Penang Hills and Trails - Bukit Gambir Explorer 7
Searching for an Elegant Solution

This is one of a series of pages on walking the hills of Penang, click here for the index. This is a medium length Grade 3 walk with a significant less straightforward section. 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.

In the early days of colonial South-East Asia it was fashionable to grow Uncara Gambir/Gambir in plantations (look it up!) and not surprisingly there are two Bukit Gambirs in Penang. The better known is between Paya Terubong and Gelugor and I wouldn't be seen dead there, it's been the subject of continuing egregious 'scalping' and development. The lesser known is further south above the Sungai Ara valley and because it's a minor peak and there were no known paths to the summit, I hadn't scaled it until recently, On that occasion, to keep the length of the walk 'sensible' we had left the ridge shortly after we reached the summit and today we would go back and finish the job. As our experience showed, that decision was a wise one because, as we have discovered many times before, following a ridge downwards is much more difficult than going up it. Later we went back, ascended from the south and exited at the west, a route which was anything but straightforward owing to fallen trees.  

Today, the plan was simple, we would climb from the Sungai Ara valley through the durian orchard on the north side which could be seen clearly from around Malihom and which we had seen through the abandoned rubber from above just west of the summit. There was only one problem with this idea, they were not the same orchard!

The hike started at the bikers' shelter accessed from by the Indian temple in Jalan Kenari. The Sungai Ara valley is never less than attractive and as it was the Chinese New Year public holiday there was plenty of 'recreational activity' going on mostly in the rock pools of the stream.

Towards the top, a 'Fig Tree Hill Mark 2' is nearing completion. This one is less claustrophobic but will no doubt also suffer from plagues of insects once the trees around it grow up.

On our last visit to Penang, we drove Mavis Mark 1 up this steep road on the left just afterwards, but this time Yuehong Mark 2 needs the kilometres and we walked up into the surviving rubber. Higher up on the right it's abandoned but it's still a viable route up to the west end of Bukit Gambir if you are patient and careful. We could have followed the concrete road to the left as a short cut but on a sunny day it would have been too exposed.

Instead, we continued up on the original path which gradually got more and more overgrown as we followed a terrace round.

If you are going to build a house in the hills today, then this is the way to do it. Set in its own orchard with a view to the north of the hills around Malihom using modern materials, it's going to be a very nice family weekend retreat, as you can see it's got electricity and double glazing. Even on a relatively still occasion like today there was still a pleasant gentle breeze.

We took a short break and just off the access road, turned right through the bananas and climbed into a recently cleared area which inevitably will see rubber replaced with durians.

It's not yet got its full ground cover and, taking care not to step on the unprotected young fruit trees, we soon reached the top, anticipating a short transition to the ridge.

I suspect there is more clearance to come here because there is still plenty of uncleared and overgrown rubber.

In fact the undergrowth got thicker although there were gaps in it.

Eventually having seen ferns left and right, we found ourselves faced with more ferns ahead. I pondered an elegant solution because such things take forever to clear a way through but Yuehong was having none of that, she just waded in with stick and secateurs  I couldn't begin to guess who might have taught her this but I just stood back and watched in amazement as an hour passed before we stood on the ridge. Bukit Gambir has two peaks, this is the minor one and we needed to go east to reach the major one. 

Along the way, it's all old rubber but the ridge is blocked at one point. It was easy enough to go round the bamboo to the left and at this point we could see the other durian orchard just below us... That would have to wait a while until we had been to the summit which was just a short way up some clear rubber.

Elegant it certainly was not but this was the uninspiring summit and it was time for a refreshment break. We headed back down again as that durian orchard looked to be a more attractive proposition than the overgrown eastern approach.

Now that's a not unattractive sight, the top tree was barely 100 metres away and not only would there be access to it from below, we could see a little used route down to it. Thereafter it was just a question of taking our time and identifying the seasonal path under the light undergrowth.

As the ridge retreated into the background, the path took a turn to the right and followed a contour, it would have been easy to have missed and carried on down for a less pleasant descent. Fortunately, our experience saved us this time.

We soon came to a 'painted tree', in fact it was the orchard boundary and ahead lay the area being 'developed' alongside the new wide track to '541'. We looped left and carried on down until we came to a black plastic wild boar fence which was easy to cross as it was less than 100% intact..

Going down we soon came to a patch of pineapples and as expected we could see a house in front and just below us. It's not lived in but it's not used by migrant labour but by the family who own the orchard. Compared to our ascent from the other house (2 hours|), the descent had taken a more acceptable 40 minutes.

Not surprisingly, there was a CNY joss stick burning and fresh offerings at the altar and nearby shrine. The dogs even had a special large dinner which they had failed to finish, no wonder they were quieter than usual, they must have been sleeping it off. 

The rest was routine with the attractive zig zags in the late afternoon sun and a gentle walk down past 'Fig Tree Hill' where business was almost 'brisk' for a change and so back to Mavis. 

If Yuehong fancies doing a job on a really large fern patch, then I have one in mind which should satisfy her needs. By all accounts, the descent from Bukit Batu Itam to Pantai Mas has one of the most overgrown paths on the island which is crying out for attention.