JUST TO SHARE (Lau Tai Onn): One Day Trip to Sasaran, Kuala Selangor

The bus that took us for the one-day trip

On Sunday, June 11, 2017, my wife Soh Ai and I joined a day-trip to Sasaran, Kuala Selangor (沙沙兰) in a group of 44 passengers (4 men and 40 women, mostly middle-aged folks and a few senior citizens including me). The tour fare is RM 89 per pax, inclusive of a dinner only. The tour was organized by 顺意旅游. This is the second time that Soh Ai and I joined their organized day trips, the first time being a day-trip to Taiwan City and Yong Peng of Johor in November last year (see: https://taionn.blogspot.my/2016/11/a-day-trip-to-yong-peng-johor-on-nov-6.html).

Sasaran is located about 32 km from Klang and it is a small fishing village situated at the river mouth of Sungai Buloh.

Soh Ai and I left home at 6.00 am to go to Batu 11 Cheras N/V basketball court. According to the itinerary, the tour bus was supposed to depart at 6.30 am. But the bus only left at 7.00 am and proceeded to pick up 3 co-travelers from Sg. Chua, Kajang and another 20 plus co-travelers from Jalan Semenyih. There was another tour bus (driven by the father of our bus driver, 27-year-old Indian boy Thina) carrying another 44 passengers for the group one-day tour.

Our first stop was ELKEN (a direct-selling company) in Subang Jaya where we were treated with coffee and dai pau (the latter sponsored by our tour organizer) as breakfast. A health talk and some introduction of ELKEN’s products were presented. It is believed.that none of us bought any product. We stayed there from 8.15 am till 9.00 am.

Second stop was a visit to the 10th floor Rooftop Garden of Sky Park, One City Mall at Subang Jaya. The glass rooftop was nothing spectacular during day time probably because the view below the glass bridge was very blurred. We also visited the adjacent The Place Garden Shoppe of SK Market to look at the very expensive sea-cucumber and other marine food products.

Sky Park, One City Mall, Subang Jaya

Walking on top of the glass roof

Glass rooftop

Taken from the roof top of Sky Park, One City Mall

The herbs bought from SK Market

At 11.45 am, we arrived at the first place of sight-seeing i.e. Sri Shakti Dhevasthanam Temple at Bukit Rotan, Ijok.

The most eye-catching thing about this Hindu Temple was the fine architecture of delicate and intricate sculptural works. Very impressive! Tourists entering the temple must take off their shoes and socks. No photos are allowed to be taken inside.

An Indian lady well-dressed in saree believed to be associated with the temple took the initiative to talk to me and introduced a few things about this temple, such as: this temple was built by the finest craftsmen from India about 4 years ago, the Goddess Shakti being worshiped here brings luck and the temple in worship of her husband is located in Klang. She explained that the reason for not allowing photos to be taken inside the temple was not to chase away the winds of luck. I was not sure if all said were true but gave away RM10 as donation before leaving.

Sri Shakti Temple

4th stop was Sasaran Nam Yin Tong (沙沙兰南音堂) in worship of the Goddess of Mercy (南海观音佛祖). Two golden dragon sculptures were under renovation and could not be appreciated.

Nam Yin Tong Temple of Guan Yin

As lunch was at our own expense, we were initially told to eat at a food-stall next to Nam Yin Tong temple. But that place was a bit too small and the food limited, we were driven to Restoran Sungai Janggut Seafood (胡须港海鲜饭店) instead. Nine of us ordered 6 dishes of moderate food (without fish or chicken) and the cost was only RM 142 or equally divided to be RM 16 / pax. The food was nonetheless delicious.

Place for lunch at Sungai Janggut

Simple dishes

Very delicious pumpkin pork-rib curry

After lunch at 2.15pm, we went to take a look at the Sasaran jetty where tourists took speed-boat ride to the famous “Sky Mirror”. We didn’t take the boat-ride which would cost about RM90 per pax.

Sasaran jetty

Speed boats

Tour guide Jenny who can sing and talk well

Next we were taken to Kuala Selangor where a few of co-travelers took the tram ride (self-paying at RM 3.20 per pax) to Taman Melawati. As Soh Ai and I had visited there not very long ago, we decided to forgo about the tram ride under the extremely hot weather. Those of us (majority) who didn’t visit Taman Melawati asked the bus-driver to bring us to a nearby Auntie Kopitiam to drink coffee.

At 4.15 pm, we visited another fishing village known as Pasir Penambang at Kuala Selangor where we shopped for seafood. Soh Ai bought a total of RM 84 of dried sotong, dried shrimps and candy. I also bought a packet of keropok udang for RM 8 and 6 pears for RM 10 at the market.

Pasir Penambang fishing village street

Wet market of Pasir Penambang

The dried seafood we bought

We had a very sumptuous seafood dinner at Restoran Sahabat Makan Laut (友谊海鲜饭店) at Bangan Pasir, Tanjung Karang, including: toddy (coconut wine 椰花酒), sweet-and-sour crabs (金香螃蟹), steamed prawns (明虾), steamed fish (清蒸鱼), fried chicken (炸鸡), fried salted-egg sotong (炸苏东), vegetable (清炒青龙菜豆芽), salad taufu (招牌沙律豆腐), claypot shark and vege and taufu soup (瓦煲鲨鱼汤) and ice-cream (雪糕). The food was yummy!