Penang Hills and Trails
The Exorcist

This is one of a series of pages on walking the hills of Penang, click here for the index. This is a Grade 3 walk.

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

Below you can read of my unpleasant encounter with stinging insects. I believe that the wasps may actually have been hornets. In late 2023 a lady hiker on Bukit Gambir was similarly attacked, suffered a Pulmonary Odema and sadly passed away. Take care!

I have always thought that making the same mistake more than once is an early indication of madness. During our first visit to Penang in 2022, I guided friend Rexy to the top of Bukit Pulau Betong and down to the ridge to its west between Gertak Sanggul and Pulau Betong. The descent on the south side to the famous 'Golf Course' was a total disaster. Despite my having done this several times over the years, we strayed off course and ended up being attacked successively by swarms of both wasps and bees. It was an extremely unpleasant experience, Yuehong spent an hour or more removing the stings from my body. 

I then did a 'proof of concept' ascent from the Gertak Sanggul side but two further attempted descents first brought me to where Rexy and I emerged some way east of the required point and then on a day when I started to question my sanity ended up far to the west. At least there were no insect attacks. At this point, Yuehong offered to help me chart the ascent properly (so we could hopefully finally nail the descent) and this we achieved without any problems. This is the story of the consequent further attempt at the descent as I needed to confront my 'devils'.

Finally, I had realised that the issue was that the paths along the ridge and down on the south face which I used to follow through what is long abandoned rubber have become indistinct after the north face had been cleared of rubber and replanted with durians etc. 

Click on the thumbnail for a larger version of the picture and click on that to return here.

We started from the temple off the main road into Pulau Betong and took what is now a concrete road past a well intentioned sign erected by a local politician.

Like many farmers, those here have diversified their plantings and at the moment jackfruit are being harvested. There is now an alternative route up the first section and we turned left along the new road. This is definitely not 'public' and should not be used by large groups or during the durian season.

Just after the first hut, we crossed into another orchard whose concrete path terminates on the other side of the bananas. This is an interesting climb with what is the best 'viaduct' I have ever seen in an orchard here.

We rejoined the traditional path and turned left at the junction at the top of the climb. Apart from those very few looking to climb Bukit Pulau Betong, most walkers turn right here. Shortly after, there is a splendid view across the Balik Pulau plains.

We passed a small Da Ba Gong shrine, while nearby a migrant worker was 'phoning home' or more likely accessing his social media. The main concrete path is quite distinct as it climbs and winds up the hill.

The beautiful blue colour of the sea is in marked contrast to that at Batu Ferringhi which we had passed on our way to Pulau Betong. When we first hiked here a few years ago, the concrete ended at this house which is now definitely on the 'endangered list', it's also full of agrochemicals. 

On the left here is a rubber roller with a Tiger motif which Yuehong says was made by the 'Quang Tek Company' in Jelutong (Road?) in Penang itself. Nearby is its other half with the 'Eagle Brand' plain roller behind

By turning left at the start of the recent planting. we joined what had once been the main path to the ridge (through the then rubber). Since most of the traffic is now motorcycle borne, it tends to use the new alignment which follows a huge U bend to the right.

The old path soon fades out, but just above to the left is the current main path which we rejoined. The 'scratch' on the picture is some string used to support a young durian tree.

There is just one further junction where we turned left, ahead soon finished without climbing further. At this point there is an excellent view along the coast to the National Park in the north-west of the island.

To the right is a view out to sea beyond another part of the orchard where a second concrete path is being installed. The most critical point of the first part of the hike is where there is a grey water barrel on a former rubber terrace. Behind it is some residual rubber which looks unattractive but is, in fact, where we needed to go, something that had become apparent when we reached it on the second successful attempt from the south. 

There is a water pipe here and we followed it into another world. A few terraces of rubber have been left which I guess is to offer a degree of protection to the ridge which so it can still act as a water store.

It's a definite 'waste not' situation, for the time being the trees are still being tapped. We continued to follow the pipe when it crossed to the outermost row of rubber trees. 

This was to be our last view for some while, the developing new path may eventually offer a more direct route up.

Where this row finished, we knew to turn left into the heart of the old rubber. After about 50 metres, we met what had once been a tapper's path running west down from the main ridge.  

We dropped down a metre or so and found this marker which we had left here earlier in the week. Who needs plastic? The picture on the right is looking downwards, but this was not the direction we wanted today.

This new terrace had been snipped by us on our ascent from the south but is still not very clear. As it starts to curve to the left there is a very large boulder on the right covered with young trees - it is barely visible in my picture. A few metres on we came to the day's second critical point. We had climbed to this tree with a fork and a plant with leaves with a serrated edge beside it. We knew we had to turn right here. 

Intuitive it was not but this steep slope had brought us up to this point and we hoped it would now take us down. Roughly speaking it seemed to be where what was a long inclined plain started to curve around the western 'nose' of the ridge. There is no visible path or track here, maybe a better GPS system than we had would have coped better. 

Our problem was that several points on the direct route had trees down from the great storm of 2017. This meant we had to skirt them to the left and we then had to guess how far back right we should go before continuing down. Coming up we had had no such problem as any route we chose would have tended to 'correct' itself.  Suffice to say that after a spell when we made unhindered progress we eventually came out above what I recognised as the abandoned road that runs east from the point where our descent was supposed to end. Rather than clamber down we turned right, walked about 50 metres and then ahead we could see the mini ridge we should have been on.

In other words, while we had not achieved perfection, it had been a very near miss, by some way the best of my four attempts! 

At this point our intended route could be construed as a path. Basically where we emerged at a more or less flat area was due south of where we had started the descent and we now continued in that direction until we could see an area of ferns on our right. There is an easy route through them but at this time of year (just after the end of the rainy season) it's not very clear. It's a lot easier to pass through than the picture suggests. 

We soon came into the open area which definitely would be a candidate for Penang's top ten environmental disasters though not on the scale of the 'reclamation' which has destroyed the ambience of Gurney Drive in George Town. It was a warm day and we rocketed across the 'moonscape'.

We would exit in the far corner, just where would not be immediately apparent to a first timer, but which would reveal itself to anyone looking carefully. Yuehong just waded in, we had done a partial clearance on our earlier visit.

This was another intended road, it was horribly blocked by prickly vines when we first came here in February 2018 and we had invested quite some time in 'restoring' it. We have been back quite often since and now it is in fair condition and had needed very little work doing on it when we recently revisited after a gap of more than 2 years. We only cleared a fairly short section as it soon reaches a durian orchard on the right. 

Stepping out into it requires some care, but dropping down slightly it's easy to find the path which will lead out.

The path I am standing on leads to the 'famous' coastal path behind me, ahead to the right is where we came from and left leads through the orchard to this large 'Da Ba Gong' shrine where the path finishes. It's a quiet and shady spot, just perfect for enjoying some Malaysian 'amber liquid'. 

Yuehong is much more resilient now, remarkably her knee has at least temporarily stopped complaining although we are not hiking at anything like full speed. After our break we needed to cross the steam.

Elegant it was not, but the boots remained dry and we skirted the bamboo and climbed a short distance up keeping slightly left. Soon a very small and shallow valley appeared on the right. We crossed and went up a few (rubber) terraces before making our way to the right just above it. It's a little tricky but overall this represents a massive short cut compared to going south and then north on proper paths.

Some 5 minutes later, we were out and into one of Penang's few remaining well maintained rubber (mini) plantations. Apart from when we had done this walk in the opposite direction, I had last been here on one of my failed attempts at today's descent. I had known about this transit from a 'group hike' back in 2017.but the ease with which I had found my way out contrasted with my experience then.

Effectively that was the end of today's adventure, we walked down to the famous path and Yuehong was reveling in her new found fitness.

It's a sure sign that the dry season has become established when durian trees start to get ready to flower but we shall be long gone when the farmers collect this year's crop in a few months' time.

I'm still not sure whether today's hike qualified as slaying this particular dragon, but we are now into the last month of our 2022/23 Penang season and ought be looking for other challenges. Certainly we would like to include it in next season's list because it is a marvellous hike with some splendid views and just enough difficulty to keep us 'honest'.