Johor 2025 Day 4: Mersing to Kluang (居銮)
- Rick
- May 30
- 7 min read
Updated: Jul 1
Day 3: Kota Tinggi to Mersing (丰盛港)
Friday, 30th May 2025
At around 6am, I was awakened by a motorcycle, with loud engine, passing by the hotel in the dead morning and was unable to get back to sleep. At 7am, some guys were talking in the lobby (sounded like hotel staff changing shift) and one of them drove off on a motorcycle from outside my room’s window — less than 2 metres from my head. Forced to get out of bed, I got ready for breakfast in a town that woke up late. This would be the first and last time I would stayed at this hotel.
I left MG Hotel at 8am, headed in the direction of Mersing Bus Terminal and came to an unnamed snack house, at the intersection between Jalan Terminal and Jalan Jeti, selling traditional pastries — it was called "Mersing 牛车档白粥叉烧角" on Google Maps. Two cars were parked outside the house while their owners waited for the char siew puffs to be ready. They allowed me to jump the queue, and I bought a vegetable puff and, then, a char siew puff that was just off the stove at that moment. Both puffs were shaped like curry puff with soft puffy skins, which tasted very much like the savoury hiam chee peng (咸煎饼). I had never seen such puffs in other places before.
The vegetable puff had a filling made with fresh crunchy turnips and other veggies with curry flavours. The char siew puff had saucy minced char siew in similar puffy skin. Both were nice and delicious, no wonder locals were willing to wait for them.
I munched on the unique puffs, which were not a lot, as I walked towards town where I intended to have breakfast with a cup of hot kopi-O. I came to the motorcycle bridge again, checked it out and used it to cross the busy road, earning a scoff from a motorcyclist who came up the bridge from the other end. What could I do? There was not a single pedestrian crossing along the trunk road — probably in the whole town too.
I arrived at Sri Mersing Cafe but it was not opened yet. There was a small lane called Laman Samudera with street arts, which I had noticed the day before. Since the cafe would open at 8:30am, I had about 15 minutes to wait so I checked out the murals. Several art pieces were painted in 2018 and were still pretty much intact. It was a short lane that lasted just 5 minutes for me.
Before Sri Mersing Cafe (丽丰西果饮冰室) opened its folding door, there were several groups of people waiting outside. The moment the door was opened, all the tables were taken up in a flash. I shared table with a family of 4. Normally, I would try to come back about an hour later as such situation would always result in longer time to take orders and serving of food. But since I was already seated, I waited patiently for my turn.
Except for hot stuffs, most of the items such as cakes, buns, nasi lemak, fried bee hoon, etc, were self-service. The nasi lemak was very popular and almost every tables had it. I preferred not to have spicy food in the morning and took a packet of fried bee hoon instead. The chilli that accompanied the bee hoon was spicy too. 15 minutes later, I placed my order for kopi-O kosong, a set of 2 soft-boil eggs and butter-kaya toasts (roti bakar) with the lady taking orders. Waited. After finishing the meal, I asked to be billed. Waited again. I had lots of time since I had nothing to do until check-out time.
Before embarking on this trip, I thought I was beating Singapore’s 1-month school holiday, starting on 31 May, by starting a week earlier, but I did not know that Malaysia’s 2-week school holiday started on 29th May. Most Malaysians would choose this period to travel, overcrowding popular spots like Sri Mersing Cafe. I would bear in mind that, unlike other non-tourist towns, Mersing could be considered a tourist town since it was the primary gateway to Pulau Tioman and best to be visited outside peak travel periods.
On the way to the hotel, I walked past the little snack house again. It had sold out all its goodies and was closing up — at 9:25am. It was a small business but seemed good. A slow life indeed.
Back at the hotel, I saw that most of the rooms were already emptied yet it was supposed to be full-house on Friday. I had expected it. I got ready to check out. Except for lunch, I had no other plans until the journey to Kluang at 1:15pm. I stayed in the room until 11am and left the hotel with my backpack.
I came to Kedai Makan Cincai Jiak 随便吃小食馆, which was just about 100 metres from the hotel. Cincai Jiak was a new coffee shop with few food stalls. I had roasted duck rice which was served with quite a lot of tender duck breast meat in nice herbal sauce. The rice was flavoured with chicken stock with nice aroma and flavour.
After lunch, I went straight to Mersing Bus Terminal. While waiting for the bus, I went to the washroom, which cost RM1. I ran out of smaller notes, took out a RM50 and the girl behind the counter shook her head. Fortunately, they had a Touch n’ Go QR code and I paid the small fee through my TnG eWallet. It seemed like TnG still had its uses but I had seen washrooms with TnG QR in Mersing so far.
1pm, the S&S International express bus opened its door for boarding and departed at exactly 1:15pm for Kluang and then Malacca. Leaving the newly-explored towns of Kota Tinggi and Mersing, I was travelling to the much-familiar towns of central Johor — hopefully not too boring as expected from frequently visited places. It would be a 2-hour ride and I tried to catch up on sleep.
2:50pm, the bus pulled up at Kluang Bus Terminal, taking just 1.5 hours, and a swapping of passengers took place. With my backpack, I alighted and walked to Be Boutique Hotel, which was just 10 minutes away.
I got one of the cleanest and well-maintained room I had ever stayed in. As for quietness, I had to wait till night time to know if it would be really quiet as the hotel was fully booked this day. I rested in the room for 30 minutes before hitting the streets.
Not far away, I came to Laman Kreatif and briefly checked out the murals along the official art lane of Kluang. Then, I stepped into Old Alley (老胡同) to have dessert in an air-conditioned environment. I ordered a Four Season Bowl and swapped the soya pudding with a matcha-flavoured one. Thus, the dessert had stronger matcha flavours.
After the dessert, I walked through the art lane again to Kluang Fire & Rescue Station. The sky, with dark clouds gathering, rumbled as I took a stroll to Kluang Railway Station.
Things had changed. The last time I was in Kluang, construction of the new Kluang (Railway) Station had completed but the station was not operational yet. This time, the new station had began operations and the Old Kluang Station, designated as a historical building, was a new tourist attraction. Admission was free and I briefly checked out the small rustic station. The good thing was that Kluang Rail Coffee, the oldest railway kopitiam in Malaysia, was still operating in the station.
Leaving the old railway station, I decided to check out the new Kluang Station too. The sky was rumbling louder but I ignored it — if it were to rain, I would take shelter in the station. The new elevated train station — started operations on 3rd December 2024 — was much bigger than the older one but, for the public and me, the few points of interest were the ticketing counter, the arrival / departure gate and washrooms. There was also a walkway to the old station but they were not linked yet and a steel fence separated the two stations.
Leaving the new train station, I chanced the rain and walked hurriedly to see a church at the far end of the train station. It was called St. Louis Church, built in 1928. I would not have noticed the rustic church if I did not take a walk to the new station.
The sky rumbled again, fiercely this time, and small droplets of water started falling from the sky. I doubled back with quick steps to a nearby building in a residential estate. I had reached shelter in the void deck of a flat — safe. The bulk of the rain finally came 10 minutes later. Out of 10 times I came to Kluang, 7 times it rained in the late afternoon — but super-hot around noon.
I was standing under the same building as Jin Tarorice, a restaurant that specialised in pork soups with dried-oyster-flavoured taro rice. I had dined at the restaurant twice on my last trip to Kluang. I walked into the restaurant to have dinner and to wait out the rain at the same time. On recommendation by the lady boss, I tried their Ginger Wine Mee Sua (姜酒面线) and a cold tofu with minced meat side dish. The taste of the Ginger Wine Mee Sua reminded me of Matsu’s Old Wine Mee Sua. I love both of them.
After dinner, it was still drizzling, I went to Kluang Parade (shopping mall) and window-shopped for about half an hour. Before going back to the hotel, I dropped by a 7-Eleven, bought another Touch n’ Go Reload PIN, using a RM100 note, to top up my TnG eWallet, which was nearly depleted. I found it easier to make small payments using the eWallet than to handle the larger note and coins.
Later in my hotel room, I heard all sort of noises through the wooden-partitioned walls. Never discuss sensitive matters in a hotel room as walls had ears — and my ears were very sensitive. Sound-proofing had always been a major defect of hotels, regardless of sizes and classes. Hotel-booking platforms always asked guests to rate the location, amenities, cleanliness, staff friendliness, etc, of accommodations but never had a category called "noise-proof" — they knew it would get super-low score. Yet noise was my utmost concern when staying at a hotel.
Day 5: Around Kluang (居銮)
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