statues of one of his female students, Xuan Nü, a professional ex-virgin willing to tutor in matters sexual, obviously something worth wishing for, but maybe at the risk of being sexist, the 'mature' version on the right perhaps a little less obviously desirable. Yuehong, of course, hardly qualifies to be photographed with the girls, instead this is her with three images of Guan Yin, the Goddess of Mercy. All in all, I suppose those who run the place feel that if you're going to make the effort to get here, then it's only fair to give you four sets of Gods for the price of one.

Yuehong now put the important question to the gentlemen in attendance. "Where was the path onwards and upwards?" Actually there wasn't one as it turned out, so we we had to try plan B, which was to find a link to the road up to Sitavana Vihara which we knew to be just a couple of hundred metres away across the valley. We went back down to the welcoming stone where there were two paths to the left coming up (right coming down). The one upwards apparently went into a 'farm', the other flatter one would 'lead to Air Itam Dam'. That sounded more hopeful, we crossed the stream, just above a large concrete water tank under construction and came to a junction. Left (down) was another 'farm' and we were told to go up to the right. This brought us to yet another concrete trail. Right again led to a 'farm', left led us up to a further main junction which we immediately recognised, so at least we had been saved from an ignominious retreat down the hill. In other words, looking at the picture below, we came from the right and would now climb on the left towards Sitavana Vihara. Further up, we got a much better view of the temple we had just left than on our previous visit which was very hazy.

This time when we came to the three way junction near Sitavana Vihara, we carried on up the left hand fork, but after a sharp bend it soon came to a halt at a small shed. The view out was simply stunning

There were two workers here who were more than happy to engage in conversation with Yuehong and they confirmed that if we followed the small path along the contour we would find a not very well used forest trail up to Penang Hill. Obviously from the locally made rubber roller, this area had been cultivated for some time. Actually, they then realised that they had left one vital element out of the instructions, namely that we should climb up to the right immediately we entered the next vegetable farm and one of them chased us on his motorbike to call us back and show us the right way.

Yuehong would later consider this to be a mixed blessing, but we climbed up and headed into the scrub about half way up. Once we were in the jungle proper, the path was generally pretty good, but of course we had no real idea of how far we had to climb. There were regular small red poles which suggested the path had some kind of official status, which was backed up by a standard 'Bukit Kerajaan Forest Reserve' sign on one large tree.

As always in the jungle, problems arise when trees fall down. One had removed several metres of the path, another had taken out two further trees and because it occurred on a hairpin bend, the lower part was blocked by small branches and the upper part by the main trunks.

On we went and finally we came to a junction covered in metal signs. Frankly, I didn't greatly like the 'dam' part of the Tiger Hill (left), it's well down in the valley, rain gauge 29 could have been on either path from the way it was placed, so the comfortable option (right) looked to be 'Tunnel Road' and 'Summit Road'. What I didn't know (and how could I?) was that there was a posse of leeches waiting for Yuehong. The first two attacked her simultaneously, I was brought back by loud screaming, one was on the outside of her trousers and was quickly dispatched, the one inside took a bit longer. Never mind they were of the small variety and barely an inch long, that was not the point! Then there was the third one and the fourth one and I was being cursed in Chinese and the lady was nearly hysterical. Generally I lead the way to scare off spiders and other nasties but in this case it was just possible that my passing had alerted them and Yuehong had walked into their trap. Actually, I suspect it is the microbes I picked up in Burmese rice mills and which give off an appalling odour from my shirts when I sweat profusely that puts them off attacking me - it works on mosquitoes too but you could never sell it. Never mind, Mr. Rob was blamed for the 'curse of leeches'. I just walked ahead again while she cooled down as she always does when letting off steam.

(Three years or so on in February 2016, we came to this point again from rain gauge 29, all the signs had vanished except for one for 'dam' which would have back down the way we had come up. Fortunately it was in the dry season and the leeches were away on holiday.)

By now the unhappy bunny was making very slow progress and even when we came to a further junction and turned left on to a wider path for Penang Hill (as indicated, right appears to be Moniot Road West), there was still not a glimmer of a smile. For the record, the path emerges on the summit road, two bends (each with a mirror) further along from Southview Bungalow. At least it was sufficiently far along that almost the only day trippers who got this far were those Malaysians who would most have benefited from using their feet instead of the buggies.

It was the first time that Yuehong had been up Penang Hill on a clear day and she was suitably impressed by the views:

We came down the jeep track to '84', if I was polite I would say it 'did the job', but I'm not and it's an abomination. It's extremely badly engineered in terms of gradient and curvature; in this respect it compares very poorly with the private concrete roads which now penetrate other parts of the hill area and even after many years its environmental impact is dreadful in places with banks still covered in ferns and other parts falling away. We left it and went down the path to the Hye Keat estate - it's described in the opposite direction in the Bukit Cendana walk. Grace Dieu (1927) lends some undeserved elegance to the jeep track and lower down we were passed by more than a dozen mountain bikers, fortunately we were clear of the bottom before most of them returned.

Unlike the morning, Penang's traffic was back to its abysmal level and it took quite a while to get home. It had been another long day and Yuehong vanished almost immediately.

If you are doing this walk in reverse, then you should take the Penang Hill summit road south and turn left down the broad track at the second bend beyond Southview Bungalow. It's a bit eroded down to the stream, but thereafter it's a wide track until you come to a three way junction. Turn right across the flat boulder and follow the narrower path round to the left which eventually leads to the tree stump with the metal signs. Follow this path until it emerges from the jungle, and go down the side of the vegetable garden until you come to the contour path. Turn left and soon you will come to the hut at the top of the concrete road from Air Itam which you can follow down without fear of getting lost.