Penang Hills and Trails - The Balik Pulau Explorer 2
Searching for New Routes above the Town

This is one of a series of pages on walking the hills of Penang, click here for the index. This is a Grade 2 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've actually had two walks in the area described below, the first was the actual 'explorer' but we have no pictures from it as we had a total camera failure, which considering the current temperature and humidity was not a complete surprise. We have since spent several days testing the paths on the east side above the Balik Pulau to Air Itam road, the others can be accessed by the index to this area.

There are 4 side ridges running out from the main ridge between Anjung Indah and Bukit Penara, in future I shall refer to them by their numbers. Strictly there are 3 and the first one splits into two. Hence the Nibbinda Ridge is Ridge 1 and so on. Today's walk was in the area between Ridges 2 and 3.

I confess we like this area because it is still almost completely durian and rubber and apart from rotational clearances it is 'green'. The house at the turn off (HT NH 4 88) on the Balik Pulau to Air Itam Road is in my book the classiest one in the valley. The owner knows what he is doing and has left many trees and planted many more young ones. Follow the road left and up, don't take the road with the barrier on the right - that's a joy to come. Go past the two houses climbing what is now a concrete path. The first junction is at a concrete platform, turn left here as the right path leads only to a small hut beyond which an old man told us there is no way out.

The next landmark is this ruined house with a huge old durian tree in front of it, it must have been a lovely place once. Behind is a small Chinese shrine of the kind that are dotted all over the southern hills of the island.

You will now be in a very well maintained durian estate, instead of taking the valley path straight up, turn sharp left up the path below (the picture is taken looking back down). .

The path climbs steadily with some splendid views across the valley and back to Balik Pulau and Pulau Betong beyond. The durian trees are preparing to flower and just beyond this one, the path joins the end point of the concrete road.

Turn right on to a second concrete path and follow it round the side of the hill being sure to keep right as shown. Keep going until you join a concrete road, turning right and following it beyond where it turns into a concrete path to the cross roads shown. Turn right here. (There is more information on the paths on this ridge in our Balik Pulau Explorer 1 report. If you want to continue reading our Balik Pulau Explorer Part 3 report, please note you should turn left up the hill and now click here.) 

The path runs down slightly before turning left (ignore the concrete path on the right in poor condition, we haven't tried it but it will almost certainly also join the main valley path). Very soon you will join the main valley path where you should turn left and continue climbing. At the next junction go straight ahead through the hut and ignore the path on the right which we haven't used yet.

We investigated the left fork at the next junction on our first visit, hence no pictures. It runs more or less along a contour to a house which is served by an electricity supply from Ridge 3. The area beyond with the poles is now overgrown but it can't be far through to the ridge. Continue climbing until yet another junction. For now turn left but you will later return here and take the other path.

Just around the corner is a sandy path off to the left. This is where we had come down on our first visit to the area in November 2012 having come through the overgrown rubber / jungle from Nanshan. Now that's not a route we intend to repeat again, but feel free to read about it! We walked along the path for 5-10 minutes until it finished at the blue plastic barrels. As we had found coming the other way, I could easily walk through the durian estate for about five minutes but beyond it did not look too pleasant. I'm sure the transit to Nanshan is still possible with determination but it was one for another time or more likely another person.

We returned to the main trail and continued up to a point where rubber had recently been planted. It was actually a lot easier than the picture suggests and when we got to the top, we had reached our furthest point for the day. Ahead was Bukit Relau Permanent Forest Reserve, the notice indicates the 69 Ha reserve was established in 1911. For an alternative route to this point which is more challenging, please read Peter van der Lans' posting (sorry http://www.bicycle-adventures.com/nibbinda-ridge-path.html is now a broken link) which also covers the route onwards to the main ridge. Apparently parts of it are in excellent condition, others rather less so. It is probably between 500m and 1km through to the south end of Nanshan, it wasn't for us having read the report!

We returned to the junction mentioned above and turned left along a path which followed the contour. To our right there were excellent views across to the 'Temple with the View' and the house with the Sacred Heart lady can be picked out just to the right of centre. The cleared area poking out above the near trees is just above the valley floor at the point where the 'main road' starts its climb with a zig-zag. We find this kind of sighting extremely helpful in working out the courses followed on our walks and also in suggesting future possible routes. 

The path reaches a small hut over it and effectively ends. However, it leads on to an easily followed rubber terrace and very soon a path comes up from the right below and finishes. Follow this down.

It's a very pleasant zig-zag descent, the rubber trees provide much appreciated shade from the afternoon sun. To the left is probably old rubber (on what is Ridge 2), there was no sign of a viable path at the points of the zig-zag which touched it. The second one especially really looked a possibility, but after a few yards it was clear there was nothing that might interest us.

The path is now some way from the main valley path and soon we were back in the durians. I had previously had a quick look at the path back up to the right but found it a dead end. There was just one more house in the trees and then we were at the final main junction.

This junction is unmistakable with the grove of ginger - there is a small pool in the V perfect for a quick splash to cool down. We had come from the right, if you are coming up the path and turn left then you will very soon come to the junction where we had joined it some two hours earlier. We were running well ahead of time now and took a short rest. Eventually in another 5 minutes we had passed the junction where we had gone up some 3 hours earlier. 

Balik Pulau can be very warm and sticky in the coffee shops so we really weren't in too much of a hurry as we sauntered down. Just after we got to the main road, a motorcyclist stopped and offered us a lift to town. He was clearly a 'hill resident' who recognised us as regular visitors. We never turn these down, that road is a pain at the end of the day, but it did seem that we were about to get an extra half hour in the sauna. However, it tuned out he was off to share a late afternoon beer with a friend of his at a previously unknown (to us) establishment behind the now demolished market - the 'Home Town Food Centre' (I hope I have this right). This is an open air establishment with a high roof in the best Penang tradition which was more to our taste. A very good value Hokkien Mee vanished almost as quickly as Yuehong's concoctions and it was no problem to kill the hour to the bus. I would guess it does very good business in the evenings but even now the beers were flowing, they even put a 60s/70s/80s pop CD on for my benefit.

Yuehong didn't give me a sour look all day which rarely happens. I do prefer a walk that goes from A to B or even back to A which does not involve retracing steps but in this case it was only the initial steep climb that had to be repeated.

We do like this area around Balik Pulau, to be honest the experience is totally reminiscent of my time in Penang in the 1970s which is the biggest compliment I could possibly pay anywhere. Of course I had a car then (all of 354cc under the bonnet) but now we have Rapid Penang's buses which have air conditioning unlike my baby Hondas (PM 9510 and PP 391). In practical terms, its accessibility means we can use just the 101 / 501 buses which eliminates the waiting for the onward 502 / 401 / 403 and maximise our time in the hills.

As such, you will work out that we have spent only a small amount of time outside this area on our 2015 hikes a situation likely to continue until we return to the UK.