Tuesday, February 21, 2023
8:44 a.m. Room 607 Nan Yeang Hotel
Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
This is it, my last day in Kuala Lumpur. My flight to Pekanbaru is at 4:40 this afternoon. With the time change, I actually go back in time and land at 4:35. As far as I’m aware, the plan remains the same. My friend Adi will be meeting me at the airport, and I’ll be spending the night at his place. And tomorrow, we’ll be going on an epic road trip from Pekanbaru to Bukittinggi. Adi is going all the way to Padang, but he’ll be dropping me off in Bukittinggi, where I will be reunited with my bicycle at his house in the village.
Yesterday was quite laid back. My original plan was to spend the whole day editing videos. However, while I was watching the recent videos from Itchy Boots, I started thinking about different ways of mounting cameras on a motorcycle or bicycle. And I remembered that I had some ideas about that, and I wanted to investigate some GoPro accessories while I was here in KL. And I had completely forgotten about it.
In particular, since I have gone back to using a GoPro quite a bit rather than the Insta360 X3, I started wondering about how to mount two GoPros at the same time – one pointing forward and one pointing backward. That’s what I used to do in Thailand when I was riding a scooter. I hadn’t come up with any way to do that on the bicycle because the X3 was going to do that for me automatically. But the lower video and audio quality of the X3 and the time required for reframing has pushed me toward using the GoPro more and more. And it isn’t easy to mount cameras on a bicycle. I had to come up with some kind of imaginative solution.
And during the night, I had this idea about how I could mount a second GoPro on the underside of the wooden stick I’m using. I could leave the GoPro at the top of the stick as usual. That GoPro is mounted using the RAM mount. It is raised up nice and high, and it works quite well when pointing back at me. I couldn’t think of any easy way of putting two GoPros up there at the top. Even if I could, it would likely be too heavy. And then I realized that I could put a GoPro midway down the stick and have it pointing forward. Pointing forward from there, it would not have the stick and the first GoPro in the frame the entire time. It would have a clear shot of the road ahead.
With that idea, I started to think about ways to mount that second GoPro, and I wondered if I could use a GoPro handlebar mount. That idea seemed worth exploring, and I decided to go shopping for one. Jamie had asked me if I wanted to get lunch at his favorite economy mixed rice place in Pudu earlier. I had originally said no because I wanted to edit videos all day. But YL Camera is located in Pudu, and I thought I could combine a shopping trip there with lunch with Jamie. And that’s what I ended up doing. Jamie was moving from his current capsule hotel to a hostel here in Chinatown. It was too early for him to move right into the hostel, so he dropped his bags off in my room at the Nan Yeang, and then the two of us walked to Pudu. Not surprisingly, YL Camera didn’t have the GoPro handlebar mount in stock. Jamie and I had lunch. And then we walked to Berjaya Times Square so that I could go to Altech Camera. They didn’t have that GoPro mount either. Finally, I went to YL Camera at Low Yat Plaza. They didn’t have this GoPro mount. However, the clerk there was very helpful and she checked their database, and she told me that the PJ branch of YL Camera had one in stock. Unfortunately, that camera store is far away. And I wasn’t in the mood to go on a 3-hour round trip there to get this mount. I ended up compromising, because another camera store at Low Yat had a different version of this mount. They didn’t have the handlebar mount, but they had the one that goes around larger tubes. I ended up buying one of those. It’s hard to say if it will be useful, but I assume it will fit naturally around the bike frame tubes and the trailer bar. I already have one GoPro handlebar mount, and I currently have it on the bike frame. It holds the base of the stick in place. And I might be able to put this larger mount there and move the handlebar mount to the stick. I have a feeling I won’t be able to do that. The water bottle cage is going to get in the way. But I might end up being able to work something out.
And that was kind of my whole day. I worked on some videos in the afternoon. I did some packing and planning for my upcoming return to Sumatra. And I went to bed very early. I’ve struggled lately with getting enough restful sleep, and I want to be fresh and energetic for my flight today. I went to bed early, and I forced myself to stay in bed as long as possible. I managed to get some sleep until 7:55 this morning. I still didn’t feel great. I still feel tired. My eyes feel sore and tired. I’m just not sleeping well. But I still feel rested enough that I think I can handle this trip.