Port Weld (Kuala Sepatang) Seafood Lunch and Charcoal Factory

Benny had been promising a road-trip to Kuala Sepatang. He insisted that the prices and freshness of the food there was unparalleled by anything available in Penang.

After sampling it, I dare say Kuala Sepatang trumped pretty much all of Malaysia and Singapore in quality and price performance...

There was a boat dock receiving arriving fishing boats that offloaded the catch directly into the warehouse below. Some of it was retained by the kitchen, but most of it was wholesaled.

Therefore, the seafood was superlatively fresh and inexpensive.

Fried mantis shrimp in 5spice.

There were these tiny seacrabs deepfried until crispy like potato chips. He kept stating that he does not see them there every time. True. They did not have any on our return outing with dad

Deep fried tiny shrimp

Glorious teochew style steamed red snapper.

Ian claimed a fish platter to himself towards the end of the meal to pick off each bone meticulously. He made me and KongKong proud!

Food coma...

Peering down at the catch brought in by each boat that docked.

Not a looker, but it's all about the food!

Negotiating the price of sundried shrimp.

We took a stroll around the town area and noticed a lot of mopeds going by with umbrellas open for shade.

Houses on stilts at the waterfront.

Covered walkway to cross the river.

On the way back to the car, the mopeds tore through like there was no tomorrow.

Playing atop a large diesel storage tank.

"What?!! What did you DO to the car?!!"

Our next stop was a venerable charcoal factory.

This man was passionate about charcoal... really passionate.

He invited us to pick up the very dense mangrove stock.

And showed us how it is fired for 2 months before cooling for a month.

These logs were MUCH heavier.

And this man single-handedly loads each kiln manually using a strap on his hip to share the load on his body.

He stacks the logs against the wall propped on a single rock to ensure hot air flows all around it.

Finally, we made our way to the Sparkletts Water bottling facility.

And saw these curious animal crossing signs.

Sadly, we were turned away when we arrived--appointments required. Yet, they refused to schedule a visit when we called them for a future visit...

So we went to the coffee roasting factory as an alternative.

Very cool to see the original equipment still being used in a venerable process.

We certainly enjoyed tasting the free coffee samples.

And looking at their museum.

Quite a lovely antique screen door!

We finished our long day with dinner at Crab Claypot Rice. It was almost seafood overkill but so good.

Battered and fried calamari rings, stirfried vegetables and tofu in saltfish accompanied our meal.

We completed our run back home running on the 21km long second link bridge to Penang, struggling to stay awake after a long day sightseeing and with full bellies.

~ Shien